Beech Tree

Beech Tree — Charles Burchfield. 1919.

Medium: Indelible pencil with touches of purple crayon on wove paper, lined. Dimensions: Sheet: 35.3 x 27.7 cm (13 7/8 x 10 7/8 in.).

Collection record: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. Museum connection according to this source; current display unverified.

Burchfield returned to his job as a clerk in the cost department at a metal fabricating plant after he was released from the armed forces in 1919. Although he continued to work primarily in watercolor in his free time, he also experimented briefly with indelible pencil—a tool containing purple dye in addition to graphite, typically used for copying documents. Burchfield likely used the pencil at work, but enjoyed the effects he could achieve while drawing with it. In works such as this sketch of a massive tree, he drew on a wet sheet of paper, allowing the pencil’s dye to faintly bleed in a way that evoked watercolor.

Source: official collection record. Metadata selected and normalized by Artline from the source export, accessed 10 September 2026; no museum endorsement. Reproduction rights are separate.