The Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by 20th century American author John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, was written in 1939, and describes the plight of migrant farm workers in Central California during the Great Depression. This work of art was created by American painter and muralist Thomas Hart Benton, an artist well known for his affinity for portraying the lives of ordinary people.

Benton presents the opening scene of the story, in which the Joad family is preparing to leave the dustbowls of Oklahoma for the promise of work and a better life in California. This image served as the cover for a 1940 version published by Limited Editions Club. It was also commissioned for use in a series of posters used to advertise the release of the film, The Grapes of Wrath, starring Henry Fonda and produced by Twentieth Century Fox in 1940.

Las uvas de la ira, la novela por el escritor estadounidense John Steinbeck y galardonada con el Premio Pulitzer, fue escrita en 1939 y describe las dificultades de los campesinos migrantes en California central durante la Gran Depresión. Esta litografía fue realizada por el pintor y muralista Thomas Hart Benton, conocido por sus representaciones de las vidas de personas ordinarias.

Benton presenta la escena inicial de la historia cuando la familia Joad se prepara a abandonar las tierras erosionadas de Oklahoma en busca de trabajo y una mejor vida en California. Esta imagen fue la portada de la edición de 1940 publicada por Limited Editions Club. Había sido encargada para una serie de carteles anunciando la película Las uvas de la ira protagonizada por Henry Fonda y producida por Twentieth Century Fox en 1940.

October 18, 2014
Anita Feldman, Deputy Director Collections & Exhibitions
Thomas Hart Benton
American • 1889–1975
Departure of the Joads
Lithograph • 1939
The phenomenal success of John Steinbeck’s controver- sial 1939 novel The Grapes of Wrath prompted the Limited Editions Club to commission Regionalist painter Thomas Benton to illustrate a new edition of the book published the following year. Benton’s Marxist sympathies and devotion to genuinely American subjects, heightened by his own experi- ence of the Great Depression, made him ideally suited for the task. After abandoning the often hostile environment of New York in 1935 to return to his Midwestern roots, Benton was teaching at the Kansas City Art Institute when he crafted his iconic images of the Joads and other characters who inhabit Steinbeck’s Pulitzer prize-winning tale. Benton taught at the Art Students League of New York from 1926–35, where his most famous student was Jackson Pollock, who later led the Abstract Expressionist movement.
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Leslie L. Johnson
1976.34
Last Updated: 10/20/2014