At first glance, Homer's Weaning the Calf seems simple enough: a reminiscence of an idyllic summer down on the farm. Though the artist frequently addresses themes of childhood in his art, his pictures generally avoid the cloying sentimentality common to other Victorian painters. In this painting, Homer pays close attention to the play of sunlight and shadow, endowing the scene with the heightened realism of a vivid memory. Such nostalgic visions were obviously escapist: they comforted Americans eager to forget four years of civil war as well as the disruptions of rapid industrialization. However, some scholars have suggested that Homer also intended other, more complex meanings. Weaning the Calf is one among a remarkable group of pictures from the 1870s depicting African-Americans with an understanding and sympathy rare for the time. These paintings have been interpreted as a sustained meditation on the unsettled position of blacks in post-war American society. In this picture, the central image of a black boy in tattered clothes straining to separate a stubborn calf from its mother has been read as a visual metaphor for the painful weaning of African-Americans from slavery. Though intriguing, there is little evidence that Homer himself intended such a reading. His contemporaries certainly preferred to enjoy the picture simply as "a farmyard scene of a very spirited character. "*