Rip Van Winkle
William Gropper, American, 1897 - 1977
1943
Lithograph on wove paper
250?
Image: 13 7/16 × 9 in. (34.1 × 22.8 cm)
Sheet: 16 × 12 1/16 in. (40.6 × 30.7 cm)
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Purchased through the Julia L. Whittier Fund and the Guernsey Center Moore 1904 Memorial Fund
PR.945.81.2
Publisher
Associated American Artists, New York
Geography
Place Made: United States, North America
Period
20th century
Object Name
Research Area
On view
Inscriptions
Signed, in graphite, lower right margin: Wm Gropper-; signed, in stone, lower left: GROPPER-
Label
A ragged old man with a long white beard supports himself by using his musket as a walking stick in this print by William Gropper. The man is Rip Van Winkle, the titular character of a short story by Washington Irving about an American colonist who sleeps for twenty years in the Catskills, completely missing the American Revolution. In the story, Rip Van Winkle’s struggles highlight the rapid changes in American society following the war for independence. The print is part of a series celebrating American folk stories, which also included characters like Johnny Appleseed, Davy Crockett, and John Henry. What can folktales and myths tell us about the ideals of a nation?
From the 2026 exhibition Nurturing Nationhood: Artistic Constructions of America, 1790-1940, curated by Haely Chang (Jane and Raphael Bernstein Associate Curator of East Asian Art), Evonne Fuselier (Hood Museum Board of Advisors Mutual Learning Fellow), Michael Hartman (former Jonathan Little Cohen Curator of American Art), Elizabeth Rice Mattison (Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Academic Programming and Curator of European Art), and Ashley B. Offill (Curator of Collections)
Exhibition History
Looking for America: Prints of Rural Life from the 1930's and 1940's, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, December 3, 1994-March 5, 1995
Nurturing Nationhood: Artistic Constructions of America, 1790-1940, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire; February 7-August 29, 2026.
Publication History
Barbara J. MacAdam, Looking for America: Prints of Rural Life from the 1930s and 1940s, Hanover, New Hampshire: Trustees of Dartmouth College, 1994, listed no. 29.
Provenance
Associated American Artists, New York; sold to present collection, 1945.
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