Valentino Ghiglia Art

Simka Simkhovitch (Russian/American 1893 - 1949) This came with a small grouping from the artist's family, some were hand signed some were not. These were studies for larger paintings. This is a miniature watercolor and gouache vibrant, colorful bouquet of flowers in a vase. Simka Simkhovitch (Симха Файбусович Симхович) (aka Simka Faibusovich Simkhovich) (Novozybkov, Russia May 21, 1885 O.S./June 2, 1885 N.S.—Greenwich, Connecticut February 25, 1949) was a Ukrainian-Russian Jewish artist and immigrant to the United States. He painted theater scenery in his early career and then had several showings in galleries in New York City. Winning Works Progress Administration (WPA) commissions in the 1930s, he completed murals for the post offices in Jackson, Mississippi and Beaufort, North Carolina. His works are in the permanent collections of the Dallas Museum of Art, the National Museum of American Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Born outside Kyiv (Petrograd Ukraine) into a Jewish family who owned a small department store. During a severe case of measles when he was seven, Simcha Simchovitch sketched the views outside his window and decided to become an artist, over his father's objections. Beginning in 1905, he studied at the Grekov Odessa Art School and upon completion of his studies in 1911 received a recommendation to be admitted to the Imperial Academy of Arts. Though he enrolled to begin classes in architecture, painting, and sculpture at the Imperial Academy, he was dropped from the school roster in December because of the quota on the number of Jewish students and drafted into the army. Simchovitch served as a private in the 175th Infantry Regiment Baturyn [ru] until his demobilization in 1912. Re-enrolling in the Imperial Academy, he audited classes. Simka Simkhovitch exhibited paintings and sculptures in 1918 as part of an exhibition of Jewish artists and in 1919 placed 1st in the competition "The Great Russian Revolution" with a painting called "Russian Revolution" which was hung in the State Museum of Revolution. In 1922, Simkha Simkhovitch exhibited at the International Book Fair in Florence (Italian: Fiera Internazionale del Libro di Firenze). In 1924, Simkhovitch came to the United States to make illustrations for Soviet textbooks and decided to immigrate instead. Initially he supported himself by doing commercial art and a few portrait commissions. In 1927, he was hired to paint a screen for a scene in the play "The Command to Love" by Fritz Gottwald and Rudolph Lothar which was playing at the Longacre Theatre on Broadway. Art dealers began clamoring for the screen and Simkhovitch began a career as a screen painter for the theater. Catching the attention of the screenwriter, Ernest Pascal, he worked as an illustrator for Pascal, who then introduced him to gallery owner, Marie Sterner. Simkhovitch's works appeared at the Marie Sterner Gallery beginning with a 1927 exhibit and were repeated the following year. Simkhovitch had an exhibit in 1929 at Sterner's on circus paintings. In 1931, he held a showing of works at the Helen Hackett Gallery, in New York City and later that same year he was one of the featured artists of a special exhibit in San Francisco at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park. The exhibit was coordinated by Marie Sterner and included four watercolors, including one titled "Nudes". He is of the generation of Russian Soviet artists such as Isaac Pailes, Serge Charchoune, Marc Chagall, Chana Orloff, Isaac Ilyich Levitan, and Ossip Zadkine. In 1936, Simkhovitch was selected to complete the mural for the WPA Post office project in Jackson, Mississippi. The mural was hung in the post office and courthouse in 1938 depicted a plantation theme. Painted on the wall behind the judge’s bench, “Pursuits of Life in Mississippi”, a depiction of black workers engaged in manual labor amid scenes of white professionals and socialites, was eventually covered over in later years during renovations due to its stereotypical African American imagery. Simka painted what he thought was typical of Jackson. His impression of pre-civil rights Mississippi was evidently Greek Revival column houses, weeping willow trees, working class families, and the oppression of African Americans. He painted African American men picking cotton, while a white man took account of the harvest and a white judge advised a white family, calling it Pursuits of Life in Mississippi. Though clearly endorsed by the government and initially generally well-received, the mural soon raised concerns with locals as the climate toward racial segregation began to change. The main concern was whether depictions that show African Americans in subjugated societal roles should be featured in a courtroom. The following year, his painting "Holiday" won praise at an exhibition in Lincoln, Nebraska. In 1940, Simkhovitch's second WPA post office project was completed when four murals, "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat", "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright", "Sand Ponies" and "Canada Geese" were installed in Beaufort, North Carolina. The works were commissioned in 1938 and did not generate the controversy that the Jackson mural had. The main mural is "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright" and depicts a shipwreck which had occurred in Beaufort in 1866. "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat" depicted the lighthouse built in 1859 and the mail boat that was running mail during the time which Simkhovitch was there. The boat ran mail for the area until 1957. "Sand Ponies" shows the wild horses common to the North Carolina barrier islands and "Canada Geese" showed the importance of hunting and fishing in the area. All four murals were restored in the 1990s by Elisabeth Speight, daughter of two other WPA muralists, Francis Speight...

