Christina’s World

Christina’s World, tempera painting on panel created in 1948 by American realist artist Andrew Wyeth. It became one of the most most popular paintings of the mid-20th century.

Just as life seemed to be in Cushing, Maine, where many of his paintings were set, Wyeth’s style remained steady for more than fifty years. The son of Newell Convers Wyeth, a famous American illustrator and artist, Andrew Wyeth was the youngest of five children who were all home-schooled and taught art by their father.

The house in the far distance of Christina’s World was the location of Wyeth’s studio for almost three decades. The austerity of its stark rooms and somber exterior were captured in many of his paintings and lithographs. As Wyeth explained, “I happen to paint things that reflect the basic truths of life: sky, earth, friends.” In Wyeth’s painting, Christina Olson, a reclusive friend of Wyeth and his wife, who had been crippled by disease in childhood, feebly raises herself on skeletal arms and gazes at her home in the distance. Her disability is not obvious from the painting, but her body’s subtle contortions create a disquieting impression.

Initially, the painting may seem to represent a pastoral ideal, but it harbors a pervasive undercurrent of loneliness, longing, and unease. Art historian Sir David Piper said of the painting, “It seems to express both the tragedy and the joy of life with such vivid poignancy that the painting becomes a universal symbol of the human condition.” When Olson died in 1968, she had lived her life in the house Wyeth painted in the distance. Neighbours say she never knew that Wyeth’s image of her had become one of the most well-known and haunting paintings in American art history.