Study for Stallion and Jack Fighting

John Steuart Curry was a leading figure among the Regionalists, artists who sought inspiration in rural America as an alternative to the urban centers of Europe. As part of his populist orientation, Curry often reiterated his painted subjects in lithographs printed in large editions and priced for middle-class consumption. In 1932, he painted Stallion and Jack Fighting, in which a powerful glistening horse tangles with a rawboned mule. At some point he decided that this subject would have wide appeal; so he set about reducing and refining the image, as we see in his drawing executed on tracing paper. He started with erasable pencil and then finalized his thoughts with ink. In 1943, he elaborated the image once again, drawing with a greasy crayon on a lithographic stone. The stone was then used to print the image, reversing the composition.