Winter Valley

Lamar Dodd (1909-1996) was an American painter known for his Regionalist landscapes of the American South and his later abstract work, and was a leading figure in the art program at the University of Georgia. Winter Valley from 1944 depicts a Southern valley in winter in the Regionalist manner that Dodd had developed in the 1930s—the rhythmic composition and sculptural modeling of the landscape that connect his work to the broader Regionalist movement while maintaining a specifically Southern character. The 1944 date places this in Dodd's Regionalist period, before his later turn toward abstraction.

Winter Valley is important in Dodd's oeuvre because it demonstrates the Regionalist manner that defined his early career before his turn toward abstraction. The 1944 painting shows the Southern landscape in the rhythmic, sculptural manner that connects Dodd's work to the broader Regionalist movement of Benton and Wood while maintaining a specifically Southern character that distinguishes his work from the Midwestern Regionalism of his contemporaries.

Winter Valley is Dodd's Southern Regionalism: a valley in winter rendered with the rhythmic composition and sculptural modeling that connect his work to the broader Regionalist movement while maintaining a specifically Southern character. The 1944 painting shows Dodd's Regionalist manner before his later turn toward abstraction.