Charles Banks Wilson

Old Injun

1948

Thomas Hart Benton, 'Goin' Home', lithograph, 1937, edition 250, Fath 14. Signed in pencil. Signed in the stone, lower right. A fine, richly-inked impression, on off-white, wove paper, with margins, in excellent condition. Published by Associated American Artists. Archivally matted to museum standards, unframed. Image size 9 7/16 x 11 7/8 inches; sheet size 10 3/4 x 13 5/16 inches. Impressions of this work are held in the following museum collections: Figge Art Museum, Georgetown University Art Collection, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Library of Congress, Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. ABOUT THE ARTIST “Benton’s idiom was essentially political and rhetorical, the painterly equivalent of the country stump speeches that were a Benton family tradition. The artist vividly recalled accompanying his father, Maecenas E. Benton — a four-term U.S. congressman, on campaigns through rural Missouri. Young Tom Benton grew up with an instinct for constituencies that led him to assess art on the basis of its audience appeal. His own art, after the experiments with abstraction, was high-spirited entertainment designed to catch and hold an audience with a political message neatly bracketed between humor and local color.” —Elizabeth Broun “Thomas Hart Benton: A Politician in Art,” Smithsonian Studies in American Art, Spring 1987. Born in 1889 in Neosho, Missouri, Thomas Hart Benton spent much of his childhood and adolescence in Washington, D.C., where his father, Maecenas Eason Benton, served as a Democratic member of Congress from 1897 to 1905. Hoping to prepare Benton for a political career, his father sent him to Western Military Academy. After nearly two years at the academy, Benton persuaded his mother to support him in attending the Art Institute of Chicago for two years, followed by two additional years at the Académie Julian in Paris. In 1912, Benton returned to America and moved to New York to pursue his artistic career. One of his first jobs involved painting sets for silent films, which were being produced in Fort Lee, New Jersey. Benton credits this experience with equipping him with the skills necessary to create his large-scale murals. When World War I broke out, Benton joined the Navy. Stationed in Norfolk, Virginia, he was assigned to create drawings of camouflaged ships arriving at Norfolk Naval Station. These renderings were used to identify vessels that might be lost in battle. Benton later remarked that being a "camofleur" profoundly impacted his career: "When I came out of the Navy after the First World War," he said, "I made up my mind that I wasn’t going to be just a studio painter, a pattern maker in the fashion then dominating the art world—as it still does. I began to think of returning to the painting of subjects, subjects with meanings, which people, in general, might be interested in." While developing his Regionalist vision, Benton also taught art, first at a city-supported school and later at The Art Students League from 1926 to 1935. One of his students was a young Jackson Pollock, who regarded Benton as both a mentor and father figure. In 1930, Benton was commissioned to paint a mural for the New School for Social Research. The "America Today" mural, now permanently exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, led to many more commissions as Benton’s work gained wide recognition. The Regionalist Movement became popular during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Painters such as Benton, Grant Wood, and John Steuart Curry rejected modernist European influences, choosing instead to depict realistic images of small-town and rural life—comforting representations of the American heartland during a period of upheaval. Time Magazine referred to Benton as "the most virile of U.S. painters of the U.S. Scene," featuring his self-portrait on the cover of a 1934 issue that included a story titled "The Birth of Regionalism." In 1935, Benton left New York and returned to Missouri, where he taught at the Kansas City Art Institute. His outspoken criticism of modern art, art critics, and political views alienated him from many influential figures in both political and art circles. Nonetheless, Benton remained true to his beliefs, continuing to create murals, paintings, and prints that captured enduring images of American life. The dramatic and engaging characteristics of Benton’s artwork drawn the attention of Hollywood producers, leading him to create illustrations and posters for films, including his famous lithographs for the film adaptation of John Steinbeck’s "The Grapes of Wrath," produced by Twentieth Century Fox. During the 1930s, The Limited Editions Club of New York asked Benton to illustrate special editions of three of Mark Twain’s books...

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