{"data":{"id":"197","type":"artist","attributes":{"id":197,"topgoose_id":2990,"tms_id":197,"display_name":"Charles Burchfield","sort_name":"Burchfield Charles","display_date":"1893–1967","begin_date":"1893","end_date":"1967","biography":"\u003cp\u003eFor Charles Burchfield, the American landscape was a source of revelation. Working primarily in watercolor, he captured the vicissitudes of each season at every time of day and change in weather— an infinite variety that, in turn, became a mirror of his own moods and emotions. \u003ca href=\"/collection/works/2566\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eNoontide in Late May\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003e belongs to an early group of lyrical nature studies Burchfield made in his boyhood home of Salem, Ohio. Produced during his self-described “golden year,” in which he completed his artistic training and embarked on his first mature works, this depiction of a neighbor’s backyard conveys the pulsing fecundity of a spring afternoon. Burchfield described the work as “an attempt to interpret a child’s impression of noon-tide in late May—The heat of the sun streaming down and rosebushes making the air drowsy with their perfume.” Yet while his swelling forms are suffused with a sense of radiant exuberance, they also hint at an underlying disquiet, especially in the writhing thicket of trees at the rear. Indeed, several of the scene’s stylized motifs relate to the series of abstract forms Burchfield devised as “Conventions for Abstract Thoughts,” evoking threatening emotional states he associated with childhood, such as “Fear,” “Menace,” and “Dangerous Brooding.”\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBurchfield’s residence in Salem and later Buffalo, New York, distanced him from the New York art world. By the 1930s, however, his emphasis on small-town subject matter and a shift to a darkened palette led to his association with fellow painters of the American Scene, and especially to his friend \u003ca href=\"/artists/621\"\u003eEdward Hopper\u003c/a\u003e. \u003ca href=\"/collection/works/2550\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eIce Glare\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003e, a watercolor from\nthis period, depicts a solitary residential\nstreet in Buffalo. The intense contrast\nbetween the dilapidated buildings and the\nbrilliant light reflected off the snow\nreinforces the crisp austerity of this\nDepression-era scene.\u003c/p\u003e","on_view":false,"artport":false,"biennial":true,"collection":true,"ulan_id":"500015189","wikidata_id":"Q3349279","created_at":"2017-08-30T17:41:23.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-03-31T07:02:40.511-04:00","links":{"artworks":"/api/artists/197/artworks","exhibitions":"/api/artists/197/exhibitions"}}}}