William Zorach Art
American, 1887-1966
Born in 1887, by 1930, he was one of America’s premier 20th century sculptors and was honored with multiple commissions and exhibitions including at the Art Institute of Chicago, the Dallas Museum of Fine Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and numerous others.
He studied in New York City at the National Academy of Design and also in Paris under the mentoring of Jacques-Emile Blanche. It was in Paris in the first decade of the 20th century where Zorach’s path crossed with Marguerite, his soon to be wife. Both Marguerite and William were both represented in the landmark Armory Show of 1913.
William continued to paint for the next two decades, but increasingly experimenting with sculpture. By the mid 20’s he was carving significant works in marble and stone. By the early 30’s, he abandoned painting entirely in favor of a new art form, sculpture. I t was in sculpture that Zorach found his true voice as an artist and achieved considerable success. “Sculpture, direct carving, was an expanding universe, a liberation and a natural form of expression to me.” Zorach stated.
Museum Collections:
Amon Carter Museum of American Art
Arizona State University Art Museum
Boca Raton Museum of Art
Butler Institute of American Art
Cleveland Artists Foundation
Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center
Cornish Colony Museum
Dallas Museum of Art
Delaware Art Museum
Edwin a Ulrich Museum of Art
Farnsworth Art Museum
Flint Institute of Arts
Frederick R Weisman Art Museum
Georgia Museum of Art
Herbert F Johnson Museum of Art
Jack S Blanton Museum of Art
LaSalle University Art Museum
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Lowe Art Museum
Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum
Memorial Art Gallery
Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC
Middlebury College Museum of Art
Minneapolis Institute of Arts
Mobile Museum of Art
Museum of Fine Art-Boston
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
Portland Museum of Art
Smithsonian Museum of Art
The Brooklyn Museum of Art
The Canton Museum of Art
The Columbus Museum of Art-Ohio
The Columbus Museum-Georgia
The Cummer Museum Of Art & Gardens
The Currier Museum of Art
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
The Newark Museum
The Phillips Collection
The Phillips Museum of Art
The University of Michigan Museum of Art
Whitney Museum of American Art
Worcester Art Museum
Yosemite Museum
(Biography provided by Lynda Anderson Galleries)
to
8
4
4
2
4
3
1
Overall Height
to
Overall Width
to
2
1
1
6
5
3
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
8
1
3
1
1
9
6,886
3,210
2,514
1,217
5
3
2
2
1
Artist: William Zorach
William Zorach Watercolor Painting, Forest Landscape
By William Zorach
Located in Lake Worth Beach, FL
Artist/Designer; Manufacturer: William Zorach (American, 1887-1966)
Marking(s); notes: signed, marking(s); 1942
Materials: watercolor on paper
Dimensions (H, W, D): 22"h, 15"w; 33"h,...
Category
20th Century William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
PORTRAIT OF NATHANIEL KAZ
By William Zorach
Located in Portland, ME
Zorach, William (American 1887-1966). PORTRAIT OF NATHANIEL KAZ. Pencil on paper, 1956. Inscribed and signed by Zorach as follows: "Nat Kaz / William Zorach / Sept 19 1920 / Feb 19, ...
Category
1950s William Zorach Art
Materials
Graphite
Watercolor Painting by William Zorach, Titled "Redwoods, Yosemite Valley", 1920
By William Zorach
Located in New York, NY
William Zorach, 1887-1966
Redwoods, Yosemite Valley, 1920
Watercolor and pencil
15 ¾ x 13 ⅜ inches
Signed (at lower right): William Zorach
WZorach-7
Provenance:
Estate of William Zorach
Exhibited:
William Zorach, 1887-1996, Sculpture, Drawings and Watercolors, Zabriskie Gallery, New
York; Feb. 10 – March 14, 1998.
William Zorach was born in Lithuania in 1889, and immigrated to the United States with his
family in 1893. Settling in Cleveland with his parents, he worked as a lithographer from 1902-
1908, making enough money to study painting with Henry G. Keller at the School of Art. In
1910, Zorach traveled to Paris to study in La Palette, where he was encouraged to develop his
own unique style rather than adhere to traditional teachings. Zorach once said, “I began to be
conscious of the various modern influences that were invading the art world…I was disturbed
and confused, and yet I felt that I was a very young man entering a new age. The forces creating
modern art seemed more alive to me than anything I had known or anything being done in
America.” 1 Together with his wife Marguerite, William Zorach produced a number of Cubist-
style paintings for the American Armory Show of 1913, and the Forum Exhibition in New York
in 1916.
