Trees Near a Fence
1943
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
pen and black ink on wove paper
Dimensions
overall: 12.8 x 20 cm (5 1/16 x 7 7/8 in.)
Classification
Drawing
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Sally Michel Avery
Accession Number
2002.104.2.28
Art Historical Context
Milton Avery's *Trees Near a Fence*1943) is a delicate pen and black ink drawing on wove paper, measuring just 12.8 x 20 cm. Captured during World War II, this intimate landscape sketch showcases Avery's masterful line work, rendering the simple forms of trees and a fence with economical strokes. The smooth texture of wove paper allowed for precise ink application, highlighting his ability to evoke depth and atmosphere in a compact format. As a key figure in American modernism, Avery realism and abstraction through simplified shapes and flattened perspectives, influencing later artists like M...
About the Artist
Milton Avery
Milton Avery, born on March 7, 1885, in Altmar, New York, to a working-class family—his father a tanner—grew up in modest circumstances. After his family's move to the Hartford area of Connecticut in 1898, he took on various manual jobs, including as a mechanic, clerk, and construction worker, to support himself and relatives following family tragedies. His artistic path began around 1905 at the C...