In 1926, Hale Woodruff received a bronze medal from the Harmon Foundation, an organization that presented achievement awards to African Americans and organized exhibitions of African American art. With his prize money, along with other gifts raised by local supporters, Woodruff was able to travel to France to continue his education. As a young art student in Paris, he experimented with a variety of modernist styles. In Normandy Landscape, he carefully structured the composition, applying delicate pigments in deliberately delineated strokes. A screen of well-formed willow trees in the foreground is set against an overcast sky, evoking the character and mood of the northern French countryside. Influenced by artists such as Paul Cézanne and Claude Monet, Woodruff clearly relished paint itself, exploring the numerous textures produced by palette knife and brush with a subtle range of color.