Around 1917, Zorach followed the lead of cubist artist Pablo Picasso and began experimenting
with wood and stone carvings. By 1922, he devoted himself entirely to sculpture, and like
Picasso, became fascinated in “primitive art”—the ritual objects and sculpture pieces of Oceanic,
Native American and African tribes. Zorach’s work developed in its use of block-like forms with
progressive suppression of detail—drawing elements from sources as disparate as the
contemporary cubist and modernist movements, and combining them with forms seen in early
African sculpture. Though the forms of his sculpture were often abstract, Zorach primarily
focused upon a traditional subject matter, producing such well-known sculptures as Young Girl,
now in the Whitney Museum of American Art, and Mother and Child, in the collection of the
Metropolitan Museum of Art. Today, William Zorach is known as one of the earliest and most
influential American artists dedicated to direct carving. Zorach also made an impression as a
teacher and writer, facilitating a major change in the aesthetic philosophy and technique of
sculpture in the United States.
During the summers from 1913 to 1922, Zorach and his wife Marguerite painted...
Category
1920s William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor, Pencil
William Zorach Oil on Canvas Painting Titled "Kiddie Kar", Dated 1920
By William Zorach
Located in New York, NY
Kiddie Kar exemplifies the integration of the primitive aesthetic and the depiction of family in William’s work. The primitive aspect of this particular painting is apparent in its d...
Category
1920s William Zorach Art
Materials
Oil
"Pioneer Family" WPA American Modernism Plaster Maquette Realism 20th Century
By William Zorach
Located in New York, NY
"Pioneer Family," 23 1/2 x 16 1/4 x 10 3/4 inPlaster. c. 1927. Unsigned. Realism
The Smithsonian has a cast of this sculpture in its collection. Pictured on the cover of “The Sculpt...
Category
1920s American Modern William Zorach Art
Materials
Plaster
Hen, Gilded Hen in Polished Bronze
By William Zorach
Located in Brookville, NY
This Sculpture "Hen" by William Zorach in polished bronze is numbered 3/6 although according to the artist son, only 4 were ever cast. Executed in 1946, signed on the reverse and nu...
Category
1940s American Modern William Zorach Art
Materials
Bronze
"Beach Day"
By William Zorach
Located in Southampton, NY
This is a very early painting by William Zorach done mostly likely when he was a student at the National Academy of Design in 1910 in New York. It is done in an impressionist style w...
Category
Early 1900s American Impressionist William Zorach Art
Materials
Board, Oil
Quebec City, Fauve Landscape
By William Zorach
Located in Miami, FL
Wonderful Fauve Landscape with blocky areas of punchy bold reds and yellows. This was done the same year of the Armory Show in which both William Zor...
Category
Early 20th Century Expressionist William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
Related Items
Dreamy, Retro, Watercolor on Paper
Located in Fort Worth, TX
Dreamland Motel, Daniel Blagg, Watercolor on Paper, 21 x 30", 2022
A well-known figure of the contemporary Fort Worth art scene, Daniel Blagg has worked ...
Category
2010s William Zorach Art
Materials
Paper, Watercolor
1961 Coty Award Plaque Kenneth Hairdresser Jacqueline Onassis Bronze Fashion
Located in New York, NY
1961 Coty Award Plaque Kenneth Hairdresser Jacqueline Onassis Bronze Fashion
Bronze on wood. The wood plaque measures 12 3/4" by 20 3/4 inches. The bronze plaque itself is 13 3/4 x 8 3/4 inches and the the bronze inscription, which reads "COTY, American Fashion Critics Special Award 1961 to KENNETH of LILY DACHE...
Category
1960s American Modern William Zorach Art
Materials
Bronze
Auguste Mayer (1805-1890) A seascape with a boat, signed drawing
Located in Paris, FR
Auguste Mayer (1803-1890
A seascape with a boat
signed with the initials on the lower left
Pencil and heightenings of white gouache on paper
17.5 x 26 cm
In fairly good condition, ma...
Category
1860s Romantic William Zorach Art
Materials
Carbon Pencil, Gouache
Bridge to Brooklyn #382
Located in Salt Lake City, UT
Bridge to Brooklyn #382, watercolor, 10.5 x 14 inches (Framed size: 18 x 21 inches), $1,750
Waldo Midgley (1888-1986) had a fruitful career spanning eig...
