Four Questions for… Elizabeth Kennedy

In The Eight and American Modernisms (my review here), Elizabeth Kennedy, Curator of Collection at the Terra Foundation for American Art, tries to reposition The Eight within the history of American modern art. Along with her fellow essayists, Dr. Kennedy tries to toss the terms “The Ashcan School” onto the dustbin of art history for good. Dr. Kennedy also graciously agreed to answer a few questions regarding The Eight for a new feature at Art Blog By Bob, Four Questions for…

ABBB: In The Eight and American Modernisms, you go out of your way to minimize the use of the term “Ashcan School.” I’m as guilty as anyone of using the two labels synonymously. Do you think that the “Ashcan School” label deserves a full retirement?

Dr. Kennedy: Since the catchy phrase “Ashcan School” was coined in 1934, it has caused much mischief in coming to terms with the painterly qualities of The Eight’s body of work as well as veiling the importance of them as early American modernists. The journalistic and commercial endeavors of the Philadelphia Four (Glackens, Luks, Shinn and Sloan), however, are somewhat connected to the concept of “realistic” portraying street life. The true connection to the term is Sloan’s 1905 etchings series of New York, which depict scenes that are alternatives to American academic artists’ genteel subjects.

For me, it is the careless mixing art and politics that is implied in the term “Ashcan,” invented during the Great Depression, which does a disservice to these artists’ ambitions to be “modern painters of one kind or another.” As early as 1907 Henri touted their differences (therefore, no school), and Sloan, until his death in the 1950s, disputed any political agenda for myself, who was at one time a socialist and a cartoonist for The Masses, or the other artists. In summary, there was no “social or political” agenda attached to these artists’ works of art.

ABBB: You chose Robert Henri’s Betalo Nude (1916) for the cover of The Eight and American Modernisms, which earned me several offended (and several lingering) stares while reading it on my commute. Do you feel that The Eight’s approach to the nude positions them closer to European modernism? If so, does that make them less “American”?

Dr. Kennedy: The human form is at the center of the western art tradition. The plethora of nude females pictured in US art after the 1860s continues until today. Art historian Kenneth Clark’s celebrated The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form (1972) makes the distinction between the “nude” and the “naked” model, which is an important difference to make for American art in the first decades of the 20th century. If the female nude form was idealized, then it could be accepted as a work of art; a realistic portrayal was problematic. While at the turn of the century, paintings of female nudes were found in American art exhibitions, but they were not as frequent as the French salons.

20th century avant-guard European art distorted the body—in color by Fauvist artists or in shape by cubists. Henri achieved his own ideas through the use of theories and inspiration—with no need to impose a national identity. The Betalo Nude is gorgeous because of the color harmonies used to create a shape that happens to be a body. Of course, a natural fission arises from viewing nudity but there are other paintings of nude women that do not have the same impact. Henri’s created an exceptional painting because if its color and composition.

ABBB: As The Eight and American Modernisms shows, the styles and personalities of the artists falling under that banner differ greatly. Is there one artist who stands out from the rest for you personally?

Dr. Kennedy: My favorite member of The Eight is Maurice Prendergast because of his willingness to explore unconventional ideas and, yet, when he found his original style that expressed his creativity he remained focused on his mission. His story is inspiring because eventually others, the important modern art collectors and artists, realized his brilliance. Nevertheless, he is an underappreciated modernist because he did not “fit the Ashcan” label nor did he preach a “mantra of modernism” in the style of Alfred Stieglitz or Thomas Hart Benton. Prendergast arose each morning and went to his studio to work and left behind some of the most beautiful paintings ever made.

ABBB: When The Eight whittled their number down to eight, they left Jerome Myers and George Bellows most notably outside the fold. Like the legendary “Fifth Beatle,” who would you nominate for the “Ninth” Eight? Are there any women candidates for the position?

