Howard Wilber Thomas (NC/GA, 1899-1971) watercolor street scene, possibly Georgia, rendered in shades of black and gray, depicting railroad tracks running in front of a Rexall Drug Store and Service Station, with "Western" street sign. Signed "Howard Thomas" lower right. Sheet – 8"H x 10 1/2" W . Matted – 15"H x 17"W. Circa 1950. Provenance: Estate of Carl Klein, Brentwood, TN. Biography (Courtesy Columbus Museum — Georgia): Howard Wilber Thomas, painter, printmaker, and educator, began studying art in 1919 at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In 1930, after several years of teaching high school, he began teaching at Milwaukee State Teachers College. He also directed the Milwaukee Handicraft Program sponsored by the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s. Thomas made his first visit to the South in 1941 and never left. In 1942 he became chair of the art department of the College for Women, University of North Carolina, Greensboro. Soon after, he relocated to Decatur, Georgia, to teach at Agnes Scott College. In 1945 he joined the faculty of the art department of the University of Georgia, where he remained until retiring in 1965. Thomas exhibited extensively throughout his career and won many honors and prizes, including invitations to exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1950 and the Annual Exhibition of Contemporary Art at the Whitney Museum in 1958. His later painting technique, which involved the use of natural earth pigments, was documented in a film, "Earth Red: Howard Thomas Paints a Gouache," produced in 1964 with his wife, artist Anne Wall Thomas, and his colleague, James Herbert. CONDITION: Painting is hinge mounted and in overall good condition with some toning to paper; some grime to mat.