Untitled (Study for "Achelous and Hercules" Mural)

Artist Thomas Hart Benton (American, 1889 - 1975)

Date1946

MediumGraphite on paper

DimensionsSheet: 4 1/4 x 17 3/8 inches (10.8 x 44.15 cm)
Mat: 9 1/4 x 22 inches (23.5 x 55.88 cm)

Credit LineGift of Papa Ray Roth

Object number2010.68

SignedSigned in graphite, lower right: Benton

InscribedDated in graphite, lower right: 46

On View

Not on view

Collections

American Art

Terms

DescriptionThis dynamic, horizontally-oriented graphite on light cream-colored paper preparatory sketch reflects an early concept for the overall composition of Benton's 1947 mural Achelous and Hercules (Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.). It is drawn with confident lines, many of which are heavy and layered. The sketch is quite abstract-a sort of geometric shorthand-with a hint of a horizon line at the right, an undulating landscape populated by the suggestion of figures and other indiscernible forms. Two inverted chevron-like forms that flank the scene at the left and right.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Gallery Label

In 1947 Thomas Hart Benton painted a 22-foot mural for Harzfeld’s department store in downtown Kansas City. The mural, set in a rural landscape familiar to most Missourians, offers a modern adaptation of the myth of Hercules fighting Achelous. Each spring, the river god becomes a wild bull with horns ripping the earth. Hercules triumphs over Achelous, and his broken horn transforms into a horn of plenty.

Benton created many compositional drawings for his murals. In these two examples, we get a glimpse of how the rolling arcs and triangles of the early designs turned into the figures, animals and landscape elements of the final painting.

Provenance

Thomas Hart Benton;

Patricia George (fashion illustrator for Harzfeld's), Kansas City, Missouri, after 1949;

To estate of Patricia George, December 2009; to Raymond J. Roth, II, Kansas City, Missouri, December 2010 (Dirk Soulis Auctions, Lone Jack, MO, December 2010, lot 98);

To NAMA, December 2010.

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