Dr. Kennedy: If there had been a 9th artist, it should have been Herni’s protégée George Bellows. Bellows was an exceptionally inventive painter, whose brightly colored palette of men at work upset the “Ashcan” label—nothing gloomy about these New York streets. Bellows’ later portraits and nudes are equally exceptional for their technique and inventiveness. His work before his untimely death was verging on the surreal.

[Many thanks to Dr. Kennedy for her gracious and thoughtful answers.]

Private Dancer

"Different men are moved or left cold by lines according to the difference in their natures,” wrote Robert Henri. “What moves you is beautiful to you." Born June 24, 1865, Henri found women dancers moving in their beautiful, graceful movements and bodily freedom. Henri and the several other of The Eight artists found the modern dance style of Isadora Duncan especially intriguing. (John Sloan painted a portrait of Duncan in action in 1911.) Throughout his career, Henri painted many dancers, but one dancer—Betalo Rubino—captured his imagination the most as a model. From 1909 up until at least 1916, the dark eyes and hair of Betalo provided the perfect focal point for Henri’s explorations into color. Henri’s 1909 Salome remains for many the pinnacle of his career, or at least of his dancer and dancing works, but he continued to move past the colorful drama of that work and seek out new combinations. Unlike Degas, perhaps the most obsessive painter of dancers ever, Henri always paints the dancer as an individual rather than as a type. Degas’ dancers are beautiful in design, but you never feel that they are alive. In contrast, Henri’s Betalo the Dancer (above, from 1910) almost vibrates with life. The vigorous brushwork gives the sensation of movement, as if Betalo herself were suddenly caught unaware by our entrance and just turned to face the viewer.

Betalo proved to be an ideal model for exotic dress. Her athletic dancer’s physique and pretty face enhanced the exoticism of the costumes in works such as Dancer of Dehli and Dramatic Dancer, both done in 1916. In that same year of 1916, Henri painted Betalo several times in the nude. In the version above, Henri surrounds the pale-skinned, dark colored beauty with blues, grays, and whites. Like Whistler in works such as Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Little Blue Girl (1898), Henri approaches abstraction in the composition of pure color compliments and contrasts but remains in the figurative tradition through the centering theme of the nude. Betalo must have seemed like a godsend of a model to Henri in her amazing versatility. A living, breathing example of chiaroscuro, Betalo exuded the drama around which Henri could experiment in color with full freedom. Betalo’s natural grace in motion comes across in Henri’s ability to paint her lounging but simultaneously raising herself slightly from the couch, as if anticipation of something or someone.


In the painting of Betalo nude above, also from 1916, Henri surrounds his private dancer with pinks and greens. As with the blue-gray nude above, the colors around her become echoed in her pale skin. Just as the dancing costumes clothed her in other paintings, the colors around Betalo “clothe” her in these nude paintings. There’s also that same sense of movement in Betalo’s reclining pose, as if she’s right at the moment of lifting herself into a new position. I doubt Betalo could hold such a suspended pose for long, but Henri tried to work quickly to get a sense of the essence of the moment. “Do it all in one sitting if you can,” Henri said of capturing the spirit of a model. “In one minute if you can. There is no virtue in delaying." For Henri, speed and movement were more virtuous than meticulous detail. Henri’s nude paintings of Betalo Rubino and other women around 1915 and 1916 present them as vital, alive, confident women rather than passive objects receiving the artist’s gaze. For many feminist critics, female nudes represent the repressive patriarchy of art history. I agree for the most part. However, Robert Henri’s nudes express rather than repress the fullness of womanhood and present the private dancer to the public eye in all her glory.

