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Label Text Worth Steel Plant is quite characteristic of Ralston Crawford's work, both thematically and stylistically. Factories, bridges, boxcars, grain elevators, ships and docks are among subjects which frequently recur in his paintings. Detail has been reduced to a minimum and the color areas are flat with very little modulation. Only in the depiction of the grass in the foreground has the artist broken his color to differentiate the organic nature of the grass with the stark block-like forms of the factory against a cloudless pale blue sky. According to a letter from Crawford, the Worth Steel Plant was located "on the route of the old Pennsylvania Railroad at or very near Claymont, Delaware...near the Pennsylvania stateline." Crawford was born in 1906 in St. Catherines, Ontario, near Buffalo, New York where his family moved when he was still a boy. His interest turned to art at an early age and he studied in art schools in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Paris and at Columbia University in New York. By the end of the 1930's he had established his reputation not only as a painter but as a lithographer and photographer as well. He taught throughout the United States. After serving in the Army Air Force during World War II, Crawford returned to art and teaching. Source: Bulletin, March-April, 1978.
Exhibition History"Selected Cowles Family Gifts to the Permanent Collection," Des Moines Art Center, July 30 - Sept. 11, 1994

"Ralston Crawford," organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art, N.Y., (circulated to: Whitney Museum of American Art, Oct. 2, 1985 - Feb. 2, 1986; The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C., Apr. 19 - June 1, 1986; Portland Art Museum, OR, July 12 - Aug. 31, 1986; Akron Art Museum, OH, Sept. 19 - Nov. 2, 1986; Grand Rapids Art Museum, MI, Nov. 17, 1986 - Jan. 4, 1987)

Selected Works from the Des Moines Art Center's Permanent Collection," organized and circulated by the Waterloo Municipal Galleries, swponsored by the Nationbal Bank of Waterloo, Painting was not exhibited at the Waterloo Municipal Galleries, (circulated to: Charles H. MacNider Museum, Mason City, Jan. 15 - Feb. 22, 1984; Muscatine Art Center, Apr. 1 - May 13, 1984; Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, May 27 - July 1, 1984; Sioux City Art Center, July 15 - Aug. 26, 1984)

"Director's Choice," Gardner and Florence Call Cowles Foundation, an exhibition of thirty-four works of art purchased with the Director's Discretionary Fund, 1973-1982, Des Moines Art Center, Sept. 13 - Nov. 13, 1983

"Lines of Power," Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc. N.Y., Mar. 12 - Apr. 9, 1977

"Ralston Crawford," by Helman Gallery, St. Louis, May 22 - June 25, 1971
Published ReferencesRichard B. Freeman, RALSTON CRAWFORD, University of Alabama Press, 1953, ill. p.13

Barbara Rose, "Ralston Crawford: American Modernist," in "Ralston Crawford," exh. cat., Helman Gallery, St. Louis, 1971

John Russell, "When the Belief In Technology Was Ironclad," NEW YORK TIMES, Arts and Leisure Section, Mar. 27, 1977, (review by Hirschl & Adler Galleeries' exhibition "Lines of Power")

James H. Maroney, Jr., "Lines of Power," Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc., N. Y., 1977, color ill.

DMAC Bulletin, Mar./Apr. 1978 (cover ill.)

DES MOINES REGISTER, article by Nick Baldwin, Mar. 16, 1978, b/w ill.

"Director's Choice," Des Moines Art Center, 1983, b/w ill.

"Selected Works from the Des Moines Art Center's Permanent Collection," Waterloo Municipal Galleries, 1984, exh. cat. no.9

Barbara Haskell, "Ralston Crawford," Whitney Museum of American Art, N. Y., 1985, exh. cat. ref. p.158

DES MOINES ART CENTER: SELECTED PAINTINGS, SCULPTURES AND WORKS ON PAPER, Des Moines Art Center, 1985, ref. & b/w ill. p.55

ARCHI-SCAPES, Calendar, Pomegranate Calendars & Books, Petaluma, CA 94975, 1990, interior, full color ill.

AN UNCOMMON VISION: THE DES MOINES ART CENTER, Des Moines Art Center, 1998, ref. p.91, color ill. p.90

"Letters from John Cowles to His Family, 1943-1976; 1952", Edited by Elizabeth Ballantine, Durango Herald Press, 2005, cover ill.

DimensionsFrame: 33 1/2 × 41 5/8 × 1 1/2 in. (85.1 × 105.7 × 3.8 cm)
Canvas (/image): 32 × 40 in. (81.3 × 101.6 cm)
Accession Number 1977.23
Classificationspainting
CopyrightRalston Crawford Estate
SignedCrawford (l,r oil paint)
ProvenanceArtist; Joseph Helman, Helman Gallery, St. Louis [purchased from the previous]; Mr. and Mrs. Richard T. Fisher, St. Louis [purchased from the previous]; (Blum/Helman Gallery, New York); Des Moines Art Center [purchased from the previous with partial gift from the prior, 1977]

Images (1)

Photo Credit: Richard Sanders, Des Moines

Audio (1)

Audio Transcript

DSM Speaks Audio Tour with Shane McQuillen, Community Member

Run Time: 1:15
Recorded by Shane McQuillen, CultureALL Community Ambassador / 2022


Shane McQuillen Bio

Shane was born in New Zealand, and worked for a decade in Australian forests. He went back to university as a nontraditional student (or adult student in New Zealand), and graduated in 2013.  In 2014 he immigrated to the United States, spending two years working all over Chicago, then coming to Des Moines in 2016. He has two young children and enjoys experiencing Iowa with them and his partner.


DES MOINES SPEAKS

DSM Speaks are short audio reflections on artwork in our permanent collection, written and voiced by diverse members of our community. Contributors to this program were selected in partnership with CultureALL and the Des Moines Art Center. We hope by elevating these diverse ways of seeing we can encourage all visitors to connect more deeply and to see themselves and their identities within our walls.

Worth Steel Plant
Photo Credit: Richard Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Richard Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Ralston Crawford
1936
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Ralston Crawford
1937
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Joanne Ike Wilson
1958
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Walter Wellington Quirt
1951
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Gardner George Symons
date unknown
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Ralph Albert Blakelock
date unknown
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Roy Lichtenstein
1969
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Agnes Pelton
1928
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Jean-Michel Basquiat
1984