Mountain Climbers
Artist
Vance Kirkland
(American, 1904 - 1981)
Dateca. 1941
MediumWatercolor over graphite on paper
DimensionsUnframed: 30 1/8 x 22 3/8 inches (76.52 x 56.82 cm)
Credit LineFriends of Art Purchase Prize, Midwestern Artists' Exhibition, 1941
Object number41-5
On View
Not on viewCollections
Gallery LabelSeen from above and dwarfed by the muscular rhythms of stone outcroppings and pines, four mountain climbers make their way upward along a winding path toward an unseen peak. By cropping the image, Vance Kirkland suggests the vast scale and power of the Colorado Rocky Mountain range that lies beyond the paper's edge. The climbers' journey is not undulating and poetic, but direct and strenuous; some may not reach the crest. Unlike Chinese mountain scenes, this has no comforting huts or carts, no harmonious waterfalls and no branches swaying in the breeze. Kirkland paints a bold, expressive vision of a stern and dramatic world.
Copyright© Estate of Vance Kirkland
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