Haying 1946

Bernard Joseph Steffen made this print titled 'Haying', and just look at the process of those simplified shapes working together. The mark making is economical, the color palette pared back. The texture is smooth, but the color is layered up to describe form. See how the blue and brown of the haymakers clothes is contrasted by the golden bales of hay. I love the way the human figures blend into the hay bales. The blue of the sky is also used to define the form of the figures on the hay stacks. There's a real sense of these people being at one with the landscape, as if they're almost part of the hay itself. This reminds me of some of the work of Thomas Hart Benton, in the way it celebrates working class labour and brings a sense of dynamism to depictions of rural life. But this is its own thing, the beauty of art is how it remixes ideas in unexpected ways.