Charles Goeller’s mastery of the still life genre was evident as early as 1929, with an early example qualified “to challenge any of the ‘immaculates’” according to one reviewer. In Unfinished Problem, the artist scatters paraphernalia from his engineering work across a drawing table: half-rolled blueprints, a t-square and eyeglasses. The pile of cigarette butts and half-eaten orange add to the impression of everyday objects casually left behind from a day’s work. Scholar Gail Stavitsky observes the artist’s conflicted feelings about the pull of the family business in the present scene (Emotion Expressed Through Precision: The Art of Charles Goeller, 2003). Trained in engineering and architecture, Goeller came from a family of structural engineers and his father ran an iron and steel fabricating plant in New Jersey. In 1939, he was called upon to return home to the family business, prompting him to leave New York City and take time way from his art.