Spring, Central Park (1921): Art, History and Details

Spring, Central Park (1921) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is George Bellows (American, 1882–1925).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Within the city’s many parks, people from different social classes could mingle and observe one another. Both the men and women in this print are dressed in fashionable attire, and yet it remains unclear if the groups are of the same social class. By 1921, clothing mimicking couture fashions could be purchased off the rack, and even working-class men could buy the “white collars” associated with businessmen. The two ladies appear unaffected by the men’s laughter and backward glances; unaccompanied, and apparently absorbed in conversation, they epitomized the increasing independence of young urban women.

Object facts

• Title: Spring, Central Park
• Date: 1921
• Creator attribution: George Bellows (American, 1882–1925)
• Culture: America
• Type: Print
• Technique: lithograph
• Dimensions: Platemark: 21.4 x 17.6 cm (8 7/16 x 6 15/16 in.); Sheet: 28.2 x 23.9 cm (11 1/8 x 9 7/16 in.)
• Collection: PR - Lithograph
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 1936.587

A detail from the museum

These fashionably dressed young women are sporting fur muffs over their hands, whose large size denotes them as luxury items.

Collection credit

Gift of Leonard C. Hanna Jr.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.