During the forty years Kenneth Hayes Miller taught at the Art Students League in New York City, he encouraged a generation of American painters, including Reginald Marsh, Paul Cadmus, and Sara Roby, to find inspiration in contemporary life. Yet he also counseled compositional balance and the value of classic form. For his own work, Miller looked to the shoppers, salesgirls, strollers, and streetwalkers he encountered around Fourteenth Street and Union Square. In Bargain Hunters, he captured the crush of femininity on sale day. Although the women seem frozen in space, their eyes sparkle with the excitement of bargain hunting.
Modern American Realism: The Sara Roby Foundation Collection, 2014
Credit: Gift of the Sara Roby Foundation
1940
Oil on canvas
78.4 x 91.8cm
1986.6.65
Text: Smithsonian American Art Museum, 2023
Image: 1940, Kenneth Hayes Miller
Image: 1940, Kenneth Hayes Miller
Where you'll find this
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Permanent collection