Walter Emerson Baum
American painter and illustrator, 1884-1956
Sunlight and Shadow
1925
Oil on composition board
32 x 40 1/8 inches (81.28 x 101.918 centimeters)
Purchase: J. I. and Anna Rodale Fund, 1945.
1961.013.000

Walter Emerson Baum, the major force behind the establishment of the Allentown Art Museum and founder of the Baum School of Art, credited this composition as reaffirming his faith in himself as a painter. Frustrated and discouraged with his attempts to complete a canvas for the 1925 annual exhibition at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, he began this winter farm scene less than twenty four hours before the deadline. This painting, still wet, earned Baum the Jennie Sesnan Gold Medal for best landscape at the exhibition.