Light Battery at Gettysburg

Artist Edward Hopper (American, 1882 - 1967)

Date1940

MediumOil on canvas

DimensionsUnframed: 18 1/8 x 27 5/16 inches (46.04 x 69.37 cm)
Framed: 25 3/4 x 35 x 2 1/2 inches (65.41 x 88.9 x 6.35 cm)

Credit LineGift of the Friends of Art

Object number47-95

SignedSigned lower right: edward hopper

On View

Not on view

Collections

American Art

Terms

DescriptionOpen country road with a battery of troops in the center moving down the road toward the left. White farm buildings at the right.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

The Seventeenth Biennial Exhibition of Contemporary American Oil Paintings, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., March 23–May 4, 1941, no. 74.

Selected American Paintings and Embroidered Murals and Paintings on Glass, Montclair Art Museum, N.J., October 8–25, 1942, no. 8.

Men in Arms, Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Conn., February 2–March 4, 1943, no. 81.

The Fifty-fourth Annual Exhibition of American Paintings and Sculpture, Art Institute of Chicago, October 28–December 12, 1943, no. 11.

Twelve Contemporary Americans, Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, Ohio, October 4–November 15, 1945, unnumbered.

Exhibition of Paintings by Contemporary American Artists, Gloversville Intercultural League, N.Y., October 26–30, 1947, no. 16.

New Accessions USA, Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, July 12–September 5, 1948, no. 32.

Edward Hopper Retrospective Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 11–July 2, 1950 (traveled), no. 55.

The Friends of Art in Retrospect, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Mo., December 1953, no cat.

Paintings Loaned by the Friends of Art Collection, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery and Atkins Museum, Kansas City, Wichita Art Museum, Kans., April 22–May 6, 1956, no cat..

Kansas Free Fair, Topeka, September 8–13, 1956, unnumbered.

Distinguished Americans, Hackley Art Gallery, Muskegon, Mich., September 30–October 28, 1956, no cat.

A Retrospective Exhibition of Oils and Watercolors by Edward Hopper, University of Arizona Art Gallery, Tucson, April 20– May 19, 1963, no. 36.

New York, Edward Hopper: The Art and the Artist, Whitney Museum of American Art, September 23, 1980–February 14, 1982 (traveled), unnumbered.

Fifty Years of Collecting: The Friends of Art at the Nelson; A Retrospective Exhibition, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Mo., December 15, 1984–January 15, 1985, no cat..

Edward Hopper: Early and Late Drawings, Watercolors, and Paintings, Hirschl & Adler Galleries, New York, March 14–April 18, 1987, no. 51.

Gallery Label

Renowned for his portrayals of common, often anonymous people in banal circumstances, Edward Hopper executed only two oil paintings of historical subjects, both of which focus on Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, the site of the famous American Civil War battle in 1863. Hopper's Light Battery at Gettysburg poetically evokes an unexceptional moment in time between clashes. The battery's slow, methodical march toward the horizon may refer metaphorically to the inevitability of death. Hopper's stark treatment of light, particularly as it falls on the house and attached structures in the middle-ground, further underscores the harsh reality of the troupe's uncertain and unenviable circumstances. That Hopper depicted this scene as the United States debated entering World War II in 1940 seems more than coincidental.

Provenance

To (Frank K. M. Rehn Galleries, New York, 1940);

to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1947.

Published References

The Seventeenth Biennial Exhibition of Contemporary American Oil Paintings, exh. cat. (Washington, D.C.: Corcoran Gallery of Art, 1941), 45, 50.

Selected American Paintings and Embroidered Murals and Paintings on Glass, exh. cat. (Montclair, N.J.: Montclair Art Museum, 1942), unpaginated.

Catalogue of an Exhibition of Men in Arms, exh. cat. (Hartford, Conn.: Wadsworth Atheneum, 1943), unpaginated.

The Fifty-fourth Annual Exhibition American Paintings and Sculpture, exh. cat. (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1943), unpaginated.

J. R., “Art and Artists: Moderns Please the Timid in Show at the Art Institute,” Kansas City Star, December 12, 1947, 33.

Exhibition of Paintings by Contemporary American Artists, exh. cat. (Gloversville, N.Y.: Gloversville Intercultural League, 1947), unpaginated.

