Pal Fried

Mona Lisa

1950

John Edward Costigan, N.A. American, 1888-1972 Woman and Child Oil on canvas Signed ‘J.E. Costigan N.A.’ lower left 24 by 30 in. W/frame 32 by 38 in. John Costigan was born of Irish-American parents in Providence, Rhode Island, February 29, 1888. He was a cousin of the noted American showman, George M. Cohan, whose parents brought the young Costigan to New York City and was instrumental in starting him on a career in the visual arts. They were less successful in encouraging him to pursue formal studies at the Art Students League (where, however, he later taught) than in exposing him to the commercial art world through the job they had gotten him with the New York lithographing firm that made their theatrical posters. At the H. C. Miner Lithographing Company, Costigan worked his way up from his entry job as a pressroom helper, through various apprenticeships, to the position of sketch artist. In the latter capacity he was an uncredited designer of posters for the Ziegfeld Follies and for numerous silent films. Meanwhile, he had supplemented his very meager formal studies in the fine arts with a self-teaching discipline that led to his first professional recognition in 1920 with the receipt of prizes for an oil painting and watercolor in separate New York exhibitions. A year earlier, Costigan had wed professional model Ida Blessin, with whom he established residence and began raising a family in the sleepy little rural New York hamlet of Orangeburg, the setting for the many idyllic farm landscapes and wood interiors with which he was to become identified in a career that would span half a century. John Costigan’s first national recognition came in 1922 with his winning of the coveted Peterson Purchase prize of the Art Institute of Chicago for an oil on canvas, “Sheep at the Brook.” It marked the start of an unbroken winning streak that would gain him at least one important prize per year for the remainder of the decade. The nation’s art journalists and critics began to take notice, making him the recurring subject of newspaper features and magazine articles. The eminent author and critic Edgar Holger Cahill was just a fledgling reporter when he wrote his first feature, “John Costigan Carries the Flame,” for Shadowland Magazine in 1922. Costigan had his first one-man show of paintings at the Rehn Gallery on New York’s 5th Avenue in November, 1924, to be followed less than three years later by another at the Art Institute of Chicago. In addition, Costigan’s work has been—and continues to be included, side-by-side with that of some of America’s most high-profile artists, in museum and gallery exhibitions throughout the country. His renown had peaked in the early 1930s, by which time his work had been honored with nearly every major award then being bestowed in the fine arts and had been acquired for the permanent collections of several prestigious American museums, including New York’s Metropolitan (which only recently, in 1997, deaccessioned his “Wood Interior,” acquired in 1934). Although Costigan’s celebrity had ebbed by the late 1930s, the Smithsonian Institution saw fit in 1937 to host an exhibition exclusively of his etchings. And, in 1941, the Corcoran Gallery (also Washington, D.C.) similarly honored him for his watercolors. (Another Washington institution, the Library of Congress, today includes 22 Costigan etchings and lithographs in its permanent print collection.) During World War II, Costigan returned briefly to illustrating, mainly for Bluebook, a men’s pulp adventure magazine. A gradual revival of interest in his more serious work began at the end of the war, culminating in 1968 with the mounting of a 50-year Costigan retrospective at the Paine Art Center and Arboretum in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Oils, watercolors and prints were borrowed from museums and private collections throughout the country, and the exhibition was subsequently toured nationally by the Smithsonian Institution. John Costigan died of pneumonia in Nyack, NY, August 5, 1972, just months after receiving his final prestigious award —the Benjamin West Clinedinst Medal of the Artist’s Fellowship, Inc., presented in general recognition of his “...achievement of exceptional artistic merit...” in the various media he had mastered in the course of his career. This painting depicts one of the artist's favorite themes --the farm family bathing...

John Edward Costigan, N.A. American, 1888-1972 Bathing Group Oil on canvas board Signed ‘J.E. Costigan N.A.’ lower left 12 by 16 in. W/frame 20 by 24 i...

LOUIS GRANER Y ARRUFI (Spanish, 1863-1929) The Glow 1923 oil on canvas Signed & dated 23 lower left In a Fine Giltwood Carved Frame 33 by 25 ½ in. W/frame ...

Lucien Pissarro French, 1863-1944 Girl Reading a Book Oil on canvas 18 ¼ by 15 in. W/frame 24 ¼ by 21 in. Signed lower right and dated 1907 Born in Pa...

Georges d'Espagnat French, 1870 - 1950 Les Vendanges Signed gdE (lower left)  Oil on canvas 67 by 43 in. W/frame 71 by 47 in. Born at Melun on 14th August 1870, Georges d’Espagnat...

Dietz Edzard German, 1893-1963 Au Circus Oil on canvas 22 by 31 in. W/frame 32 by 41 in. Signed lower right Dietz Edzard was born in Bremen in 1893 Germany. He traveled extensive...

Family scene. Oil sketch on cardboard. This work will be recorded in the catalogue raisonné of the work of the artist currently in preparation. Jules Van Biesbroeck was the son of Jules Evariste van Biesbroeck, a painter of Ghent, but was born in Italy, in Portici, near Naples, while his parents were staying there. (In the 19th century many artists made educational trips to Italy). It was a long visit: the child was two years old by the time the family returned to Ghent.[1] After a short period of practice with his father, van Biesbroeck was enrolled in the Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent. His first painting, "The Shepherd" (French: Le pâtre), was sold at the Triennale in Ghent. In 1888, when he was only 15 years old, he made his debut at the "Salon des Champs-Elysées" in Paris with his monumental work "The Launch of the Argo" (French: Le lancement...

'Cours de maison Blida'. Oil sketch on cardboard. Signed and titled on the back. This work will be recorded in the catalogue raisonné of the work of the artist currently in preparati...

A fine mid 20th century post impressionist oil of a young woman sewing by lamplight circa 1960's oil on canvas 46cmx 70cm good gallery frame 63cmx 88cm Very atmospheric light effect painted in expressive colourfield palette creating a soft diffused atmosphere under the old lamp...

David R. Buchanan 20th Century British. 'Men at Work' circa 1930's oil on canvas 45cmx60cm good quality gallery frame 61cmx76cm A dymanic scene of a gang of road workers laying mains...

A. J. Bennett (South African, fl. Early 20th century) Light and Shade • Oil on canvas artist board ca. 42.5 x 29.5 cm • Later frame ca. 53.5 x 41 cm Worldwide shipping is complime...

Literature Dorival, Bernard & Rouault, Isabelle, Rouault, L’Oeuvre peint(Monaco, 1988), vol. 2, p. 150, no. 1864 (illus.) Executed in 1937, Carlotta belongs to a group of portraits...