Fitz Hugh Lane (1804-1865) was an American marine painter whose works express the transition from the narrative to the highly personal and poetic style associated with luminism.

Fitz Hugh Lane was born in Gloucester, Mass., on Dec. 19, 1804. At the age of 2 he contracted polio, which left his legs paralyzed for life. As a youth, he sketched the Massachusetts coastline around Cape Ann. In the mid-1830s his talents came to the attention of the eminent lithographer William Pendleton, who invited Lane to become an apprentice in his Boston firm.

Pendleton's shop provided Lane with his only formal training in art. Lane produced several lithographed business cards and music-sheet covers. In 1837 he did his first town views, including the National Lancers on the Boston Common. During this time he also saw exhibitions of 17th-century Dutch art at the Boston Athenaeum, as well as the city and harbor views then...