George Luks’s Armistice Night records one of the frenzied, flag-waving celebrations that marked the end of World War I. Luks’s skill at capturing the essence of an event in a few swift strokes was honed during his years as a newspaper illustrator in Philadelphia at the turn of the twentieth century, when he was often dispatched to sketch scenes of breaking news. In Armistice Night, as in his earlier illustrations, Luks does not deliberate over particulars: the painting is a blur of American and Allied flags, faces, and fireworks. Blue smoke obscures the buildings in the background, and few individuals stand out in the quickly-rendered crowd. Typically, Luks was more committed to capturing the spirit of the moment than to transcribing visual facts—in this case the action and human drama in a celebratory crowd.
Collection: Images
Project: 6. Under a cloak of terror: violence and armed conflict in Europe.
Chronology: XX
Scope: Secondary Education, Higher Education
Link: https://whitney.org/collection/works/909
Resource type: Painting
Format: Images
Source: Whitney Museum of American Art
Date: 1918
Owner: Porto group (Modernalia)
Identifier: 54.58
Copyright: Whitney Museum of American Art
Abstract: World War I
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