Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
"From an upper snow platform to which the hard blocks were thrown, a second man heaved them over the bank."
Alternate Title(s):Attack of the Snow Shovels; The Snow Shovels
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: 1906
Dimensions:
52 1/4 × 37 in. (132.7 × 94 cm)
Brandywine River Museum of Art, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Richard M. Scaife, 1992
Accession number: 92.4
Research Number: NCW: 56
InscribedLower right: N. C. WYETH (underlined) / 06; written on reverse of canvas: "And the next day they kept up / the attack of the shovels till long after / night had fallen."
ProvenanceThe artist; Mrs. N. C. Wyeth (and with Knoedler Galleries, 1956 - ca. 1968, #54805); Carolyn Wyeth to 1991
Exhibition HistoryNew York, NY, 1957, no. 36, as "The Attack of the Shovels"; Chadds Ford, PA, 1972, no. 37, as "The Snow Shovels"; Chadds Ford, PA, 1975; Cody, WY, 1980, ps. 14 and 57, b/w illus. p. 44 (plate no. 25) as "The Snow Shovels"; Chadds Ford, PA, Brandywine River Museum, "Visions of Winter," Jan. 14 - March 11, 1984; Chadds Ford, PA, 1987(2), p.12 (text), painting shown in b/w photo of N. C. Wyeth p. 13, color illus. p. 14, p. 199 no. 1; Chadds Ford, PA, 1990(2), p. 75, p. 81 no. 20, color illus. p. 48; Chadds Ford, PA, 2002(2); Burlington, VT, Shelburne Museum, "Wyeth Vertigo," June 22-Oct. 31, 2013, illus. p. 20, see also p. 26; Chadds Ford, PA, Brandywine River Museum of Art, June 22-Sept. 15, 2019 (and Portland, ME, Portland Museum of Art, Oct. 4, 2019-Jan. 12, 2020, and Cincinnati, OH, Taft Museum, Feb. 8-May 3, 2020), "N. C. Wyeth: New Perspectives," illus. p. 118;
References
Betsy James Wyeth, ed., The Wyeths, The Letters of N. C. Wyeth, 1901-1945 (Boston: Gambit, 1971), p. 177; Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth, The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, 1972), p. 268, b/w illus. p. 126; Stephen May, "N. C. Wyeth's Wild West," Southwest Art, vol. 20, no. 9 (Feb.1991), color illus. p. 99; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), I.147, p. 151
Curatorial Remarks"Caspar Whitney [editor of Outing Magazine] is sending me on a definite errand-to witness the blasting and shoveling out of the wagon provision trails to the mining camps…." So wrote N. C. Wyeth to his mother in late January or early February, 1906.
By Feb. 11, he wrote his mother, "I have completed one of the most glorious trips imaginable! Covering the ground from Denver to Hot Sulphur Springs on the Moffat R.R. directly across the "Continental Divide" 13,000 alt. Went from Sulphur Springs to Kremmling on a freight wagon by moonlight, reaching camp about 12:30 mid-night and minus 22 degrees. Followed through the famous and almost impassable Gore Canon the next day and stayed at the R.R. construction camp at the further end with 150 Swedes and Irish men. The next morning it was minus 33 degrees. Returned to Sulphur Springs Friday night." (both letters, Wyeth Family Archives)
The "Snow Road" pictures were the result of this trip, powerful documentation of first hand experience. In the Wyeth Family Archives is a photograph of N. C. Wyeth posing before this painting on an easel (reproduced in Betsy James Wyeth, ed., p. 177). Wyeth wrote about this painting, "...I have turned out the best picture I ever painted."
By Feb. 11, he wrote his mother, "I have completed one of the most glorious trips imaginable! Covering the ground from Denver to Hot Sulphur Springs on the Moffat R.R. directly across the "Continental Divide" 13,000 alt. Went from Sulphur Springs to Kremmling on a freight wagon by moonlight, reaching camp about 12:30 mid-night and minus 22 degrees. Followed through the famous and almost impassable Gore Canon the next day and stayed at the R.R. construction camp at the further end with 150 Swedes and Irish men. The next morning it was minus 33 degrees. Returned to Sulphur Springs Friday night." (both letters, Wyeth Family Archives)
The "Snow Road" pictures were the result of this trip, powerful documentation of first hand experience. In the Wyeth Family Archives is a photograph of N. C. Wyeth posing before this painting on an easel (reproduced in Betsy James Wyeth, ed., p. 177). Wyeth wrote about this painting, "...I have turned out the best picture I ever painted."
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:1. transparency directly from photograph; 2. N. C. Wyeth in the Bancroft studios, N. Rodney Street, Wilmington, DE, 1906, by an unknown photographer (Wyeth Family Archives)
Photo Credit:no credit on transparency