Accident in the Air
Anton Refregier
American, born Russia. 1905–1979
1939
An oil on board painting in which Anton Refregier stages a dramatic midair accident, using flattened, stylized figures to make the sudden, violent fall feel both theatrical and inevitable.
What hits you is the suspended, tumbling bodies—a white‑draped figure and a red‑clad form—set against a deep blue void, their angular limbs and flying fabric captured in a frozen, cinematic instant.
Painted on the eve of World War II, the work links American social‑realist narrative to modernist flattening, turning a single catastrophic moment into a public meditation on modern technology, danger, and human vulnerability.
Medium
Oil on board
Dimensions
19 x 23" (48.3 x 58.4 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of the New York World's Fair, 1939
Accession
641.1939
Palette
Exhibitions
