For most of 1881 and 1882, Homer lived in the English village of Cullercoats, near Tynemouth, on the North Sea. There, he concentrated on watercolors, depicting the working lives of the people in the fishing community. The painting Perils of the Sea portrays a group gathered at the Volunteer Life Brigade’s Watch House. Seven years after completing the watercolor, Homer made an etching after it, altering some of the details and retaining the natural reversal of a composition that takes place in the printing process. He included two remarques (the small images of an anchor and a sailor’s head) in the lower margin. Homer clearly felt that Perils of the Sea offered a theme to which a wide audience would respond. Sterling Clark achieved a collecting coup by acquiring both the watercolor and the etching and bringing the two versions together.