Rico Lebrun painted “Terrified Woman with Child” in 1949. With World War II ending in 1945, the historical context of this painting shines through. During the war, people lived in fear of their lives being suddenly interrupted, causing them to flee from their homeland. Women, especially during this time, were seen as physically dainty and weak. Interestingly, Lebrun chose to give the mother, among other things, masculine and powerful legs, portraying her as a strong and resilient person, capable of getting her child to safety. 

This theme of darkness and frightening, violence-related imagery is central in a large majority of Rico Lebrun’s work. Having served in World War I as a member of the Italian Army, Lebrun was no stranger to the dangers and hardships of war. “War and murder, nuclear holocaust, and calculated genocide” proved to be central events “not only in Lebrun’s life, but in his work”. 

After moving to the United States in the 1920s, Lebrun began teaching in Los Angeles at the Chouinard Art Institute, furthering his artistic range and his life experiences. Lebrun’s popularity spiked during the post-war era, as his “deeply psychological and emotional works” (The Unforgettables, page 338) resonated with audiences from coast to coast. In the years following the war, there wasn’t a more famous avant-garde artist from LA. He also had a career as an instructor and teacher of art, holding jobs at schools across Los Angeles and Southern California. While mentoring aspiring artists, Lebrun became a “guiding force among the first generation of abstract expressionist artists” as they switched up their narrative on traditional notions of painting and “established a new path on the West Coast” (The Unforgettables, page 338). 

After holding this job, in 1947, Lebrun began to devote his art to themes dealing with religious experience and human suffering. Over the next three years, he would work on over two hundred drawings and paintings in a series entitled “The Crucifixion Series”. These paintings, which greatly contrasted his “rather sedate and conventional” (autobiography) way he had approached painting in the years leading up to their creation, featured much violence and religious theming. Through much introspection, Lebrun, who “thought about violence” in a way that was “almost too natural”, chose this theme due to its relation to “so many other things that were going on at this time”. Having done over two hundred paintings in this series, Lebrun felt deeply about the toll war takes on one's body and spirit. 

The themes of violence and hardship found in the Crucifixion series are also seen in “Terrified Woman with Child”. Both that painting and the series at hand seem to have been inspired by Lebrun’s life experiences both in serving in World War I and experiencing the weight of World War II as an observer. The overall tone of “Terrified Woman with Child” and related “Running Figure” paintings feature the same anti-war rhetoric that is embodied in the “Crucifixion” series. The terror felt by people living during wartime is tastefully demonstrated in all of these works.