After Many Springs: Regionalism, Modernism, and the Midwest

by Debra Bricker Balken

After Many Springs is the title of a Thomas Hart Benton painting that evokes nostalgia for a fertile, creative time gone by. This bold new book––taking the name of this work by Benton––examines the intersections between Regionalist and Modernist paintings, photography, and film during the Great Depression, a period when the two approaches to art making were perhaps at their zenith.

 

It is commonly believed that Regionalist artists Benton, John Steuart Curry, and Grant Wood reacted to the economic and social devastation of their era by harking back in tranquil bucolic paintings to a departed utopia. However, this volume compares their work to that of photographers such as Dorothea Lange and Ben Shahn and filmmakers such as Josef von Sternberg—all of whom documented the desolation of the Depression—and finds surprising commonalities. The book also notes intriguing connections between Regionalist artists and Modernists Jackson Pollock and Philip Guston, countering prevailing assumptions that Regionalism was an anathema to these New York School painters and showing their shared fascination with the Midwest.

Genres: Art

208 pages, Hardcover

First published March 3, 2009

Reviews

[Brian Kovesci · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's great to look at America's place in capital a Art history through the lens of a specific Midwestern movement. Regionalism as a term is new to me, but it makes total sense. The players, the influences and subject matter, the visual language they developed, the general dismissal from the rest of the world, but its very important role in making America an international hub of capital a Art.

Interesting to me that America took so long to establish itself as an authority in the eyes of the rest of the world when the Hudson River School was just so fucking objectively good, even using any stringent European measure of the time. Yes, Folk Art is interesting. Yes, Regionalism was interesting, but how could anything compete with what Picasso was doing? He had the world's undivided attention, and many thought the Regionalists relied too heavily on European precedent, that there wasn't anything commanding to compete with Picasso. And this includes the work of Grant Wood, Edward Hopper, Georgia O'Keeffe and Thomas Hart Benton, artists heavily represented in museums all over the world [all over the world but with heavy representation in the Midwest. The to major works of Grant Woods are in Chicago and Cincinnati, and the rest of the book is filled with works in Iowa, Missouri, Ohio, etc.]

It's good to get this context. I've been to museums all over, but specifically all over the Midwest:
• Cleveland Museum of Art (Cleveland, OH)
• Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland (Cleveland, OH)
• Akron Art Museum (Akron, OH)
• Stan Hywet Hall & Gardens (Akron, OH)
• Canton Museum of Art (Canton, OH)
• Toledo Museum of Art (Toledo, OH)
• Columbus Museum of Art (Columbus, OH)
• Wexner Center for the Arts (Columbus, OH)
• Cincinnati Art Museum (Cincinnati, OH)
• Contemporary Art Center (Cincinnati, OH)
• 21C Cincinnati (Cincinnati, OH)
• The Mattress Factory (Pittsburgh, PA)
• The Andy Warhol Museum (Pittsburgh, PA)
• Carnegie Museum of Art (Pittsburgh, PA)
• Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago, IL)
• Grand Rapids Art Museum (Grand Rapids, MI)
• Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum (Lansing, MI)
• Detroit Institute of Art (Detroit, MI)
• Newfields (Indianapolis, IN)

And only a few outside of the Midwest
• The Vatican Museums (Vatican City)
• SFMoMA (San Francisco, CA)
• Legion of Honor (San Francisco, CA)
• DeYoung (San Francisco, CA)
• LACMA (Los Angeles, CA)
• The Broad (Los Angeles, CA)
• the Getty (Los Angeles, CA)
• Huntington Library Art Museum & Botanical Gardens (Los Angeles, CA)
• Hearst Castle (San Simeon, CA)

I need to add more to both of these lists.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book! It was a quick read. I felt like I learned something without having to strain my brain! My friend suggested this book after she saw the accompanying show at Des Moines Art Center. The book focuses a bit too much on Thomas Hart Benton for my taste, but I learned some new information about American Regionalism and a St. Louis artist named Joe Jones.