Bluemner emigrated to the United States from Germany in 1892, after receiving his diploma and an award for a painting of an architectural subject from the Königliche Technische Hochschule in Berlin. In the United States, he first worked as a draftsman at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, and later designed New York's Bronx Borough Courthouse (1902). Around 1910, his professional focus moved to painting under the aegis of Alfred Stieglitz, who gave him a one-man exhibition at the 291 Gallery in 1915. From 1916 to 1926, Bluemner made his home in northeastern New Jersey, whose red brick mill towns and small suburban villages became the frequent subjects of his sketches and paintings, often created en plein air. In this sheet, Bluemner depicts a curving road along a hillside in the township of Nutley, New Jersey, the houses and trees of which are schematically rendered using simplified geometric planes and rhythmic contours.
Watermark: dandyroll: "Old Hampshire Bond."
Inscribed at lower left in black chalk, "OFB"; "S. Nutley [...] 22-21 4 P.M."; "BR + W"; on verso, in red chalk, "gn alley".