Horace Pippin, The Buffalo Hunt, 1933

Narrator: At first glance, this winter landscape may appear almost empty: a tree, snow drifts, and a gloomy gray sky. But the painting’s title, Buffalo Hunt invites you to look more carefully. In the lower right, you can make out the shaggy outline of a roughly painted buffalo or two. Forms in the lower left seem like they could be hunting dogs. And hunched below the tree, there’s a silhouette of a crouching man carrying a rifle. Horace Pippin’s loose, almost abstract approach to the scene makes it seem like a dream, a memory, or a symbol of something larger. He leaves the painting open to interpretation—inviting us to think for ourselves about what the scene might mean.