I Met a Painting Once

And got to know it well

Sep 23, 2024

YEARS AGO, when the Cleveland Museum of Art undertook a massive renovation and redesign of its galleries, visitors were, for a while, out of touch with Gray and Gold, an oil painting by American John Rogers Cox. For me and many others, I suspect, this was a little unsettling, for while the painting isn't Mona-Lisa famous, it definitely has a following. Post a picture of it on Facebook and watch how many people chime in with, "I love that painting!"

Up until social media, I confess, I thought the painting and I had a special relationship. If memory serves, it used to be hung at the juncture of two hallways, set off by itself in a way that seemed to say You are here. As you see, the image depicts golden fields illuminated by an unseen sun and made more ominously bright by dark billowing storm clouds. The canvas is divided by two intersecting country roads. Telephone poles march backward toward the horizon.

It first caught my eye because it reminded me of scenes I'd come across as an erstwhile runner putting in country miles on the roads around Bowling Green, Ohio. You could see scenes just like that out on a long run when maybe you had started under a benign-looking sky and found yourself four miles out of town when clouds started rolling in.

But Cox (1915–1990) didn't make Gray and Gold for nostalgia. As you can read if you visit the painting on the web¹ or in person at CMA's Gallery 226B, Cox painted Gray and Gold in 1942-43, soon after the United States joined World War II.

"(I)ts image of amber waves of grain threatened by ominous storm clouds likely has symbolic overtones. The painting's foreground features an intersection of two dirt lanes, as well as a telephone pole emblazoned with political campaign posters. The artist seems to imply that American democracy is at a crossroads during this time of combat against the spread of fascism in Europe and Asia."

Soon after he'd made the painting, Cox — who had gone to art school but fell back on work at a bank before becoming director of a gallery in Terre Haute, Indiana — enlisted in the Army, where he served from 1943 to 1945.

CMA bought Gray and Gold, which was only Cox's second oil painting, out of a traveling exhibition titled Artists for Victory — a show assembled to support the war effort.

But enough history.

ONE OF THE THINGS I love about this painting is that it bears repeated viewing. It features no figure with an ambiguous smile, no lilies floating in misty waters or stars swirling in a magical sky. Yet even if you know nothing about the context in which it was made, you can still feel what Cox must have wanted us to feel: beauty made brighter by the darkness rolling in. We can hear his warning.

And of course the painting takes on extra resonance in these times when we, too, are surrounded by beauty and peril.

So why have I written all this about one painting?

Because to me, it's important to have touchstones in visual art. This is especially true for those of us lucky enough to live in proximity to a great art collection. When we visit a favorite painting or sculpture, we can come to know it like an old friend — to come to appreciate details we hadn't noticed at first and create a dialogue over time.

Last week, someone shared with me an interactive piece from The New York Times headlined Test Your Focus: Can You Spend 10 Minutes With One Painting.²The article is based on a professor's assignment that challenges students to look at a painting for three hours. You can think of it as a challenge of attention span, and it is. But I think the world might be a little brighter if we all stopped rushing past the awesome and settled in for a bit.

Could you — do you? — ever go to a museum or gallery just to visit a single piece of art? Not to test your attention span but simply to have the kind of conversation the artist might have hoped you'd have with it? Do you bring this sort of attention to any art you might have in your own home?

This isn't something to do to make oneself morally superior. But in my experience with Gray and Gold and other artworks, focusing on a single artwork stills the soul in a uniquely satisfying way. Almost like watching the face of a longtime friend when they're talking and feeling it down deep:

I know you.