The Swimming Hole is an 1884–85 painting by the American artist Thomas Eakins, Goodrich catalog #190, in the collection of the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas. Executed in oil on canvas, it depicts six men swimming naked in a pristine lake. The Swimming Hole is regarded as a masterpiece of American painting. According to art historian Doreen Bolger it is "perhaps Eakins's most accomplished rendition of the nude figure", and has been called "the most finely designed of all his outdoor pictures". Since the Renaissance, the human body has been considered both the basis of artists' training and the most challenging subject to depict in art, and the nude was the centerpiece of Eakins' teaching program at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. In this work, Eakins took advantage of an exception to the generally prudish Victorian attitude to nudity: swimming naked was widely accepted, and for males was seen as normal, even in public spaces. Eakins was the first American artist to portray one of the few occasions in 19th century life when nudity was on display. The Swimming Hole develops themes raised in his earlier work, in particular his treatment of buttocks and his ambiguous treatment of the human form. Such themes had earlier been examined in his The Gross Clinic and William Rush, and would continue to be explored in his paintings of boxers (Taking the Count, Salutat, and Between Rounds) and wrestlers (Wrestlers). The Swimming Hole has been "widely cited as a prime example of homoeroticism in American art".

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_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

456:

Magister militum Ricimer defeated Emperor Avitus at Piacenza and became master of the Western Roman Empire. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricimer

1813:

The Sixth Coalition attacked Napoleon and the First French Empire in the Battle of Leipzig, the largest conflict in the Napoleonic Wars with over 500,000 troops involved. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Leipzig

1843:

William Rowan Hamilton first wrote down the fundamental formula for quaternions, carving the equation into the side of Broom Bridge in Cabra, Dublin, Ireland. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/quaternion

1978:

Karol Józef Wojtyła, a cardinal from Kraków, Poland, became Pope John Paul II, the first non-Italian pope since the 16th century and the first ever from a Slavic country. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_II

1995:

Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam convened the Million Man March in Washington, D.C. in an effort to unite in self-help and self-defense against economic and social ills plaguing the African American community. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Million_Man_March

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

catechumen (n): A convert to Christianity under instruction before baptism; a young Christian preparing for confirmation http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/catechumen

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

The way to combat noxious ideas is with other ideas. The way to combat falsehoods is with truth. --William O. Douglas http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_O._Douglas