Pueblo, Tesuque, Number One

George Bellows 1917 - This painting shows a pueblo village with mountains behind it and activity in the town square with people and animals. George Wesley Bellows (1882-1925) was an American painter known for his depictions of urban life in New York City. He was proclaimed "The most acclaimed American artist of his generation." He was encouraged to go into proffesional baseball but instead went to New York to learn painting. He became a student of Robert Henri's "The Eight" and the Ashcan School, a group of artists who advocated painting contemporary American society in all its forms. His paintings are characterized by dark atmospheres, through which the bright, roughly lain brush strokes of the human figure vividly strike with a stong sense of motion and direction. He also associated with a group of radical artists and activists called "The Lyrical Left," who tended towards anarachism in their extreme advocacy of human rights.