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Painting by Thomas Hart Benton
America Today is a mural comprising ten canvas panels, painted with egg tempera in 1930–1931 by the American painter Thomas Hart Benton . It provides a panorama of American life throughout the 1920s, based on Benton's extensive travels in the country. Originally commissioned for The New School for Social Research , it has belonged to the Metropolitan Museum of Art , in New York , since 2012.
Title
Dimensions[1]
Instruments of Power
92 x 160 in. (233.7 x 406.4 cm)
City Activities with Dance Hall
92 x 134 1/2 in. (233.7 x 341.6 cm)
City Activities with Subway
92 x 134 1/2 in. (233.7 x 341.6 cm)
Deep South
92 x 117 in. (233.7 x 297.2 cm)
Midwest
92 x 117 in. (233.7 x 297.2 cm)
Changing West
92 x 117 in. (233.7 x 297.2 cm)
Coal
92 x 117 in. (233.7 x 297.2 cm)
Steel
92 x 117 in. (233.7 x 297.2 cm)
City Building
92 x 117 in. (233.7 x 297.2 cm)
Outreaching Hands
17 1/8 x 97 in. (43.5 x 246.4 cm)
Creation [ edit ]
The mural was commissioned in 1929 by Alvin Saunders Johnson , director of The New School for Social Research in New York City, for the school's boardroom. Benton was not offered any payment beyond material costs. Instead, he saw the work as an opportunity to make a name for himself and thereby get more commissions in the future. The subjects were based on Benton's extensive travels in the United States. Benton said about the work: "Every detail of every picture is a thing I myself have seen and known. Every head is a real person drawn from life."[2] The mural was painted with egg tempera on linen canvases.[1]
Provenance [ edit ]
The mural was acquired by AXA Equitable Life Insurance Company in 1984. After two years of renovation it was installed at AXA's headquarters at 787 Seventh Avenue in New York City. In 1996 AXA moved to 1290 Avenue of the Americas and installed the mural in the building's lobby. In January 2012 the mural was renovated again, and in December 2012 it was donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art .[3]
References [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]
show Paintings Museums Related
show Places
Directors Miscellaneous Antiquities Paintings
1476 Altarpiece
A Cavalryman
A Vase of Flowers (1716)
The Abduction of Rebecca
The Accommodations of Desire
The Actor (painting)
Adoration of the Magi (Bosch, New York)
Adoration of the Shepherds (Mantegna)
The Aegean Sea
The Afternoon Meal (Luis Meléndez)
Alexander Hamilton (Trumbull)
The Allegory of Faith
Allegory of the Planets and Continents
Alpine Pool
Altman Madonna
America Today
Ancient Rome (painting)
Annunciation (Memling)
Annunziata Polyptych
Anthony van Dyck self portrait
Approaching Thunder Storm
Arab Woman (watercolor)
Arcadia (painting)
Ariadne (Giorgio de Chirico)
Aristotle with a Bust of Homer
Artillery (Roger de la Fresnaye)
The Artist's Wife and His Setter Dog
At the Seaside
Au Lapin Agile
Autumn Ivy (Ogata Kenzan)
Autumn Rhythm (Number 30)
Bache Madonna
Bain à la Grenouillère
The Baker's Cart
The Banks of the Bièvre near Bicêtre
Banquet in Silence (Marsden Hartley)
Bashi-Bazouk (Jean-Léon Gérôme)
A Basket of Clams (Winslow Homer)
Beauty Revealed
Black Iris (painting)
Black Stork in a Landscape
Boating (Édouard Manet)
Annunciation (Botticelli, New York)
Bouquet of Small Chrysanthemums (Léon Bonvin)
Boy Carrying a Sword
The Bridge at Villeneuve-la-Garenne
Brigand and His Wife in Prayer
Bringing Down Marble from the Quarries to Carrara
The Brioche
Broadway and 42nd Street
Broken Eggs
Burg Weiler Altarpiece
Butler Madonna
By the Seashore
Ca' Dolfin Tiepolos
The Calm Sea (painting)
Camouflage Self-Portrait
Cannon Rock (painting)
The Card Players
Catania and Mount Etna
Cemetery, New Mexico (Marsden Hartley)
Cervara Altarpiece
The Chess Players (Eakins painting)
Children Playing with a Goat
Christ Carrying the Cross (El Greco, New York)
Christ Presented to the People (Il Sodoma)
Christ with a Staff
Claes Duyst van Voorhout
Cloudy Mountains
Coast Guard Station, Two Lights, Maine
Coast Scene, Isles of Shoals
The Collector of Prints (Edgar Degas)
Comtesse de la Châtre
Captain George K. H. Coussmaker
