The only painting of New York in the National Gallery

George Bellows’s ‘Men of the Docks’ makes hard work into high art. 

Once dismissed as “trashcan” painters, Bellows and the Ash Can School used fine art to capture working-class New York. Art historian Oliver O’Donnell breaks down why this painting, the first by a major American artist in the National Gallery Collection, still resonates today, even if Bellows did make some changes to the city’s famous skyline...