Category
1970s Ashcan School William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
Pavilion with waterfall, an ink wash attributed to Hubert Robert (1733 - 1808)
By Hubert Robert
Located in PARIS, FR
This large wash drawing is a slightly enlarged version of a composition executed by Hubert Robert in 1761, at the end of his stay in Rome. This composition is a marvellous synthesis of the painter's art: the clatter of the waterfall, in a grandiose setting inspired by antiquity, is opposed to the intimacy of a genre scene, made up of a few peasant women performing some agricultural work.
1. The stay in Italy, an important founding stage in Hubert Robert's carrier
Hubert Robert came from a privileged family of Lorraine origin, linked to the Choiseul-Stainville family, where his father was an intendant. The protection of this powerful aristocratic family enabled him to study classical art at the Collège de Navarre (between 1745 and 1751). After a first apprenticeship in the workshop of the sculptor Slodtz (1705 - 1764), he was invited by Etienne-François de Choiseul-Beaupré-Stainville (the future Duke of Choiseul, then Count of Stainville) to join him in Rome when the latter had just been appointed ambassador.
Hubert Robert arrived in Rome on 4 November 1754, aged twenty-one, and remained there until 24 July 1765. Thanks to his patron, he obtained a place as a pensioneer at the Académie de France without having won the prestigious Prix de Rome. On his arrival in Rome, he frequented the studio of the painter Giovanni Paolo Panini (1691 - 1765), the inventor of the ruins painting, and also benefited from the proximity of Giovanni Battista Piranesi’s studio (1720 - 1778). During his eleven-year stay in Rome, Hubert Robert studied the great Italian masters and drew many of the great archaeological sites, multiplying the sketches which he would use throughout his career, becoming one of the masters of the "ruin landscape".
Back in Paris in 1765, he was very successful. He was accepted and admitted to the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture on the same day, July 26th 1766, which was very unusual. He was appointed draughtsman of the king's gardens in 1784, then guard of the Royal Museum from 1784 to 1792. Arrested in 1793 and detained in the prisons of Sainte Pélagie and Saint-Lazare, he was released in 1794 after the fall of Robespierre and undertook a second trip to Italy. In 1800, Hubert Robert was appointed curator of the new Central Museum and died at his home in Paris in 1808.
2. Description of the artwork
This composition, formerly called "La Cascade du Belvédère Pamphile" , is undoubtedly inspired by the water theatres of the Frascati villas. Hubert Robert presents a hemicycle of columns with rustic bossages at the foot of which is a cascade of water falls into a basin. The hemicycle is flanked by two high walls, pierced by window wells topped with antique masks...
Category
1760s Old Masters William Zorach Art
Materials
Ink, Watercolor
Oil on Canvas “Arroyo 14”
By Frank Arnold
Located in Fresno, CA
" Arroyo 14" is 72” x 60”. A rich sienna and ochre figure centered on a textured field of light yellows and beige. Frank Arnold’s paintings exhibit the highest quality materials for ...
Category
2010s Abstract William Zorach Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
"Great Pine", Tree Inhabited by Human in Nature, Drawing and Pigments on Paper
By Frank Girard
Located in Clermont-Ferrand, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
This drawing by Frank Girard is created with pigments, Chinese ink, watercolors, acrylic, and colored pencils on 300g/m2 neutral white paper. It is not fr...
Category
2010s Realist William Zorach Art
Materials
Paper, Ink, Watercolor, Pigment, Acrylic, Color Pencil
H 25.6 in W 19.69 in D 0.02 in
'Amalfi, Italy', mixed media on paper c2005
Located in Frome, Somerset
'Amalfi, Italy'. Mixed media on paper . circa 2005.
painting 41cm x 54cm
glazed frame 62cmx 82cm
Atmospheric view of the seafront topography and buildings of the famous coastal town...
Category
Early 2000s Modern William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
"1940 - New Mexico Farmers" Orig. Mixed Media on Board by Tom Perkinson, Framed
By Tom Perkinson
Located in Encino, CA
"1940 - New Mexico Farmers" is an original mixed media on board by Tom Perkinson. His use of saturated violets, vivid yellows, and resplendent oranges pushes color to almost-otherwor...