Renée Arb, “The Buys Museums Call Best,” Art News 47 (Summer 1948), 24–25, 58.

Kansas City Philharmonic Orchestra Fourth Subscription Concert program, December 7–8, 1948, cover.

New Accessions USA, exh. cat. (Colorado Springs: Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, 1948), unpaginated.

Winifred Shields, “A Special Collection of Works Is Growing at Nelson Gallery,” Kansas City Star, May 19, 1950, 28.

Lloyd Goodrich, Edward Hopper Retrospective Exhibition, exh. cat. (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1950), 56.

Winifred Shields, “Key Role at Art Gallery Filled by Society of 500,” Kansas City Star, January 4, 1953, 8D.

Dorothea Pellett, “Fair Displays Work of Eminent Artists,” Topeka (Kans.) Daily Capital, September 9, 1956, 17A.

“Art Works Are Selected for Wide Range, Interest,” Muskegon (Mich.) Chronicle, September 25, 1956, 21.

Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4^th ed. (Kansas City, Mo.: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 256.

Douglas Denniston, A Retrospective Exhibition of Oils and Watercolors by Edward Hopper, exh. cat. (Tucson: University of Arizona Art Gallery, 1963), 11, 36.

Donald L. Hoffmann, “For Friends of Art: Four Lively Paintings,” Kansas City Star, May 1, 1966, 1F.

Ross E. Taggart and George L. McKenna, eds., Handbook of the Collections in The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, vol. 1, Art of the Occident, 5^th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 252.

Donald Hoffmann, “Tracing the Ups and Downs of the Friends of Art,” Kansas City Star, September 19, 1976, 4E.

Gail Levin, “Hopper, un Gigante del Realismo Americano. L’America è Sola al Mondo,” Bolaffi Arte (Turin, Italy) 101 (October 1980), 47–48.

Gail Levin, Edward Hopper: The Art and the Artist, exh. cat. (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, in association with W. W. Norton and Company, 1980), 61, 263.

Gail Levin, moderator, “Artists’ Panel: Joel Meyerowitz, George Segal, William Bailey,” Art Journal 41 (Summer 1981), 151–52.

Edward Hopper, 1882–1967, exh. cat. (London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1981), 44.

Edward Hopper, 1882–1967: Gemälde und Zeichnungen, exh. cat. (Munich: Schirmer/Mosel Verlag, 1981), 60.

Elizabeth Shaw, “Edward Hopper Exhibition,” Maine Antique Digest 15 (May 1987), 23A.

Edward Hopper: Early and Late Drawings, Watercolors, and Paintings, exh. cat. (New York: Hirschl & Adler Galleries, 1987), 27–28.

Peter Schjeldahl, Edward Hopper: Light Years, exh. cat. (New York: Hirschl & Adler Galleries, 1988), 33.

Henry Adams, Handbook of American Paintings in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (Kansas City, Mo.: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1991), 158.

Sotheby’s, New York, September 24, 1992, lot 195.

Roger Ward and Patricia J. Fidler, eds. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the Collections. 6^th ed. (New York: Hudson Hills Press, in association with Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1993), 249.

Nancy J. Skarmeas, The Heritage of America (Nashville, Tenn.: Ideals Publications, 1994), 29.

Gail Levin, Edward Hopper: An Intimate Biography (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), 325–26.

Gail Levin, Edward Hopper: A Catalogue Raisonné (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, in association with W. W. Norton & Company, 1995), 1:85, 2:116, 3:274–75, 4 (CD-ROM): O-313.

Christie’s, New York, December 4, 1996, lot 273.

Gail Levin, Hopper’s Places, 2nd ed. (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1998), 98, 164.

Virginia M. Mecklenburg, Edward Hopper: The Watercolors, exh. cat. (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of American Art, in association with W. W. Norton and Company, 1999), 127, 161, 170 n48.

Margaret C. Conrads, ed. The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: American Paintings to 1945 (Kansas City, Mo.: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2007), 1: 18, 20, 324-29 (repro.), 2: 135-36 (repro.).

Deborah Emont Scott, ed., The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the Collection, 7th ed. (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2008), 182 (repro.).

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