American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765–1915

American Stories closed Sunday, January 24, 2010, but the exhibition’s conclusion provides an opportunity to consider how storytelling continued to evolve in American visual media after 1915. Narratives about everyday life appeared in paintings by artists such as Edward Hopper, and, most notably, in the work of Regionalist painters such as Thomas Hart Benton and Grant Wood. However, with the spread of European modernism, particularly after the seminal 1913 Armory show in New York, many painters began turning from representational to abstract styles. As the emphasis on narrative decreased in painting, film emerged as an important medium for storytelling in America. Motion pictures and painting are closely linked, and in American Stories, we find several late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century works that offer a glimpse at the connections between the two media. Read more »

Fall is an ideal time for American sports fans, as professional baseball, basketball, football, and hockey seasons overlap. It’s no secret that Americans love sports, and artists are no exception. American Stories features a number of iconic paintings that depict sports and games, including Thomas Eakins’s The Champion Single Sculls (Max Schmitt in a Single Scull) and Winslow Homer’s view of encamped Union soldiers playing a game of quoits, or horseshoes (Pitching Quoits). Read more »