Skip to main contentProvenanceThe artist
Margo Pollins Schab, Inc., New York, New York
Terra Foundation for the Arts Collection, Chicago, Illinois, 1996
Exhibition HistoryPublished References
Clare Leighton
(American, 1898–1989)
The Lumber Camp - Cutting
1931
Wood engraving on off-white simile Japan or Japanese paper
Image: 11 7/16 x 8 in. (29.1 x 20.3 cm)
Sheet: 15 1/8 x 9 7/8 in. (38.4 x 25.1 cm)
Mat: 20 x 16 in. (50.8 x 40.6 cm)
Sheet: 15 1/8 x 9 7/8 in. (38.4 x 25.1 cm)
Mat: 20 x 16 in. (50.8 x 40.6 cm)
Credit LineTerra Foundation for American Art, Daniel J. Terra Collection
Object number1996.33.a
SignedIn graphite, lower right beneath image: Clare Leighton
InterpretationIn Clare Leighton's Cutting, two lumberjacks use a thin-bladed two-hand crosscut saw to fell a large evergreen tree in a snow-covered forest. Leighton positions the viewer behind the man at left, who anchors his vigorous exertions by wedging his knee into the mounded snow at the base of the tree. On the other side of the trunk, his partner is hunched over as he saws. The background, framed by a snow-laden bough at the upper left, is a glimpse of a forest of slender trees and pristine snow; a snow-crowned stump at the upper right hints at the harvest of a prior year.
Cutting is the first in Leighton's series of six wood engravings illustrating different aspects of the work involved in timber harvesting. The series grew out of her observations at the Canadian International Paper Company's lumber camp in the Laurentian Mountains of Quebec, which she visited in the winter of 1930–31 during one of a series of lecture tours she undertook in the United States before emigrating there permanently in 1939. Leighton engraved her designs on wood blocks from sketches made on site. Notwithstanding the remote setting that inspired the series, its theme of bodily toil is consistent with Leighton's many prints of English rural life. Her series echoes the concerns of many American artists during the 1930s, when the poverty and unemployment of the Great Depression inspired glorification of the ordinary worker, as in the prints of James Edward Allen (TF1995.23), Gifford Beal (TF 1996.76, TF 1996.77), and Benton Murdoch Spruance (TF 1995.47.a, TF 1995.47.b, TF 1995.47.c), who, like Leighton, used a serial format to portray work in a narrative fashion.
Leighton probably delighted in this subject about wood, the material she used to create her prints. Adapting traditional technique to her modern sensibility, she carefully modeled the figures, contrasting the smoothness of their clothing with the textured tree bark. Powerful juxtapositions of dark and light, derived here from the white of the uninked paper, underscore the drama of the subject, in which the massive tree appears about to fall with thunderous and potentially deadly effect. Leighton's technique itself is delicate; contours and highlights are delineated in superfine lines, with such minute details as the jagged saw edge and the nails in the heel of the lumberjack's right boot brought into sharp focus. Leighton evidently considered Cutting an exemplary print, for in her 1932 book Wood-engraving and Woodcuts, a manual on the exacting wood-engraving process, she reproduced three impressions of this print to demonstrate the result of under-inking, over-inking, and the perfect medium between the two.
Cutting is the first in Leighton's series of six wood engravings illustrating different aspects of the work involved in timber harvesting. The series grew out of her observations at the Canadian International Paper Company's lumber camp in the Laurentian Mountains of Quebec, which she visited in the winter of 1930–31 during one of a series of lecture tours she undertook in the United States before emigrating there permanently in 1939. Leighton engraved her designs on wood blocks from sketches made on site. Notwithstanding the remote setting that inspired the series, its theme of bodily toil is consistent with Leighton's many prints of English rural life. Her series echoes the concerns of many American artists during the 1930s, when the poverty and unemployment of the Great Depression inspired glorification of the ordinary worker, as in the prints of James Edward Allen (TF1995.23), Gifford Beal (TF 1996.76, TF 1996.77), and Benton Murdoch Spruance (TF 1995.47.a, TF 1995.47.b, TF 1995.47.c), who, like Leighton, used a serial format to portray work in a narrative fashion.
