Joseph Stella’s seven-foot-high Brooklyn Bridge (1919–20) is an ecstatic vision of New York—its audacious engineering, bright lights, rumbling tunnels, and omnipresent grit—compressed and stylized on canvas. A European-trained modernist smitten by American dynamism, Stella (1877–1946) constructed a synthesis of his visual impressions and visceral reactions to his adopted city. This lecture explores Stella’s imagery, its web of associations, and the artist’s distinctive means of expression. Generously sponsored by the Martin A. Ryerson Lectureship Fund.



In each lecture in this series, John Walsh selects an American painting in the Gallery’s collection and examines the similarities and differences between depiction and reality, returning to the painter’s original vantage point in an attempt to work out just what happened when he returned to the studio.



Note: This lecture is the fifth in the series American Views, Viewpoints, and Manipulations. All lectures are held in the Robert L. McNeil, Jr., Lecture Hall. Seating is limited. Doors open one hour prior to each lecture. Free tickets to the lecture are handed out in the lobby beginning one hour prior; ticket holders are guaranteed a seat.