Personal Shopper

When Dr. Albert C. Barnes wanted to start the collection that eventually became The Barnes Foundation in 1910 he had more money than actual knowledge of art. Dr. Barnes resourcefully called upon his high school friend, the painter William Glackens, to buy the works that would become the foundation of the museum. Born March 13, 1870, Glackens was already a well-established illustrator and painter associated with the Ashcan School who had been to Paris many times and became quite familiar with the works of the Impressionists. Glackens’s May Day, Central Park (above, from 1905) shows how he imported to America not only the Impressionist painting technique but also the Impressionist fascination with the everyday life of regular people. May Day, Central Park captures turn of the century New Yorkers enjoying leisure in Central Park, which opened in 1859 in emulation of the green-friendly renovations by Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann of Paris, France. One Impressionist especially obsessed with the Haussmannization of Paris was Glackens biggest influence (and biggest purchase on behalf of Barnes)— Renoir.

Glackens recognized the greatness of Renoir early on, buying works before the market rose. (Barnes himself would obsessively buy Renoirs for the rest of his life. Visiting The Barnes Foundation and its 181 works by Renoir today can give you a serious case of Renoir fatigue.) Glackens isn’t considered primarily an American Impressionist because of his association with Robert Henri, John Sloan, and other members of the Ashcan School, but Glackens appreciated the new dynamic of the Impressionists better than many others who simply mimicked the subject matter and brush stroke style. While others camped out on Monet’s doorstep, Glackens was painting works such as Nude with Apple (above, from 1909). Nude with Apple may not be as audacious as Edouard Manet's Olympia, which it alludes to, but for an American artist in 1909 it’s still pretty bold. Again, Glackens takes the French model and translates it into an American idiom, adding the apple to allude to this new “Eve” of the American “Eden,” where everything seemed so much fresher and newer than centuries-old Europe.

The Glackens room at The Barnes Foundation seems an anomaly after walking through rooms and rooms of Renoirs and other European masters. It stands as the simple acknowledgment to Glackens contribution of taste to the collection. For many critics, Glackens was too taken with Renoir, even to the point of losing the ability to put his own personality into his art. It is eerie how Glackens’ The Soda Fountain (above, from 1935) looks as if Renoir had traveled through time and space to drink a milkshake at an American corner drug store, circa 1935. However, I see Glackens as a great interpreter of the Impressionists, especially Renoir. Glackens saw beneath the brushstrokes and sunny day landscapes to the spirit and mind of the Impressionists. I like to think that if Manet or Renoir had been born in America in the late nineteenth century, they’d paint just like William Glackens.

Troubling the Waters

When Art Young published his political cartoon titled Poisoned at the Source (above) in the July 1913 issue of The Masses, The Associated Press sued him for libel. Born January 14, 1866, Art Young fought against the establishment at every turn, taking on the compliant media that Young saw assisting capitalism in its oppression of the people. Young married his passion for justice with his passion for art at a young age. After looking at a book illustrated by Gustave Dore, Young decided to become an illustrator himself, eventually studying at the Art Students League of New York, where he may have encountered several of the members of what later became known as the Ashcan School. Whereas the Ashcan School artists sought to depict the new urban existence of big American cities such as New York at the beginning of the twentieth century, and some of those artists, such as John Sloan and George Bellows dabbled in what could be called Socialism, none of them took their art as far left politically as Young. Sloan, the art director of The Masses, left over the ideological breach. "To me this magazine exists for socialism,” Young then said of The Masses. “That's why I give my drawings to it, anybody who doesn't believe in a socialist policy, as far as I go, can get out." Young believed in The Masses as an antidote to the “poison” spread by the AP and other mainstream media outlets.

Young truly saw the battle for social justice as a religious crusade. “I think we have the true religion,” Young told an interviewer in 1940 in his defense of his Socialism. “If only the crusade would take on more converts. But faith, like the faith they talk about in the churches, is ours and the goal is not unlike theirs, in that we want the same objectives but want it here on earth and not in the sky when we die.” In A Compulsory Religion (above, from 1912), Young portrays capitalism as the great god mammon, before whom the masses must bow out of fear of poverty and sickness. It’s amazing that we face the same concerns today, nearly a century later, as health care and bankruptcy haunt Americans as the twin specters of economic recession. Young uses amazingly deep blacks to depict the dark mood and ever-present fears of the people, whom he dwarfs before the gluttonous, grotesque god of greed. Although surrounded by the Impressionist-influenced Ashcan School artists, Young instead approaches the techniques of the German Expressionists in visually plumbing the depths of the collective American psyche.

