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Chris L. Christensen

Chris L. Christensen

John Steuart Curry

The imposing figure leading several men through the verdant cornfield at the heart of this painting is Chris L. Christensen, former dean of the University of Wisconsin’s College of Agriculture. Under Christensen’s leadership, University scientists developed a new corn hybrid well-suited to Wisconsin’s environment that helped farmers improve their crop yields.
Artist/Maker
John Steuart Curry
(American, 1897 – 1946)
Title
Chris L. Christensen
Date
1941
Material & Process
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
72 x 48 in. Overall
Credit
On loan from the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Inventory No.
3.1999.2
Classification
Paintings
Location
United States

Related

1943, gifted by the U.S. Treasury Department to the University of Wisconsin College of Agriculture [now called the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences]; 1999, deposited as a long-term loan to Elvehjem Museum of Art [now called Chazen Museum of Art]

  • Junker, Patricia. "John Steuart Curry: Inventing the Middle West." Madison, WI: Elvehjem Museum of Art and New York: Hudson Hills Press, 1998. pp. 71, 185, pl. 67, fig. 2
  • Kroiz, Lauren. "Cultivating Citizens: The Regional Work of Art in the New Deal Era." Oakland: University of California Press, 2018. pp. 186-188, 191, fig. 79, 81
  • Erickson, Doug. "7 Objects of Affection,” On Wisconsin vol. 188, no. 4 (Winter 2017): 26-27. p. 26, no. 6

  • John Steuart Curry: Inventing the Middle West: Elvehjem Museum of Art, 3/7/1998–1/3/1999

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