This tender depiction of the Holy Family represents a subject which was central to Raphael's oeuvre. The painting is based on the famous panel by Giulio Romano, called Madonna della ...

Flemish 1600s School The Card Players oil on oak panel panel dimensions 22.5 x 20 cm frame included Provenance: From a Swedish private collection. Condition: Flat and stabl...

The signature at the bottom right with the date and ink inscriptions on the stretcher lead us to the Norwegian painter Henrik Asor Hansen (1862 - 1929). In the center of the scene is...

Work on canvas

Eliezer Weishoff (Israeli, 20th century) Still life of kettle (Russian samovar) over a warmer, 1973 Acrylic or oil on canvas Signed, dated and signed ...

Original vintage 1945 oil painting with an interior still life with a vase of flowers, tea cup, and drapery by 20th century Colorado modernist, John E. Thompson (1882-1945). Oil on c...

Signed lower right, 'Haefner' for Janice Haefner (American, 1919-2002) and painted circa 1960; additionally signed, verso, and with artist address. This life-time member of the Pacific Art League lived in Los Altos...

Vertical composition made in oil on linen canvas in the modern style. Diversity and bright colors with a predominance of white, red, blue, yellow, purple and turquoise. The work is c...

Urbex is the English acronym for urban exploration and is an activity that consists of searching for and locating abandoned infrastructure with the goal of visiting, photographing and conveying its contents, with particular involvement of methodologies from geography, anthropology, sociology to cultural studies. Her works have been in the past approached to the works of Anselm Kiefer (b. 1945) and Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1770), but in Gullotta's paintings the absence of color makes the spaces particularly ethereal, allowing them to be ideally lifted to new places and to new life. An artist of international caliber who has decided to entrust her return to her homeland to Almach Art Gallery in Milan, while maintaining connections with important galleries, such as Marlborough Fine Art in London and Galerie Koch in Hanover. The artwork represents the famous Velasca Tower in Milan. This artwork was exhibited during the Daniela Gullotta...

Signed lower left, 'Karl Goldschmidt' (Anglo-German, 1912-1995) and painted circa 1930. Photo of Karl Goldschmidt (Kenneth Gay) with Robert Graves courte...

Attributed by Nikolay Alekseyevich Kasatkin (1859 - 1930). In this touching artwork, the artist perfectly conveyed the character of the old woman, who has seen a lot in her life. The hands, tired out and riddled with veins, lie helplessly on the knees. Her slouched body tells us about the load of years lived. The painter skillfully conveys a sense of wisdom, kindness, and humility through her wrinkled face and detached gaze. The painting exudes warmth with a subtle touch of sadness and reflection on a life lived. Thanks to moderately contrasting colors, the portrait comes to life and shows us the depth of the artist's intention. Kasatkin not only continued the traditions of the best masters of portraiture in Russia in the 19th century, but also introduced new principles into it. He sought to display on canvas not only the external features of a person, but also to demonstrate his spiritual world. Antique oil painting on canvas, signed bottom left, framed. Size app.: 68.5 x 52.3 cm (roughly 27 x 20.6 in), frame is 80.5 x 63.5 cm (roughly 31.7 x 25 in). Very good condition, very well preserved recently conserved condition with minimal wear (notice few micro losses here and there). Please study good resolution images for cosmetic condition. In person actual painting may appear darker or brighter than in our pictures, strictly depending on sufficient light in your environment. Weight of app. 5.4 kg is going to measure 8 kg packed for shipment. Nikolay Alekseyevich Kasatkin (1859 - 1930) was a Russian painter, considered to be one of the founders of Social Realism in Russia. From 1873 to 1883 he studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture with Vasily Perov and Illarion Pryanishnikov. Upon graduating, he received a medal for his painting "Beggars at the Church Door". In 1891, he began exhibiting with the Peredvizhniki and, from 1894 to 1917, was a teacher at his alma mater. For thirty years, beginning in 1883, he worked with Ivan Sytin, providing illustrations for his popular almanac/calendars and teaching lithography. He also contributed The Great Reform, an encyclopedia that celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the Emancipation (1861), and a collection called "Russian History in Pictures". In 1903, he became a member of the Imperial Academy of Arts. He participated in the Exposition Universelle (1900), where he won a silver medal, and the Louisiana Purchase Exposition (1904), among others. In 1923, following the Civil War, he was named the first "People's Artist of the Republic" and became a member of the AKhRR (Association of Artists). He is considered to be one of the forerunners of Socialist Realism in the arts and was sometimes called the "Gorky of Painters". In 1956, the Soviet Union honored him with a 40 kopeck commemorative postage stamp. In 1971, his painting of a female mine worker...