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Benton is best known for creating and being a principle artist in the American scene painting movement known as Regionalism. His works depict scenes of ordinary American folk shown participating purposefully in everyday activities. He often showed the melancholy, desperation and beauty of small-town life. As a Regionalist painter, Benton often portrayed inhabitants of rural America participating in popular leisure activities. Down the River depicts a "float trip", a typical recreational activity for Missourians. In the foreground, an older man and a boy (Benton's son, T.P. Benton) travel down a river in a "johnboat". The man rows the small boat, while the youth, wearing a large straw hat, fishes. In the distance, two other figures guide their boat down the same winding river. Signed lower right , 13 X 10 inches