Art and Industry in the XXth century

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Art and Industry in the XXth century

• The example
• of
• Charles SHEELER
• (18831965)

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In the fall of 1927 Charles Sheeler was
commissioned to photograph the Ford Motor Company
plant in Dearborn, Michigan, often referred to as
the Rouge plant. With the launch of the new Model
A, automobile production began that same year.
Sheeler's Rouge commission was part of a 1.3
million advertising campaign to generate
excitement and public interest in a new modern
automobile and powerful new plant.
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Sheeler spent about six weeks at the massive Ford
plant, which covered 1100 acres and employed
about 75,000 people. The Rouge was the largest
industrial complex in the world, distinguished by
its independence from outside suppliers. Most
notably, it had its own steel foundry. Iron ore
was brought in by freighter, converted into steel
and transformed into the engines, frames, bodies,
and parts to make a complete automobile
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River Rouge Plant Slag Buggy, 1927
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River Rouge Plant Stamping Press 1927
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River Rouge Plant, Criss-Crossed Conveyors, 1927
gelatin silver print. Courtesy of the Museum of
Fine Arts, Boston, The Lane Collection
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the cathédral ,Chartres 1929
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 Our factories are our substitute for religious
expression.  C.Sheeler
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River Rouge Plant 1932 Original Size 51 x 61
cm
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Classic Landscape (1931)
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In 1938, Charles Sheeler was commissioned by
Fortune magazine to produce six paintings
extolling America's industrial power . They werre
published and exhibited in 1940
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(No Transcript)
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Rolling Power, 1939.  Oil on canvas 38,1 x 72,6
cm
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Suspended Power, 1939Oil on canvas
A new hydroelectric turbine being lowered into
place at the Tennessee Valley Authority dam in
Guntersville, Alabama
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Steam Turbine, 1939Oil on canvas, 22 X 18"
(55.88 x 45.72 cm.)
one of the turbines at the Hudson Avenue Station
of the Brooklyn Edison Company, New York, then
the world's largest steam power plant
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Yankee Clipper1939Museum of Art,School of
DesignProvidence, Rhode Island, US
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Conversationsky and earth 1939 (oil on
canvas) The Hoover dam
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machines are not "strange, inhuman masses of
material, but exquisite manifestations of human
reason   C.Sheeler