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Glite Dictionary
Ashcan school

Ashcan school

9.4
A group of American artists from the early 1900s who paint real, often rough city scenes
  • noun
  • /ˈæʃˌkæn skuːl/
  • Specialized
translation icon : escuela Ashcan
  • Members of the Ashcan school, such as George Bellows, focused on gritty urban scenes.

Examples

  • The threat of violence by election-night throngs became an artistic subject as well, as evident in Election Night, Times Square, a drawing by George Bellows, another member of the Ashcan school (ca. 1906; Fig. 20).

    Academic text (2011)

  • They thus connected with the body of city life etchings he had begun working on soon after his arrival in New York, and they take their place in the broader treatment of urban subjects for which members of his circle, also identified as the Ashcan school, would become known.

    Academic text (2011)

  • Sloan wasn't the only Ashcan school artist to tackle this sort of subject matter.

    Academic text (2011)

  • Studies addressing the socially engaged American artist privilege the period before the Liberator, namely the Ashcan school, or the period following the Liberator, Social Realism of the 1930s.

    Academic text (2002)

  • He is completing a book on John Sloan, the Ashcan school, and popular illustration. School of Humanities, Purchase College, 735 Anderson Hill Road, Purchase, N.Y. 10577-1400.

    Academic text (2011)

  • The Ashcan school artists captured the raw energy of city life in their paintings.

  • The work of the Ashcan school reflects the challenges and vibrancy of early 20th-century America.

Surface Forms

Ashcan school singular
Ashcan schools plural

Morphology

Ashcan + school

Although 'school' as 'a group of artists' is transparent, the element 'Ashcan' is a proper-name label with no predictable, compositional relation to the meaning 'artists depicting gritty urban life' for an average B1 learner. The term functions as a historical/labelled movement name rather than a literal descriptor, so the overall meaning cannot be derived from the parts.

Etymology

Ashcan school may come from the image of the city's ashcans, the old trash cans, because these artists painted rough streets, garbage and ordinary people. So the name refers to a group of artists who showed 'real' and often 'gritty' urban life.