Trusty on a Mule

Portfolio TitleSelections from the Atlanta Period

Artist Hale Woodruff (American, 1900 - 1980)

Printer Robert Blackburn's Printmaking Workshop (American)

Date1931-1940; printed 1996

MediumLinocut on lana royal bright white thai mulberry chin colle paper

DimensionsImage: 8 1/16 × 10 3/8 inches (20.48 × 26.35 cm)
Sheet: 19 × 15 inches (48.26 × 38.1 cm)

Credit LinePurchase: acquired through the generosity of The Print Society in honor of Dr. Leo Goertz and gift of Auldlyn Higgins Williams and E.T. Williams Jr. of Sag Harbor, N.Y.

Object number2018.4.8

SignedA blind stamp of the Blackburn emblem at the bottom left edge. The artist's blind stamp at the bottom right edge, "(C) Hale Woodruff"

Inscribed"13/75" in pencil at the bottom left corner

On View

Not on view

Collections

American Art

Terms

DescriptionThe horizontally oriented black-and-white print Trusty on a Mule depicts at the center of the composition a bare-chested black man wearing a large hat, bandana, horizontally striped pants, and boots. He sits side-saddle on a mule that moves left to right across the sheet, his proper right front leg raised. As he rides, the man places his proper left hand across his proper left thigh while he steadies himself by bracing his proper right hand on the rump of his mule. The landscape through which the pair move is full of vegetation. There is a leaf-less tree at the upper left of composition behind which thin clouds streak the sky. Just to the right of center in the background of the composition is another leaf-less tree in which a single bird sits, its head oriented towards the rider on the mule.Provenance

Provenance

Auldlyn Higgins Williams and E.T. Williams, Jr., Sag Harbor, NY, 1996–2018;

Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, February 2018.

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