{"data":{"id":"301","type":"artist","attributes":{"id":301,"topgoose_id":2667,"tms_id":301,"display_name":"Ralston Crawford","sort_name":"Crawford Ralston","display_date":"1906–1978","begin_date":"1906","end_date":"1978","biography":"\u003cp\u003eIn his early paintings Ralston Crawford\nsought to develop an aesthetic language\nsuited to the massive industrial expansion\nof the United States in the decades\nfollowing World War I. Like his elder\ncolleagues \u003ca href=\"/artists/344\"\u003eCharles Demuth\u003c/a\u003e and \u003ca href=\"/artists/1209\"\u003eCharles\nSheeler\u003c/a\u003e, Crawford portrayed factories,\ngrain elevators, and mechanical structures\nusing hard-edged geometries, flat\nplanes of color, and crisply articulated\nlines—a style that came to be known\nas Precisionism. While many of Crawford’s\npaintings capture the country’s optimism\nabout technology and progress,\u003cem\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/em\u003e\u003ca href=\"/collection/works/2274\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eSteel\nFoundry, Coatesville, Pa\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003cem\u003e.\u003c/em\u003e presents a more austere vision. The painting depicts a foundry in Coatesville, a center of steel production located forty miles west of Philadelphia. The site had first captivated Crawford during his days as a student at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and by the time he painted this work he was living in nearby Exton, Pennsylvania. With their boldly flattened forms, the building and surroundings depicted in the painting reflect the Machine Age values of order, logic, and purity. At the same time, the dark structure is devoid of human presence and blocked off by a double layer of wooden fencing and concrete wall, its bleak severity countered only by the vivid blue sky and wispy clouds hovering above.\u003c/p\u003e","on_view":false,"artport":false,"biennial":true,"collection":true,"ulan_id":"500029588","wikidata_id":"Q3929822","created_at":"2017-08-30T17:30:37.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-03-30T07:05:06.389-04:00","links":{"artworks":"/api/artists/301/artworks","exhibitions":"/api/artists/301/exhibitions"}}}}