Object Record
Images
Metadata
Title |
Plowing It Under |
Artist |
Benton, Thomas Hart |
Date |
1934 |
Medium |
lithograph |
Support |
paper |
Dimensions |
Image size: 8 x 13 5/16 inches |
Signature |
Benton |
Signature Location |
bottom left |
Credit line |
Museum purchase |
Accession Number |
2011.011 |
Collection |
Work on Paper |
Description |
Considered the quintessential American Regionalist painter, Benton is well known for his vibrant mural paintings that depict common everyday scenes of life in the Midwest and South. Along with artist Edward Hopper and later Andrew Wyeth, Benton was an outspoken opponent of the Eastern art establishment and the European-influenced Modernist movement first promoted by the Armory Show of 1913. Benton spent much of his career creating iconic images of rural America. During sketching trips taken in the 1920s and 1930s, Benton visited South Carolina and created a number of field studies on paper that he later developed into prints, watercolors and oil paintings. "Ploughing it Under" is one such example. Benton created the drawing for this lithograph, and a painting (owned by Crystal Bridges Museum) on a visit to South Carolina in 1934. The title is a reference to a 1933 New Deal policy that forced farmers to destroy their crops in order to raise prices by limiting production. |
Subjects |
Horses Figures man African Americans Animals Agriculture |
Image |
013\2011.011.jpg |