This "Hot Cripple" Series is an experiment; an effort to bring attention to the fact that Disability isn't necessarily synonymous with Ugly- as in Ugly Laws, which proliferated this country for over a century.
This month we feature American icon, Christina Olson.
This month we feature American icon, Christina Olson.
Christina Olson is the woman in Andrew Wyeth's striking painting Christina's World, and questions surrounding why she is sprawled in a field, looking longingly toward a far-off farmhouse have drawn in viewers for decades. The true story behind Christina's World makes the 1948 painting even more intriguing.
The 31-year-old Wyeth modeled the painting's brunette after his neighbor in South Cushing, Maine. Anna Christina Olson suffered from a degenerative muscular disorder that prevented her from walking. Rather than using a wheelchair, Olson crawled around her home and the surrounding grounds, as seen in Christina's World.
The neighbors first met in 1939 when Wyeth was just 22 and courting 17-year-old Betsy James, who would later become his wife and muse. It was James who introduced to Wyeth to the 45-year-old Olson, kicking off a friendship that would last the rest of their lives. The sight of Olson picking blueberries while crawling through her fields “like a crab on a New England shore” inspired Wyeth to paint Christina’s World.
"The challenge to me was to do justice to her extraordinary conquest of a life which most people would consider hopeless," he wrote. "If in some small way I have been able in paint to make the viewer sense that her world may be limited physically but by no means spiritually, then I have achieved what I set out to do."
Olsen was a recurring muse and model for Wyeth, captured in paintings like Miss Olson, Christina Olson, and Anna Christina.
The 31-year-old Wyeth modeled the painting's brunette after his neighbor in South Cushing, Maine. Anna Christina Olson suffered from a degenerative muscular disorder that prevented her from walking. Rather than using a wheelchair, Olson crawled around her home and the surrounding grounds, as seen in Christina's World.
The neighbors first met in 1939 when Wyeth was just 22 and courting 17-year-old Betsy James, who would later become his wife and muse. It was James who introduced to Wyeth to the 45-year-old Olson, kicking off a friendship that would last the rest of their lives. The sight of Olson picking blueberries while crawling through her fields “like a crab on a New England shore” inspired Wyeth to paint Christina’s World.
"The challenge to me was to do justice to her extraordinary conquest of a life which most people would consider hopeless," he wrote. "If in some small way I have been able in paint to make the viewer sense that her world may be limited physically but by no means spiritually, then I have achieved what I set out to do."
Olsen was a recurring muse and model for Wyeth, captured in paintings like Miss Olson, Christina Olson, and Anna Christina.
"Miss Olson"
"Anna Christina"
Though it would become his best-known work and an icon of American art, Christina's World was described by Wyeth as “a complete flat tire” when he sent it off to the Macbeth Gallery for a show in 1948. He also wondered if the painting would have been improved if he “painted just that field and have you sense Christina without her being there.”
Alfred Barr, the founding director of the Museum of Modern Art, was so taken with Wyeth’s work that he purchased Christina's World for $1800. While the early critical reception was lukewarm to cool, the painting's prestigious position at MoMA fortified its reputation. Today it’s one of the museum's most admired exhibits.
Though undeniably iconic, the painting has long been undermined by vocal detractors. Art historians have often snubbed Wyeth's works in their surveys, and some naysayers have attacked the painting's widespread popularity, deriding it as "a mandatory dorm room poster." Meanwhile, critics have chastised Wyeth's attention on Olson's infirmity and characterized it as exploitation. Still others claim there was no art in rendering realistic imagery in paint.
One person who didn’t object to Wyeth’s depiction of Olson was Olson. In her book about her husband's work, Betsy James Wyeth recounts a conversation she had with Olson about the piece, writing:
Christina's World remained her favorite to the end. Once when I asked her why, she simply smiled and said, 'You know pink is my favorite color.'
'But you're wearing a flowered pink dress in Miss Olson and holding a kitten. I thought you loved kittens.' 'Course I do, but in the other one Andy put me where he knew I wanted to be. Now that I can't be there anymore, all I do is think of that picture and I'm there.'
