Heade painted 120 views of salt marshes, natural farmlands where laborers harvested black marsh grasses and gathered them into haystacks to dry. Heade first went into the marshes to hunt and fish, and he had a deep appreciation for the productive relationship between humans and the land. The two figures in the canoe—likely a father and son—may have symbolized the future generations that would benefit from protecting and maintaining such natural resources. Heade is one of a number of American artists who have been grouped together as “luminists.” While these artists never worked as a school—they did not necessarily know each other--their work shares a number of formal characteristics: pronounced horizontal format, absence of visible brushstrokes, and a close attention to the qualities and effects of light.