Category
1970s Realist William Zorach Art
Materials
Pastel, Color Pencil, Watercolor, Mixed Media, Ink
No Reserve
H 18.625 in W 24.5 in D 2.5 in
Disappearances / Extinctions #1 Hélène Duclos 21st Century drawing landscape art
By Hélène Duclos
Located in Paris, FR
This drawing is part of the current exhibition entitled "The fantastic story of the liquid mountain" at Claire Corcia Gallery in Paris.
The liquid mountain is populated by living be...
Category
2010s Contemporary William Zorach Art
Materials
Color Pencil, Graphite, Paper, Gouache
H 39.38 in W 27.56 in D 1.97 in
"Great Pine", Tree Inhabited by Human in Nature, Drawing and Pigments on Paper
By Frank Girard
Located in Clermont-Ferrand, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
This drawing by Frank Girard is created with pigments, Chinese ink, watercolors, acrylic, and colored pencils on 300g/m2 neutral white paper. It is not framed.
Through drawings, the...
Category
2010s Realist William Zorach Art
Materials
Color Pencil, Pigment, Paper, Ink, Acrylic, Watercolor
H 25.6 in W 19.69 in D 0.02 in
French 19th Century Oil on Canvas Blue and White Music Allegory Cherub Painting
Located in Firenze, IT
This romantic French 19th century allegoric oil painting on square canvas has a sky blue background, a fluffy cloud fills the central part of the painting where a woman is lying down playing the lyre, while a graceful cherub seems to twirl over her.
This oil on canvas painting represents the allegory of music - with a woman dressed in classical clothes and a putto- a very popular theme during all the neoclassical age, with its lively scene inspired by the Rococo period.
The composition creates a awesome trompe-l'œil effect thanks to the color palette scheme. Well painted white and gray shadings (chiaro scuro) that stands out from the light blue background in typical grisaille style.
This painting originally was an over door frieze...
Category
19th Century Rococo William Zorach Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
H 34.26 in W 34.26 in D 1.58 in
Previously Available Items
Girl with Clasped Hands
By William Zorach
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Girl with Clasped Hands
Watercolor on paper, 1913
Signed and dated lower right (see photo)
Provenance: Gift of the Artist
Felix ...
Category
1910s American Modern William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
TEN TREES ON A HILL
By William Zorach
Located in Portland, ME
Zorach, William (American, 1887-1966). LANDSCAPE WITH CLOUDS. Watercolor and pencil on paper, not dated, but circa 1913. Unsigned, but inscribed verso "By William Zorach/(Tessim Zorach)." Tessim Zorach, (1915-1995) was the eldest of the children of William and Marguerite Zorach. 8 x 11 1/2 inches, the full sheet. Provenance, Tessim Zorach, Zabriskie Gallery...
Category
1910s William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
LANDSCAPE WITH CLOUDS
By William Zorach
Located in Portland, ME
Zorach, William (American, 1887-1966). LANDSCAPE WITH CLOUDS. Watercolor on paper, 1913. Signed and dated in pencil, lower right. 9 1/2 x 11 inches, the full sheet. Provenance, The a...
Category
1910s William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
"Study of a Hand, 1934"
By William Zorach
Located in Southampton, NY
This is a very nice drawing of a study of a hand; graphite on paper done by William Zorach in 1934. Pencil signed and dated lower right on the mat. In ...
Category
1930s American Modern William Zorach Art
Materials
Graphite
Winter Day Along the Kennebec
By William Zorach
Located in Wiscasset, ME
Painter, sculptor and writer William Zorach was born in Lithuania in 1889 but moved to the United States with his family in 1893, settling in Cleveland. Zorach stayed in Ohio for al...
Category
1930s Modern William Zorach Art
Materials
Watercolor
Maine Harbor
By William Zorach
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed lower right: Zorach
From the Estate of Felix Russman (1888-1962), a friend of Zorach and fellow artist.
Bibliography:
Henry Adams, Out of the Kok...
Category
William Zorach Art
William Zorach art for sale on 1stDibs.
Find a wide variety of authentic William Zorach art available for sale on 1stDibs. You can also browse by medium to find art by William Zorach in paint, watercolor, oil paint and more. Much of the original work by this artist or collective was created during the 20th century and is mostly associated with the modern style. Not every interior allows for large William Zorach art, so small editions measuring 7 inches across are available. Customers who are interested in this artist might also find the work of Walter Beach Humphrey, Stuart Davis, and Jan Matulka. William Zorach art prices can differ depending upon medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $1,875 and tops out at $45,000, while the average work can sell for $18,000.