Field Workers
1897-1977
Oil on canvas
27 1/8 in x 34 1/8 in
1942
Label:
Known for his socially-engaged artwork, New Yorker William Gropper visited the Great Plains and the Southeast after receiving a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in 1937. In 1942, he painted Field Workers, based on sketches made while in the South a few years prior. Documenting the plight of African American sharecroppers, Gropper represents the perilous and fixed position of the figures while they are set against infinite rows of tobacco plants. Utilizing a skewed perspective, saturated colors, and angular features, Gropper conveys the exhaustion and labor of working the field.
As Exhibited In:
Picture of America: Art of the Southern Scene, TJC Gallery, Spartanburg, SC, March 9–April 21, 2017
The Elemental South: Visions of the Southern Landscape, TJC Gallery, Spartanburg, SC, December 4, 2014–February 26, 2015
Illuminating Hub Cities: The Depiction of Industry and Agriculture in the South, TJC Gallery, Spartanburg, SC, May 10–May 31, 2013
Art for Life’s Sake: Ashcan Realism of the South, TJC Gallery, Spartanburg, SC, December 15, 2011–February 16, 2012
Landscape of Slavery: The Plantation in American Art, Gibbes Museum of Art, Charleston, SC, January 18–October 19, 2008, University of Virginia Art Museum, Charlottesville, VA, January 18–April 20, 2008, Morris Museum of Art, Augusta, GA, August 23–October 19, 2008