A Different View

The picture of the “Gloucester Wharf” by Stuart Davis is vibrant and full of color. Davis is mentioned in Polis is This due to his beautiful paintings of Gloucester. The painting, “Gloucester Wharf” is eye-catching and rather different from how most people view Gloucester. The poem titled “A Different View” is inspired by this painting and also the life of Stuart Davis. Stuart Davis is an incredible artist, born in Philadelphia, who later in life found inspiration for his paintings in Gloucester, Massachusetts. The poem is titled “A Different View”, because Davis’ artistic style portrayed Gloucester in a new way and also this view of Gloucester allowed him to shape his artistic skills in a different way.

The first verse of the poem describes the “golden, glowing sun on the water”. There is a warm golden color in the picture which gives a feeling of happiness and peace. The next line states, “1915”, which is the year when Davis first visited Gloucester and he was “21”, at the time. The rest of this stanza reveals how Gloucester , “changed his view of life/ different from the urban city scapes/ and all that jazz”. Davis, later in life paints city scenes inspired by jazz music and the Gloucester landscape is much different and has a different feel. The second stanza is connected to Olsen’s belief that people are their geography. The line states, “This is not his place but/ part of his place/ and his art”. This means that although he was not born or from Massachusetts it is still a part of his being and obviously is found in his art.

The first verse of the third stanza simply describes the puffy clouds in the distance which are over “Cape Ann”. Cape Ann is a part of Gloucester and is where Davis spent most of his time painting. The next lines state. “where they fell in love/ red, red, red, tiny cottage/”. While living in Gloucester in the summer Davis shared a red cottage with other artists such as John Sloan and Paul Cornayer mentioned in the lines after. These two artists became extremely close with Davis and were his close friends while living in Gloucester. Also red is written three times because the cottage is red but also because there are many vibrant red colors in random parts of the painting. All of these artists loved this place and how they were learning from their art as well as each other. Art is capitalized because their art plays a huge role in their life. The next stanza lists the words, “ropes, fish, nets…” because these are some of the objects in the picture and also Davis believes that every object, no matter the size is important. The last verse of the fourth stanza states, “which enhanced his optical geometry”. Optical geometry is a style of painting that Davis uses and the atmosphere and landscape of Gloucester allowed him to improve his style.

The fifth stanza is describing how one can see the painting but not hear what is going on in the actual painting which relates to The Masses. The Masses is a socialist journal which believed that the U.S.should not join with the allies after World War one. Davis drew covers for the magazine along with other famous artists of his time. But their voices were “unheard” similar to the sounds in the painting, because the journal was forced to shut down due to its unpatriotic messages. This painting “reveals a new perspective” and is not how the “average man” views Gloucester. The last two lines of this stanza state “but that is the purpose of art/to inform the living of life”. This statement is something which Davis believed and by painting Gloucester in such a different way he made it recognized. The last stanza describes “Henri” or rather Robert Henri who was Davis’ first teacher at in art school in New York City. Davis says in an article that Henri forced you to look things up and “discover things” on your own. The last three stanzas state “1943: the view is different that is true for I paint what I see in America, in other words I paint the American scene”. “1943” is the year of the summer when Davis stopped returning to Cape Ann in Gloucester. This view was different from what he was used to and allowed him to become a different artist by using the beautiful Gloucester landscape. The last line “I paint what I see in America, in other words I paint the American scene”, is a quotation from Davis which reveals that he painted to capture the beautiful parts of the American landscape and the American culture. His goal was to show people their life and how they lived and that there is more than one way to view a situation.

I wrote this poem because I love art and was inspired by Davis’ painting as soon as I saw it in the movie. I was attracted to the many different shapes and colors which are in many of his paintings. While writing this poem and researching Davis I found that there are many things that Davis and Olsen share in common. They are both artists who produce art to reveal new ideas and beliefs to the world. Davis and Olsen both share a love for Gloucester and in their art they reveal Gloucester’s natural beauty that often goes unnoticed. This project has helped me realize how art is a part of our being and that all artists and people are in some way connected.