A flatboat with eight light-skinned men floats toward us down a wide river in this horizontal painting. The boat nearly spans the width of the composition and has low sides and a shallowly arched, low cabin upon which the men gather. At the center, a man with dark hair and wearing light blue trousers and a pink shirt dances with one foot and both arms raised. To our right a seated musician plays a fiddle, and to our left a smiling man holds up a metal pot and strikes the flat bottom with the back of his fingers. The remaining men sit or recline around the musicians and dancing man, some…
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The Jolly Flatboatmen

George Caleb Bingham (American, 1811 - 1879)

1846

Medium
oil on canvas
Classification
Painting
Dimensions
overall: 96.8 x 123.2 cm (38 1/8 x 48 1/2 in.) ; framed: 116.8 x 143.8 x 10.5 cm (46 x 56 5/8 x 4 1/8 in.)
Culture
American
Museum
National Gallery of Art, CAB
Credit line
Patrons' Permanent Fund
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