Cow's Skull: Red, White, and Blue
A Cowherd at Valhermeil, Auvers-sur-Oise
Cows Crossing a Ford
Crucifixion (Corpus Hypercubus)
Crucifixion and Last Judgement diptych
Crucifixion with the Virgin and St John
The Cup of Tea
Cypresses (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
The Dance Class (Degas, Metropolitan Museum of Art)
The Dancing Class
The Dead Christ with Angels
The Death of Harmonia
The Death of Socrates
The Defense of Champigny
Delirious Hem
The Denial of Saint Peter (Caravaggio)
Diana and Cupid
The Dream of Aeneas (Salvator Rosa)
Dressing for the Carnival
Madonna and Child (Duccio)
Egyptian Woman with Earrings
Egyptians Raising Water from the Nile
The Empress Elizabeth of Russia on Horseback, Attended by a Page
Entrance to a Dutch Port
Equestrian Portrait of Cornelis and Michiel Pompe van Meerdervoort with Their Tutor and Coachman
Esther before Ahasuerus (Artemisia Gentileschi)
Ethel Scull 36 Times
The Experts (painting)
The Falls of Niagara
The Farm at Les Collettes, Cagnes
Femme Lisant
Ferry near Gorinchem
The Fingernail Test
Fish Market (Joachim Beuckelaer)
The Fishing Boat
Fishing Boats, Key West
The Five Points (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Florinda (painting)
The Forest in Winter at Sunset (painting)
The Fortune Teller (de La Tour)
Fruit Dish and Glass
The Funeral (painting)
Fur Traders Descending the Missouri
Garden at Sainte-Adresse
George Washington (Trumbull)
Gilbert Stuart (Goodridge)
A Girl Asleep
Girl with a Cat (Gwen John)
Glass Blowers of Murano
Golden Cock and Hen
A Goldsmith in His Shop, Possibly Saint Eligius
The Great Sirens
The Gulf Stream (painting)
Harlequin with a Guitar
The Harvest, Pontoise
The Harvesters (painting)
Haystacks:Autumn
Head of Christ (Rembrandt, New York)
The Heart of the Andes
The Hermit (Il solitario)
The Horse Fair
Houses on the Achterzaan
I Saw the Figure 5 in Gold
In a Courtyard, Tangier
The Interior of an Atelier of a Woman Painter (Lemoine)
Interior with a Young Couple and a Dog
Irises screen
Isaac Blessing Jacob (Gerbrand van den Eeckhout)
Isle of the Dead (painting)
Italian Hill Town (Arthur B. Davies)
Jo, the Beautiful Irishwoman
Joy of Life (Valadon)
Juan Legua
July Fourteenth, Rue Daunou, 1910
The Kearsarge at Boulogne
The Lacemaker (Maes)
Lachrymae (Frederic Leighton)
Lady at the Tea Table
Lady with the Rose (Charlotte Louise Burckhardt)
Lake George (John Frederick Kensett)
Landscape with Sky
The Last Communion of Saint Jerome (Botticelli)
Lehman Madonna
Lilacs in a Window
Lobster Fishermen (Marsden Hartley)
The Lovesick Maiden
Lukas Spielhausen
Lydia Crocheting in the Garden at Marly (Mary Cassatt)
Madame Élisabeth de France
Madame Grand (Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun)
Madonna and Child (Bellini, New York, 1485–1490)
Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints (Raphael)
Magdalene with Two Flames
The Maidservant
Maine Coast
Majas on a Balcony
Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zúñiga
The Marriage of the Virgin (Michelino da Besozzo)
The Martyrdom of Saint Barbara (Lucas Cranach the Elder)
The Masquerade Dress
The Matador Saluting
Max Schmitt in a Single Scull
Mérode Altarpiece
Merry company with two men and two women
Mezzetino (painting)
The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere (painting)
Miss V Dressed as a Bullfighter
Model by the Wicker Chair
Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley
Moonlight, Wood Island Light
Morning, An Overcast Day, Rouen
Moses Striking the Rock
Mother and Child (Cassatt)
Mountain Stream (John Singer Sargent)
Mountain with Red House
Movement No. 5, Provincetown Houses
Mr. and Mrs. I. N. Phelps Stokes
Mrs. Atkinson (Gwen John)
Mrs. Beckington (Alice Beckington)
Mrs. Hugh Hammersley
The Musician (Bartholomeus van der Helst painting)
A Musician and His Daughter
The Musicians (Caravaggio)
Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine (Memling)
Nativity scenes attributed to Zanobi Strozzi
Night-Shining White
Northeaster (painting)
Nude Before a Mirror
Oedipus and the Sphinx
Old Trees, Level Distance
Pity (William Blake)
Portrait of Madame Jacques-Louis Leblanc
Exhibitions