Today the farmhouse is a national landmark. The Olson house has won comparisons to Monet's garden at Giverny because of the plethora of paintings and sketches it inspired. In the 30 years from their first meeting to Christina's death, Wyeth created over 300 works at the Olson house, thanks to the Olsons allowing him to use their home as his studio. Explaining the house's hold on him, Wyeth said, "In the portraits of that house, the windows are eyes or pieces of the soul almost. To me, each window is a different part of Christina's life."
For all this, the Olson House was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2011. As part of the Farnsworth Museum, patrons will be able to visit the Olson house starting on Memorial Day weekend, 2016. Until then, the house is closed for vital infrastructure upgrades.
Christina's World made Olson famous. Shortly after the painting made its MoMA debut, one overzealous admirer walked into Olson's home, came upon her resting, and asked for an autograph. Twenty years later, her death made national news, reviving interest in Christina's World.
MoMA has only loaned out Christina's World once. Following Wyeth's death in 2009 at the age of 91, the museum allowed Christina's World to visit its creator's birthplace, Chadds Ford, Penn., where the Brandywine River Museum exhibited the polarizing painting for two days in memorial before returning it to New York.
Wyeth is buried near his painting's birthplace. Down the hill from the Olson house lies a cemetery, where Andrew Wyeth's grave can be found in the family plot of Alvaro and Anna Christina Olson. Wyeth's tombstone faces up toward the house at an angle that closely resembles that of Christina's World. According to his surviving family, it was his final wish "to be with Christina."
Alfred Barr, the founding director of the Museum of Modern Art, was so taken with Wyeth’s work that he purchased Christina's World for $1800. While the early critical reception was lukewarm to cool, the painting's prestigious position at MoMA fortified its reputation. Today it’s one of the museum's most admired exhibits.
Though undeniably iconic, the painting has long been undermined by vocal detractors. Art historians have often snubbed Wyeth's works in their surveys, and some naysayers have attacked the painting's widespread popularity, deriding it as "a mandatory dorm room poster." Meanwhile, critics have chastised Wyeth's attention on Olson's infirmity and characterized it as exploitation. Still others claim there was no art in rendering realistic imagery in paint.
One person who didn’t object to Wyeth’s depiction of Olson was Olson. In her book about her husband's work, Betsy James Wyeth recounts a conversation she had with Olson about the piece, writing:
Christina's World remained her favorite to the end. Once when I asked her why, she simply smiled and said, 'You know pink is my favorite color.'
'But you're wearing a flowered pink dress in Miss Olson and holding a kitten. I thought you loved kittens.' 'Course I do, but in the other one Andy put me where he knew I wanted to be. Now that I can't be there anymore, all I do is think of that picture and I'm there.'
Today the farmhouse is a national landmark. The Olson house has won comparisons to Monet's garden at Giverny because of the plethora of paintings and sketches it inspired. In the 30 years from their first meeting to Christina's death, Wyeth created over 300 works at the Olson house, thanks to the Olsons allowing him to use their home as his studio. Explaining the house's hold on him, Wyeth said, "In the portraits of that house, the windows are eyes or pieces of the soul almost. To me, each window is a different part of Christina's life."
For all this, the Olson House was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2011. As part of the Farnsworth Museum, patrons will be able to visit the Olson house starting on Memorial Day weekend, 2016. Until then, the house is closed for vital infrastructure upgrades.
Christina's World made Olson famous. Shortly after the painting made its MoMA debut, one overzealous admirer walked into Olson's home, came upon her resting, and asked for an autograph. Twenty years later, her death made national news, reviving interest in Christina's World.
MoMA has only loaned out Christina's World once. Following Wyeth's death in 2009 at the age of 91, the museum allowed Christina's World to visit its creator's birthplace, Chadds Ford, Penn., where the Brandywine River Museum exhibited the polarizing painting for two days in memorial before returning it to New York.
Wyeth is buried near his painting's birthplace. Down the hill from the Olson house lies a cemetery, where Andrew Wyeth's grave can be found in the family plot of Alvaro and Anna Christina Olson. Wyeth's tombstone faces up toward the house at an angle that closely resembles that of Christina's World. According to his surviving family, it was his final wish "to be with Christina."
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