Achelous and Hercules by Thomas Hart Benton is a raucous, gaudy, vibrant mural, 22 feet long, full of surging shapes and churning rhythms. By the time Benton painted it for a Kansas City department store in 1947, he had already been tagged by the East Coast critics as an uncouth, outspoken, provincial artist, so he may have been playing to his critics with his bright colors and athletic figures.