John Brown

Curry created several images of John Brown, the abolitionist who fought against pro-slavery forces in Curry's home state of Kansas before the disastrous 1859 raid on the armory at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, a failed attempt to arm slaves and begin an insurrection. In this lithograph, Brown, with arms outstretched and mouth open, seems to call down a tornado onto the Kansas plains through the force of his will. The image is based on Michelangelo's marble statue Moses (ca. 1515), which shares with John Brown an expression of single-minded purpose bordering on madness.