Louis Oscar Griffith

Nashville at Sunrise

c. 1925

Jersey Shore III Casein on Masonite, 1967 Signed lower right (see photo) Initialed, dated and titled verso Provenance: Estate of the artist Virginia Dehn (the artist's widow) Dehn Quests Created on location on the Jersey Shore. The Jersey Shore was the main playground for thousand to escape the summer heat of New York. This small painting shows Dehn's mastery of patterning color to depict movement and recreation. Part of a suite of paintings done on this theme. Within a year of it's creation, Dehn dies from a heart attack. Casein on Masonite Condition: Excellent Image: 6 x 11" Frame: 9 3/8 x 14 1/2" Adolf Dehn, American Watercolorist and Printmaker, 1895-1968 Adolf Dehn was an artist who achieved extraordinary artistic heights, but in a very particular artistic sphere—not so much in oil painting as in watercolor and lithography. Long recognized as a master by serious print collectors, he is gradually gaining recognition as a notable and influential figure in the overall history of American art. In the 19th century, with the invention of the rotary press, which made possible enormous print runs, and the development of the popular, mass-market magazines, newspaper and magazine illustration developed into an artistic realm of its own, often surprisingly divorced from the world of museums and art exhibitions, and today remains surprisingly overlooked by most art historians. Dehn in many regards was an outgrowth of this world, although in an unusual way, since as a young man he produced most of his illustrative work not for popular magazines, such as The Saturday Evening Post, but rather for radical journals, such as The Masses or The Liberator, or artistic “little magazines” such as The Dial. This background established the foundation of his outlook, and led later to his unique and distinctive contribution to American graphic art. If there’s a distinctive quality to his work, it was his skill in introducing unusual tonal and textural effects into his work, particularly in printmaking but also in watercolor. Jackson Pollock seems to have been one of many notable artists who were influenced by his techniques. Early Years, 1895-1922 For an artist largely remembered for scenes of Vienna and Paris, Adolf Dehn’s background was a surprising one. Born in Waterville, Minnesota, on November 22, 1895, Dehn was the descendent of farmers who had emigrated from Germany and homesteaded in the region, initially in a one-room log cabin with a dirt floor. Adolf’s father, Arthur Clark Dehn, was a hunter and trapper who took pride that he had no boss but himself, and who had little use for art. Indeed, during Adolf’s boyhood the walls of his bedroom and the space under his bed were filled with the pelts of mink, muskrats and skunks that his father had killed, skinned and stretched on drying boards. It was Adolf’s mother, Emilie Haas Dehn, a faithful member of the German Lutheran Evangelical Church, who encouraged his interest in art, which became apparent early in childhood. Both parents were ardent socialists, and supporters of Eugene Debs. In many ways Dehn’s later artistic achievement was clearly a reaction against the grinding rural poverty of his childhood. After graduating from high school in 1914 at the age of 19—an age not unusual in farming communities at the time, where school attendance was often irregular—Dehn attended the Minneapolis School of Art from 1914 to 1917, whose character followed strongly reflected that of its director, Munich-trained Robert Kohler, an artistic conservative but a social radical. There Dehn joined a group of students who went on to nationally significant careers, including Wanda Gag (later author of best-selling children’s books); John Flanagan (a sculptor notable for his use of direct carving) Harry Gottlieb (a notable social realist and member of the Woodstock Art Colony), Elizabeth Olds (a printmaker and administrator for the WPA), Arnold Blanch (landscape, still-life and figure painter, and member of the Woodstock group), Lucille Lunquist, later Lucille Blanch (also a gifted painter and founder of the Woodstock art colony), and Johan Egilrud (who stayed in Minneapolis and became a journalist and poet). Adolf became particularly close to Wanda Gag (1893-1946), with whom he established an intense but platonic relationship. Two years older than he, Gag was the daughter of a Bohemian artist and decorator, Anton Gag, who had died in 1908. After her husband died, Wanda’s mother, Lizzi Gag, became a helpless invalid, so Wanda was entrusted with the task of raising and financially supporting her six younger siblings. This endowed her with toughness and an independent streak, but nonetheless, when she met Dehn, Wanda was Victorian and conventional in her artistic taste and social values. Dehn was more socially radical, and introduced her to radical ideas about politics and free love, as well as to socialist publications such as The Masses and The Appeal to Reason. Never very interested in oil painting, in Minneapolis Dehn focused on caricature and illustration--often of a humorous or politically radical character. In 1917 both Dehn and Wanda won scholarships to attend the Art Students League, and consequently, in the fall of that year both moved to New York. Dehn’s art education, however, ended in the summer of 1918, shortly after the United States entered World War I, when he was drafted to serve in the U. S. Army. Unwilling to fight, he applied for status as a conscientious objector, but was first imprisoned, then segregated in semi-imprisonment with other Pacifists, until the war ended. The abuse he suffered at this time may well explain his later withdrawal from taking political stands or making art of an overtly political nature. After his release from the army, Dehn returned to New York where he fell under the spell of the radical cartoonist Boardman Robinson and produced his first lithographs. He also finally consummated his sexual relationship with Wanda Gag. The Years in Europe: 1922-1929 In September of 1921, however, he abruptly departed for Europe, arriving in Paris and then moving on to Vienna. There in the winter of 1922 he fell in love with a Russian dancer, Mura Zipperovitch, ending his seven-year relationship with Wanda Gag. He and Mura were married in 1926. It was also in Vienna that he produced his first notable artistic work. Influenced by European artists such as Jules Pascin and Georg Grosz, Dehn began producing drawings of people in cafes, streets, and parks, which while mostly executed in his studio, were based on spontaneous life studies and have an expressive, sometimes almost childishly wandering quality of line. The mixture of sophistication and naiveté in these drawings was new to American audiences, as was the raciness of their subject matter, which often featured pleasure-seekers, prostitutes or scenes of sexual dalliance, presented with a strong element of caricature. Some of these drawings contain an element of social criticism, reminiscent of that found in the work of George Grosz, although Dehn’s work tended to focus on humorous commentary rather than savagely attacking his subjects or making a partisan political statement. Many Americans, including some who had originally been supporters of Dehn such as Boardman Robinson, were shocked by these European drawings, although George Grocz (who became a friend of the artist in this period) admired them, and recognized that Dehn could also bring a new vision to America subject matter. As he told Dehn: “You will do things in America which haven’t been done, which need to be done, which only you can do—as far at least as I know America.” A key factor in Dehn’s artistic evolution at this time was his association with Scofield Thayer, the publisher of the most notable modernist art and poetry magazine...

