Reel
1935/1942
Medium
watercolor, graphite, gouache, and pen and ink on paper
Dimensions
overall: 30.5 x 23.1 cm (12 x 9 1/8 in.) Original IAD Object: 35 1/2" high; 30" wide
Classification
Index of American Design
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Index of American Design
Accession Number
1943.8.14851
Art Historical Context
**Reel** by Florence Truelson, between 1935 and1942, is a rendering from the Index of American Design, a WPA Federal Art Project that employed artists during the Great Depression to document the nation's folk art and crafts. This mixed-media work—watercolor, graphite, gouache,, and ink on paper—measures 30.5 x 23.1 cm and meticulously captures an original American design object measuring 35½ inches high by 30 inches wide, likely a functional folk artifact like a fishing or yarn reel, highlighting everyday ingenuity in early American life. Truelson's precise technique exemplifies the Index's g...
About the Artist
Florence Truelson
Florence Truelson is an artist whose biographical details remain largely undocumented in the major art historical sources. No confirmed dates of birth or death have been established, and her nationality, training, and primary working period are not reliably recorded in available scholarship. Works attributed to Truelson suggest a practiced hand and an awareness of the artistic conventions of her ...