The Burial of Fodder-Wing

Artist:

N.C. Wyeth

(American, 1882 - 1945)

The Burial of Fodder-Wing

Medium: Oil on hardboard (Renaissance Panel)
Date: 1939
Dimensions:
30 × 22 1/4 in. (76.2 × 56.5 cm)
Private collection, Wilmington, DE
Accession number: SUPP2000.1696
Research Number: NCW: 1696
InscribedLower left: N C WYETH (underlined); painted on reverse of panel: THE BURIAL OF FODDER WING; adhered to reverse of panel, Renaissance Panel label of F. Weber Co., no. 763, dated 3/24/39; written in blue crayon at bottom of label: 4; adhered to panel in u.r., red-bordered label written in ink: 131
ProvenanceMrs. N. C. Wyeth; (Chadds Ford Gallery, Chadds Ford, PA, 1967); descended in family of purchaser
Exhibition Historyprobably Clearwater, FL, 1941
References Richard Layton, "Inventory of Paintings in the Wyeth Studio, 1950," unpublished, Wyeth Family Archives, p. 13; Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth, The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, 1972), p. 196; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), I.1278, p. 576
Curatorial RemarksWyeth visited Florida in preparation for this trip, collecting a number of photographs and postcards that he used as visual references. Several of the photographs show this silhouette-like effect of a line of trees against a contrasting background.
Henry White Taylor was the first director of the Clearwater (Florida) Art Museum but prior to this post was in the Bucks County-Philadlephia region, a former student at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. He had met N. C. Wyeth by 1928 and was probably the organizer of the exhibition in Clearwater of Wyeth's Yearling paintings.
At least eight of Wyeth's paintings for The Yearling, including this one, were used as models for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's 1946 movie adaptation of the book. Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings felt that "the most effective shots in the film were exact reproductions of (Wyeth's) paintings." (Time Magazine, vol. XLIX, no. 6 (Feb. 10, 1947), p. 12)
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:1. photography directly from painting; 2. archival photograph, Brandywine River Museum library, marked: MAR 7 |39, PROD, 1, 6, 1, 0, SBLD, 36.
Photo Credit:1. Rick Echelmeyer, 2/2006; 2. photographer unknown