Label Text:
The Black Bull depicts a bucolic, sun-drenched rural scene near Middletown, Rhode Island (north of Newport), where the Bellows family rented a farmhouse in 1918 and 1919. Bellows’s depiction of cattle grazing peacefully in a verdant landscape might appear to be a surprising, even dubious diversion for the artist best known for his vigorous engagement with modern life. Yet this rather pedestrian bovine subject must have offered a reprieve from the emotionally fraught series of paintings decrying the horrors of World War I that had consumed the artist over preceding months (one of which resides in the collection of the Michele & Donald D’Amour Museum of Fine Arts in Springfield). Indeed, Middletown’s close proximity to Newport’s Naval Complex, which experienced a dramatic increase in activity during the war, would have made the human effects of the conflict practically inescapable. With the war recently concluded (the Treaty of Versailles having been signed in late June), Bellows could, like the rest of the nation, breathe a sigh of relief and embrace the welcome return to normalcy.
RRG, 2010
Born in Columbus, Ohio, George Bellows belonged to the Ashcan School, along with Robert Henri and other colleagues. His paintings display a vibrant palette and lively brushwork. He is known for his lush landscapes, poignant portraits of family and friends, and incisive scenes of life in the urban tenement. Bellows was a proficient draftsman and printmaker, and his drawings and prints offer passionate vignettes that investigate life in the boxing ring, as well as social injustices, the agonies of war, and other socio-political issues. Bellows endowed his subjects with animation and confidence. "Fern Woods" was painted on Monhegan Island, Maine, where Bellows spent many happy days, while "The Black Bull" depicts a scene from Middletown, Rhode Island, where the Bellows family rented a farmhouse in 1918 and 1919.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=AC+1972.113 |
