Woman on a Bus is an example of the figurative work that Robert Indiana, then known as Robert Clark, produced as a high school student. As a student he was introduced to American regionalist painters such as Charles Sheeler, Edward Hopper, and Reginald Marsh. The influence of Marsh’s social realism can be seen in this work, which depicts an everyday scene of a young woman sitting on a crowded bus.
Woman on a Bus remained in the artist's collection, and in 2009 was included in the exhibition Robert Indiana and the Star of Hope, at the Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine.