Amber waves of grain display their bounty to an invincible fortress of dark, churning stormclouds in the subtly patriotic Midwestern scene, “Gray and Gold,” by American Regionalist John Rogers Cox. The artist rendered the painting completely from his imagination for entry in the 1942 Artists for Victory exhibition. Finishing the night before the competition’s deadline, Cox (1915 – 1990) shipped the work while it was still wet. Only his second painting, and possibly his last, it owes its detailed, flawless appearance to glazes of oil, varnish and turpentine. “Gray and Gold” won the Second Medal in the Artists for Victory exhibition at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.

© Art.com