The Southwest Wind (The Captain's Daughter)
The dramatic beauty and the unpredictability of the sea evoke ideas of romance, intrigue, and often tragedy. The Captain’s Daughter personifies these three emotions. Wearing a long white summer dress, a woman wraps herself in an oversize navy peacoat. The double-breasted gold buttons and red stripes betray that of a sea captain’s coat. The woman appears as restless as the turgid sea behind her. Whitecaps skimming the water and bending sails announce blustery weather. Wiles imparts the feeling that something is about to happen, something in the air is brewing. Why does the woman stroll on the windy shore? Does she await her father the Captain, or perhaps a lover? Might she be searching for them, or simply longing for their return? Wiles leaves many questions unanswered, heightening the mysterious nature of his composition.
Wiles had the fortune of being brought up in an artistic family; his father, Lemuel Maynard Wiles, was an accomplished artist specializing in landscapes. First instructed by his father, he attended the Art Students League, where he became a life-long friend of fellow student and later distinguished artist William Merritt Chase. At the age of twenty-one, Wiles embarked upon the European pilgrimage as was traditional for so many American artists; in Paris, he enrolled at the Académie Julien and the Académie Colarossi. He returned to the United States and began to work as an illustrator for leading magazines such as Scribners and Harpers. After painting the portrait of actress Julia Marlowe, he became a financial success as a society portraitist.
The impressionistic and spontaneous execution of The Captain’s Daughter illustrates the phase when Wiles retreated from the genre of portraits and took respite in Long Island, New York. He and his father ran an art school in the area, and Wiles set up a studio in Peconic, called the Moorings. The Captain’s Daughter likely shows the Peconic Bay, looking southward. Marine paintings such as this one was a detour from his previously tighter, more controlled style. Scientific examination showed that originally the painting did not include the female figure. Wiles first painted a boat drawn up on the sand. Unsatisfied with this, he painted the female figure to cover up the boat.
For more on this work, see: Union League Club of Chicago Art Collection, M. Richter; W. Greenhouse, Union League Club of Chicago, Chicago, 2003, p.264.
