The painting depicts a wintry scene from an elevated point of view, showing people skating and playing games on a frozen river. On the left, leafless trees line the frozen bank. On the right, there are brown buildings with snow on their roofs and smoke rising from their chimneys. A woman stands on one of the porches, holding a small child. On the snowy ground outside the buildings, a sled is being pulled by two horses. In the center of the painting is the wide frozen river. The people on it wear colorful clothes in shades of red, yellow, green, blue, and brown. Some of them slip and fall on…
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Skating Scene

John Toole (American, 1815 - 1860)

c. 1835

Medium
oil on canvas
Classification
Painting
Dimensions
overall: 36.9 x 46.2 cm (14 1/2 x 18 3/16 in.) ; framed: 43.2 x 52.7 x 4.6 cm (17 x 20 3/4 x 1 13/16 in.)
Culture
American
Museum
National Gallery of Art, CAB
Credit line
Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch
Rights
Public domain (NGA Open Access, CC0), as the museum states it.
Who can see it
Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed

View at the National Gallery of Art

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