Leighton probably delighted in this subject about wood, the material she used to create her prints. Adapting traditional technique to her modern sensibility, she carefully modeled the figures, contrasting the smoothness of their clothing with the textured tree bark. Powerful juxtapositions of dark and light, derived here from the white of the uninked paper, underscore the drama of the subject, in which the massive tree appears about to fall with thunderous and potentially deadly effect. Leighton's technique itself is delicate; contours and highlights are delineated in superfine lines, with such minute details as the jagged saw edge and the nails in the heel of the lumberjack's right boot brought into sharp focus. Leighton evidently considered Cutting an exemplary print, for in her 1932 book Wood-engraving and Woodcuts, a manual on the exacting wood-engraving process, she reproduced three impressions of this print to demonstrate the result of under-inking, over-inking, and the perfect medium between the two.
Margo Pollins Schab, Inc., New York, New York
Terra Foundation for the Arts Collection, Chicago, Illinois, 1996
Exhibition History
Visions of a Nation: Exploring Identity through American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, August 10, 1996–January 12, 1997.
On Process: The American Print, Technique Examined, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, January 13–March 2, 2001.
(Re)Presenting Women, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, October 16, 2001–January 13, 2002.
The People Work: American Perspectives, 1840–1940 (Le Travail à l'oeuvre: les artistes américains 1840–1940), Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, June 8–August 17, 2003. [exh. cat.]
Manifest Destiny, Manifest Responsibility: Environmentalism and the Art of the American Landscape. Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois and Loyola University Museum of Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizers). Venue: Loyola University Museum of Art, May 17–August 10, 2008. [exh. cat.]
On Process: The American Print, Technique Examined, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, January 13–March 2, 2001.
(Re)Presenting Women, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, October 16, 2001–January 13, 2002.
The People Work: American Perspectives, 1840–1940 (Le Travail à l'oeuvre: les artistes américains 1840–1940), Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, June 8–August 17, 2003. [exh. cat.]
Manifest Destiny, Manifest Responsibility: Environmentalism and the Art of the American Landscape. Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois and Loyola University Museum of Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizers). Venue: Loyola University Museum of Art, May 17–August 10, 2008. [exh. cat.]
Leighton, Clare. Wood-Engraving and Woodcuts. How to do it Series, No. 2. London, England: The Studio, Ltd., 1932. [See pp. 88-93 for text and illustrations of Cutting, which is used as an example to show an underinked impression, an overinked impression, and an impression with the right amount of ink.]
Hardie, Martin. "The Wood Engravings of Clare Leighton." The Print Collector's Quarterly 22 (April 1935). No. 199, p. 163; pp. 139–165.
Fletcher, William Dolan. Clare Leighton, An Exhibition: American Sheaves, English Seed Corn. (exh. cat., Boston Public Library). Boston, Massachusetts: Boston Public Library, 1978. No. 193.
Jaffe, Patricia. The Wood Engravings of Clare Leighton. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Silent Books, 1992. No. 40.
Brownlee, Peter John. Manifest Destiny / Manifest Responsibility: Environmentalism and the Art of the American Landscape. (exh. cat., Loyola University Museum of Art, Chicago, Illinois). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for American Art and Loyola University Museum of Art, 2008. Text p. 36 (checklist).
Hardie, Martin. "The Wood Engravings of Clare Leighton." The Print Collector's Quarterly 22 (April 1935). No. 199, p. 163; pp. 139–165.
Fletcher, William Dolan. Clare Leighton, An Exhibition: American Sheaves, English Seed Corn. (exh. cat., Boston Public Library). Boston, Massachusetts: Boston Public Library, 1978. No. 193.
Jaffe, Patricia. The Wood Engravings of Clare Leighton. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Silent Books, 1992. No. 40.
Brownlee, Peter John. Manifest Destiny / Manifest Responsibility: Environmentalism and the Art of the American Landscape. (exh. cat., Loyola University Museum of Art, Chicago, Illinois). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for American Art and Loyola University Museum of Art, 2008. Text p. 36 (checklist).