Artist:
Barclay Rubincam
(American, 1920 - 1978)
Memorial Day
Medium: Oil on gesso panel
Date: 1951
Dimensions:
30 1/2 × 48 in. (77.5 × 121.9 cm)
Accession number: 2008.8.3
Copyright: © artist, artist's estate, or other rights holders
Label Copy:
Barclay Rubincam was born and raised in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and studied at the Wilmington Academy of Art under Frank Schoonover and N.C. Wyeth. During World War II, Rubincam served with an engineering unit in the South Pacific but was reassigned to produce illustrations, murals and posters for the Army’s Information Education Section.
After his military service he established a studio in West Chester, Pennsylvania, and began his career in portraits, landscape painting, murals, and graphic design. He exhibited his work at The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia Art Alliance, Chester County Art Association, The Wilmington Society of the Fine Arts, Hagley Museum, Toledo Museum of Art, West Chester State Teachers College, and Pennsylvania State University.
Rubincam’s reputation was built on scenes of local history such as his many visions of downtown West Chester during the nineteenth-century, recreations of the Battle of Brandywine in Chadds Ford, and Washington and his army at Valley Forge. The artist was also dedicated to exploring contemporary subjects from a modernist viewpoint in works such as Memorial Day. Rubincam minimized details, heightened the bold angle of light and shadow that divides the architecture, and contrasted these sharp angles with the organic shape of the iris and curvilinear turnings of the chair. The effect of his composition is a somber, poignant mood of reflection.
Barclay Rubincam was born and raised in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and studied at the Wilmington Academy of Art under Frank Schoonover and N.C. Wyeth. During World War II, Rubincam served with an engineering unit in the South Pacific but was reassigned to produce illustrations, murals and posters for the Army’s Information Education Section.
After his military service he established a studio in West Chester, Pennsylvania, and began his career in portraits, landscape painting, murals, and graphic design. He exhibited his work at The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia Art Alliance, Chester County Art Association, The Wilmington Society of the Fine Arts, Hagley Museum, Toledo Museum of Art, West Chester State Teachers College, and Pennsylvania State University.
Rubincam’s reputation was built on scenes of local history such as his many visions of downtown West Chester during the nineteenth-century, recreations of the Battle of Brandywine in Chadds Ford, and Washington and his army at Valley Forge. The artist was also dedicated to exploring contemporary subjects from a modernist viewpoint in works such as Memorial Day. Rubincam minimized details, heightened the bold angle of light and shadow that divides the architecture, and contrasted these sharp angles with the organic shape of the iris and curvilinear turnings of the chair. The effect of his composition is a somber, poignant mood of reflection.