After returning to the U.S. in 1912, he often visited the 291.

But Americans were building a new society; lives were crowded with triumphs and heartaches. Benton felt that the abstractionists were concerning themselves with geometric designs while the reality of America went unpictured. He changed his direction in art while working as an architectural draftsman at the Norfolk naval base during W.W.I. Away from the theorizing influence of New York, Benton noticed mechanical objects: buildings, new airplanes, blimps. He tore himself away from playing with colored cubes. (The same mechanical shapes turned other artists TO abstraction.)

A rapid decline of popularity struck American Scene painting in the 1940s. Benton blamed It on "college professors and museum boys." His attacks were highly verbal and not always intelligent.

"The intellectual aspects of art are not art; nor does a comprehension of them enable art to be made." Benton attacked Stieglitz and his group as "Intellectually diseased lot, victims of sickly rationalizations and psychic inversions."

The uncompromising Benton turned supporters away; Henri originally was sympathetic but was forced to disassociate himself.