During his European travels, Harry P. Carnohan studied with the influential modernist teacher André L'Hote and exhibited his work at the Salon d'Automne in Paris. He returned to Dallas where he espoused his theories on modern art at Dallas Art League meetings. More open to European modernism than other Dallas Regionalists, Carnohan taught at the Art Institute of Dallas and the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center before joining the art department at Columbia University in 1940. Later, he moved to the West Coast where he spent most of his time working as a furniture and antique dealer. Therefore, Carnohan's body of work is relatively small, and a work from his California period is particularly rare.