The Port of San Tropez Oil on canvas, c. 1920 Signed lower right corner (see photo) Condition: Excellent, professionally cleaned Image/Canvas size: 25 3/4 x 32 inches Frame size: 30...

Long Light Notre Dame Oil on canvas, 1931 Note: the painting is NOT framed Signed and dated lower right Condition: Excellent Conservation by Monica Radecki, South Bend Canvas size: ...

Untitled (also known as "1811 THE BACKWOODSMAN'S CHRISTMAS") Oil on canvas, c. 1875-1925 Unsigned Provenance: Found in Ohio A charming American naive no...

Gulf of Corinth Oil on canvas, April 1912 Signed by the artist lower left; titled by the artist lower right (see photos) Image size: 5 1/2 x 13 1/2 inches Frame size: 9 x 16 3/4 inc...

Southhampton 8:45 PM Signed Gray lower right Titled on verso in black paint Oil on canvas, 28 x 40 inches Exhibited: Jacques Seligman Galleries (label) twice, original price $450. (See photo) Condition: {Small slit in canvas, delivered to Monica for cleaning and repair} Expertly repaired by Monica Radecki Gray had his first one man show at Seligmann in 1947. NY Times Obit: Large Abstract Works, Dies By Ken Johnson Dec. 10, 2004 Cleve Gray, a painter admired for his large-scale, vividly colorful and lyrically gestural abstract compositions, died on Wednesday in Hartford. He was 86. The cause was a massive subdural hematoma suffered after he fell on ice and hit his head on Tuesday outside his home in Warren, Conn., said his wife, the writer Francine du Plessix Gray. Mr. Gray achieved his greatest critical recognition in the late 1960's and 70's after working for many years in a comparatively conservative late-Cubist style. Inspired in the 60's by artists like Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, Mark Rothko and Helen Frankenthaler, Mr. Gray began to produce large paintings using a variety of application methods -- pouring, staining, sponging and other nontraditional techniques -- to create compositions combining expanses of pure color and spontaneous calligraphic gestures. In 1972 and 73 he produced "Threnody," a suite of 14 paintings, each measuring 20 feet by 20 feet, dedicated to the dead on both sides in the Vietnam War. The series was commissioned by the Neuberger Museum of Art at Purchase College, part of the State University of New York, and is considered one of the largest groups of abstract paintings created for a specific public space. PUBLIC COLLECTIONS: Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, Andover, MA Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY The Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY Cathedral of Saint John the Divine Art Gallery, New York, NY Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, ME Columbia University Art Gallery, New York, NY Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, OH The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. Grey Art Gallery and Study Center, New York University, New York, NY Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY Heckscher Museum, Huntington, New York, NY Honolulu Academy of the Arts, Honolulu, HI The Jewish Museum, New York, NY Krannert Art Museum, University of Illinois, Champaign, IL Mattatuck Museum, Waterbury, CT The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY Minnesota Museum of Art, St. Paul, MI Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. The Neuberger Museum, State University of New York, Purchase, NY New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, CT The Newark Museum, Newark, NJ Norton Gallery of Art, West Palm Beach, FL Oklahoma City Art Center, Oklahoma City, OK The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. The Art Museum, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA Shearson Lehman Hutton Collection...

This delightful turn of the century (early 20th century) oil on canvas painting represents an Italian landscape with one of the most famous squares in the world: Piazza San Marco in ...

"Houses And River" Signed A. Huntington (English School) Oil on canvas Measures: Canvas - 60x110 cm (Gilt Wood Frame - 76x126 cm) Private collection. Framed

This very fine quality 19th century oil on canvas in dark brown wood frame with gold leaves details throughout is signed by Joseph Brunner (Vienna 1826-...

A luxuriant forest is the romantic and lyrical landscape where the dance of the nude nymphs takes place in this joyful 19th Century antique oil on canvas painting featuring a mythological scene. Dance of the Nymphs and Naiads is a myth inspired by the tales of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, a subject already much loved in the Renaissance period as an allegory of rebirth - as in one of the most famous paintings in the world the Spring by Sandro Botticelli- then reproduced throughout the neoclassicism by academic painters -due to the renewed interest in classical artworks following the discovery of archaeological sites- and taken up later, with ecological purposes and meanings, also by the Barbizon school and Impressionist artists. The present artwork – signed Vagner low left and datable to the second half of the 19th century - is closely inspired by an important work by the great Camille Corot, which is now housed at the Musée d'Orsay (Paris). This historical oil on canvas painting, featuring a joyful scene with the three graces and other dancing nymphs...

Fascinating mythological story of Diana and Actaeon can be found in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Very important provenance from a royal collection. Fabulous finely carved gilt wood coeval frame . Giovanni Battista Viola...

Fascinating mythological story of Diana and Actaeon can be found in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Very important provenance from a royal collection. Fabulous finely carved gilt wood coeval frame . Giovanni Battista Viola...