From the collection of:
Clara M. Eagle Gallery, Murray State University || VAM Home

While the title of this artwork might lead you to imagine a lush, wooded scene, there are only a few trees in the composition. Instead, rows of houses are featured in the foreground and background. A lone figure (perhaps Brown?) stands on a path in front of the houses. The figure is quite dark, with no discernible features. The houses and objects in the foreground are darker and more detailed than those in the background, which are sketched with soft lines and shading—a technique that imbues the artwork with a sense of depth and atmosphere. The artist, Russell Limbach, was a leading 20th-century lithographer known for satirical art.

About the Artist

An Ohio native, Russell Limbach was formally trained at the Cleveland School of Art from 1922 to 1926. He spent the next several years working at a local advertising agency until leaving for Europe in 1929. There he traveled frequently and spent time studying in Paris and Vienna.

When Limbach returned to the United States, he worked as a political cartoonist before taking on a key role as a technical adviser on color lithography for the New York City Works Progress Administration (WPA) in 1935. He maintained that position until 1940. The following year, he joined the faculty at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut.

Classroom Ideas

Discussion: What style would you consider this work? What is the mood conveyed? What is the focal point? Compare this work to other landscapes in the Kentucky Virtual Art Museum. How does the title relate to this work? What possible meanings could the title have? Look at some of Limbach’s other works and discuss satire and how visual artists convey a satirical message. Do you think this work is satirical? If so, what is the satirical comment?

Activities: Draw a realistic landscape. Get an 8-1/2" X 11" sheet of card stock and cut a rectangular hole in the middle. Use this paper as a viewfinder that will let you focus in on part of a landscape. Use your viewfinder to find a composition, paying close attention to the details in the landscape. Use some of the same techniques in your landscape that Russell Limbach used in his. Notice that objects closer to the viewer appear darker and more detailed, while things that are farther away are less detailed and lighter in color.

Research the WPA Federal Art Project and some of the artists who worked in it. Create reports or posters for a class display.

Links

Read more about Limbach and one of his best-known works, Student and Master, at The Art of the Print.
[www.artoftheprint.com/artistpages/limbach_russell_studentandmaster.htm]

See Student and Master (or Two Painters) and another work by Limbach at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
[search.famsf.org:8080/search.shtml?keywords=russell+limbach]

You’ll find links to more Internet resources on Russell Limbach in the Artcyclopedia.
[www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/limbach_russell.html]