Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.

American, 1909 - 1988

Explore Selected Works

A man bows his bald head deeply as he rests his splayed elbows on his thighs in this freestanding plaster sculpture. The long toes of the man’s feet nearly touch, and they are angled to our right in this photograph. He sits on a low surface, also sculpted from plaster, and his long limbs create a cage around his hollowed chest. The surface of the plaster is ivory white in some areas and parchment brown in others. The piece rests on a gray pedestal against gray walls.
Wilhelm Lehmbruck, Seated Youth, 1917, composite tinted plaster, Andrew W. Mellon Fund, 1974.49.1

Seated Youth

Wilhelm Lehmbruck · 1917 · composite tinted plaster ·  Accession ID  1974.49.1

We look across river at a bridge with a city skyline beyond in this stylized, horizontal landscape, which is painted entirely with broad, visible brushstrokes in vivid, saturated colors. The river spans nearly the width of the canvas, and the riverbank is lined to our left with a row of several buildings between us and the bridge. Those buildings are outlined with royal blue and filled in with mostly flat areas of color in coral pink, mint green, tangerine orange, and pinkish tan. Letters across the top of the building farthest from us reads “BREVER.” Eight boats are tied up at the foot of the buildings. The pointed hulls of three extend into the scene from the lower left corner, painted in marigold orange and outlined in cobalt blue. Five more boats, with rounded prows and hulls and painted with lapis blue and muted aqua, line up like a row of empty shoes. The bridge runs from behind the tallest building to our left across and off the canvas, and is painted with deep lapis blue with crimson-red Xes crisscrossing the span to suggest trestles. The front faces of the pilings below are also highlighted with red. The river fills most of the bottom half of the painting. The water to our left is painted as a field of coral pink with a few, short horizontal baby and cobalt-blue strokes, suggesting reflections of the boats and a bridge piling. A narrow band of kiwi green and sky blue lines the pink field to our right. Next to it, the water is painted as short, horizontal, disconnected strokes and dots mostly in bumblebee yellow with some strokes in bubblegum pink and pale burnt orange, all against the off white of the canvas below. The final zone, to our right, is more densely painted with short dashes in indigo, turquoise, and aqua blue. Beyond the bridge, the skyline is painted in silhouette with spiky spires to our left in mint green and a mass of shorter buildings in periwinkle blue to our right. Four clouds of pale yellow billow off the bridge in front of the skyline. The sky above is painted with short and long vertical strokes of butter yellow, rose pink, pale orange, and a few areas of watermelon pink. The artist signed the work with cobalt-blue paint near the lower left corner: “a derain.”
André Derain, Charing Cross Bridge, London, 1906, oil on canvas, John Hay Whitney Collection, 1982.76.3

Charing Cross Bridge, London

André Derain · 1906 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1982.76.3

A cartoonish tooth-like form and a fork float against a roughly oval field in this abstracted wooden sculpture. Presumably the shirt front of the sculpture's title, the tooth-like form takes up the left half of the composition. It has a rounded top with two pointed root-like legs below, and has two dots like eyes near the top. The fork to our right points downward and the four tines are cut off by the bottom edge of the composition. The shirt front, dots, and fork are carved and painted nickel gray so they look like thick outlines in low relief. The background to our left and over the shirt front is black. The area between the shirt front and fork is dark gray, and the field to our right of the fork is silvery gray. The sculpture hangs on a white wall, and it casts a narrow shadow from the bottom edge.
Jean (Hans) Arp, Shirt Front and Fork, 1922, painted wood, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1983.3.1

Shirt Front and Fork

Jean (Hans) Arp · 1922 · painted wood ·  Accession ID  1983.3.1

A battle scene set on a grassy field is painted with vivid, saturated tones of green, bright blue, brown, pearl white, and shades of gray and blue in this nearly square composition. The men closest to us wear uniforms of black jackets, dark blue pants, and flat-topped, brimmed caps. At the center, a man flails backward on a rearing chestnut-brown horse. A uniformed man with a goatee and wearing a high-crowned hat with a gray feather holds the reins of the rearing horse, as a white horse shies just beyond his shoulder. Another brown horse lies on the ground, tongue out, with a man draped over its saddle nearby. In the near distance, two men help an injured solider. Closer to us, a man reaches for some bushes and another lies on the ground, one arm raised. A screen of white smoke obscures the view beyond the rearing horse, and a black form at the center of orange and red streaks could represent an explosive. Another soldier on a brown horse raises one hand just to the right of the others, and three lines of troops press forward to the right following an American flag with seventeen visible stars and the thirteen red and white stripes held aloft by a bearer in the front row. Two men lie dead on the ground here, and another man is carried away on a stretcher. More troops stand in rows or man cannons in the background. A line of soldiers wearing brown and a mounted officer wearing a gray uniform advance from the left in the background. These troops hold flags with two red stripes flanking a single white stripe, and blue fields with seven stars. White clouds kick up in the blue sky above. The scene is painted simply in an almost cartoonish style.
American 19th Century, Civil War Battle, 1861 or after, oil on canvas, Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, 1959.11.7

Civil War Battle

American 19th Century · 1861 or after · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1959.11.7