Sunrise

Sunset

A 30-second online art project:

Peter Burr, Sunshine Monument

Learn more

Learn more at whitney.org/artport

Skip to main content

Stuart Davis

House and Street
1931

Not on view

Date
1931

Classification
Paintings

Medium
Oil on canvas

Dimensions
Overall: 26 1/8 × 42 1/8in. (66.4 × 107 cm)

Accession number
41.3

Credit line
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase

Rights and reproductions
© Estate of Stuart Davis / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

API
artworks/1607

Although photographs from the 1930s reveal that House and Street represents the intersection of Front Street and Coenties Slip in lower Manhattan, complete with a backdrop of tenements and commercial skyscrapers, the painting’s most striking formal feature is the splitting of the intersection into two simultaneous, yet distinct street views—what Stuart Davis referred to as a “mental collage.” Davis was a movie fan, and it seems likely that he structured his composition like frames in a strip of film. House and Street, like many of his cityscapes, incorporates the barrage of signs, words, and lettering that constantly confront urban inhabitants. Along with “Front,” for Front Street, the artist included a bell—the symbol of the telephone company—and the word “Smith,” which may derive from a campaign poster for Alfred E. Smith, the popular governor of New York State who was seeking his party’s nomination in the 1932 presidential race.




Have feedback about the Whitney's online collection? Send us a message.