I find Young’s illustrations still fresh and relevant today. Although he points to specific concerns of his time, those concerns still remain with us as long as social and economic injustice reigns. The timelessness of Young’s crusade coincides with the eternal message of Christianity in Young’s He Stirreth Up the People (above, from 1914). For Young, Jesus is “The Workingman of Nazareth” speaking to other workers to stand up for their rights. Here is Jesus the community organizer and rabble rouser causing trouble who refuses to be silenced. The U.S. Government tried to silence Young and The Masses in 1918 under the Espionage Act, claiming that Young’s anti-war comics interfered with the draft for World War I. The charges were eventually dropped, but The Masses ceased publication soon after. Young, however, continued to stir up trouble in other publications, practicing his personal brand of Christianity that placed the Beatitudes over the Ten Commandments. “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled,” said Jesus. Art Young lived those words and drew them until the end.

Before the Footlights

When Everett Shinn traveled to France in the summer of 1900, he most likely saw Edgar Degas’ paintings of dancers from the 1870s and 1880s. Born November 6, 1876, Shinn the American took Degas’ French treatment of the theater and dance and translated it to the American idiom of the Ashcan School in works such as Dancer in White Before the Footlights (above, from 1910). A playwright and actor himself, Shinn felt himself drawn to the theater and made it his specialty (as Degas had done before) in the Ashcan School’s larger program of depicting the growing American urban populating both at work and at play. Because of the clear appeal of such works, Shinn enjoyed commercial success long before fellow Ashcan School artists such as Robert Henri, John Sloan, William Glackens, and George Bellows. While his fellow Ashcan artists earned their reputation in depicting the darker, harsher side of urban life, the handsome and urbane Shinn cultivated a position in high society through these Degas-esque paintings.

Of course, Shinn still remained true to some degree to his roots as an illustrator. Working alongside Glackens and Sloan as newspaper illustrators, Shinn’s quick drafting skills and eye for arresting compositions soon made him a successful artist of everyday life in New York City. After witnessing the eviction of an old musician from his apartment on the Lower East Side, Shinn painted Eviction (Lower East Side) (above, from 1904). Pumping up the pathos, Shinn replaced the single old man with a whole family cast onto the streets. The family slumps onto a mattress in despair as passersby watch workers dump the family’s belongings beside them on the pavement. Jacob Riis’ photography, collected most notably in his 1890 work How the Other Half Lives, drew public attention to the deplorable living conditions many immigrants endured in their pursuit of the American dream. Despite such awareness and the first social policy changes aimed at alleviating the problem, squalor and crime continued to plague the poor in New York City decades later and demand the talents of Shinn and others to bring it to the public’s eye.


Today, scholars recall Shinn mainly as another member of the Ashcan school. Henri, Sloan, Glackens, and Bellows usually eclipse Shinn and his work. Shinn’s talent is undeniable, as seen in quick pastels such as his Self-Portrait (above, from 1901), but the balance of light and dark in his work skews too heavily towards the Degas-esque and not enough in the gritty direction we associate with his better known contemporaries. Shinn played to the taste of his time at the eventual expense of later obscurity when the public desired fewer pretty pictures and more depictions of harsh reality. Sadly, Shinn suffered through a series of broken marriages and financial ruin during the Great Depression before enjoying a brief renaissance of interest in his work in the 1930s until his death in 1953. Like his Ashcan cohorts, Shinn raised the field of illustration in America to the level of high art and helped usher in the age of American urban life as a subject worthy of the artistic spotlight.