Skip to main content

Chaim Gross Art

American, 1904-1991

Chaim Gross was one of the most important American sculptors of the 20th century. Along with other noted sculptors William Zorach and Jose de Creeft, Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, and a majority of his work was carved from wood. Born in Ukraine in 1904, Gross studied at the art academy in Budapest under painter Béla Uitz, followed by art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna. He immigrated to the United States with two of his brothers in 1921 and continued his studies at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design with Elie Nadelman and others, and the Art Students League with sculptor and direct carver Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School at the same time as Peter Blume, Adolph Gottlieb and Moses and Raphael Soyer. Thereafter, Gross began an illustrious career that included important public commissions via his work for the Works Progress Administration and solo and group shows at prestigious galleries and museums such as the Whitney and the Smithsonian. Gross was also recognized with a silver medal at the Exposition Universelle de 1937 in Paris and 1942 with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Artists for Victory exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. Gross also had a long career as a professor of printmaking and sculpture at various institutions including the The New School for Social Research, Art Students League and New Art School (which Gross ran briefly with fellow artists Alexander Dobkin and Moses and Raphael Soyer). But he had his longest tenure of 50 years as a professor at his alma mater, the Educational Alliance Art School, where he taught Louise Nevelson in 1934 and helped guide her transition from painter to one of the most important female sculptors of her generation. Gross received multiple honorary doctorates in the 70s and 80s and his work can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington DC. Gross died in 1991.

2
to
8
53
5
2
31
15
29
14
10
Overall Height
to
Overall Width
to
18
14
2
41
23
21
17
17
10
9
6
4
4
3
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
53
3
16
4
10
8
59
6,826
3,118
2,517
1,217
33
7
6
6
6
Artist: Chaim Gross
Study for Sculpture of Nude Woman Balancing Baby
By Chaim Gross
Located in New York, NY
Study for Sculpture of Nude Woman Balancing Baby, 1949, by Chaim Gross (1902-1991) Ink on paper 10 ½ x 7 ½ inches unframed (26.67 x 19.05 cm) 1...
Category

1940s Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Paper, Ink, Pen

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1955 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, and published by the Artists Equity Association of New York in an edition of 2000...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Waterscape, Impressionist Watercolor on Paper by Chaim Gross
By Chaim Gross
Located in Long Island City, NY
Waterscape Chaim Gross, Austrian (1901–1991) Date: 1948 Watercolor on Paper, signed and dated in pen lower right Size: 15 x 23 in. (38.1 x 58.42 cm)
Category

1940s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Watercolor

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1952 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Chaim Gross Bronze Sculpture, Dog & Children
By Chaim Gross
Located in Lake Worth Beach, FL
Additional Information: Provenance: Collection of Mrs. S. Furer, Boca Raton, Florida. Much of Mrs. Furer’s extensive art collection was acquired in Hempstead, New York during the 196...
Category

20th Century Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Bronze

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1958 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1956 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1958 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1956 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1956 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1957 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph is from the rare 1954 "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 1954 Spr...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

NEW INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC ORDER Signed Serigraph, Abstract Cornucopia, Fruit
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
"NEW INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC ORDER" is a brightly colored serigraph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross printed in 16 colors including shades of yellow, blue, purple, salmon p...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

FLAG SERIES 1980 Signed Lithograph Colorful Flag Collage Madagascar Stamp, Birds
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
FLAG SERIES 1980 is a brightly colored lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross printed in 10 colors on archival Arches printmaking paper. FLAG SERIES 1980 depicts a bold graphic image comprised of colorful flag segments intermixed to form a varied bird-shaped designs. Chaim Gross' FLAG SERIES was specially commissioned by The World Federation of UN Associations (WFUNA) in 1980 as a limited edition lithograph for the UN stamp issue. Print is pencil signed by the artist numbered 166/1500. Postal Stamp and First Day cancel on lower left. Print size - 11.0" x 8.5" unframed, fresh, vivid colors, very good condition. Chaim Gross,(1904 - 1991) was a sculptor, artist, and teacher, known for his wood carvings, sculptures of moving human figures, religious imagery, acrobats, mothers and children. Chaim was born on March 17, 1904 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia. During World War I, Russian forces invaded Austria-Hungary; amidst the turmoil, the Grosses fled Kolomyia. They returned when Austria retook the town in 1915, refugees of the war. When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest, where Gross attended the city's art academy and studied with painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna shortly before emigrating to New York City in 1921. In the U.S., Gross's studies continued at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied sculpture with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League, with sculptor Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky. In the late 1920s and early 1930s Gross exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club (the precursor to the Whitney Museum of American Art). In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. Also in 1932, Gross married Renee Nechin (1909-2005), and they had two children, Yehuda and Mimi (Mimi Gross is a New York-based artist, and was married to the artist Red Grooms from 1963-1976). In 1933, Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures for schools and public colleges, and created works for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the 1937 Exposition universelle in Paris. Chaim Gross, Sculptor by Josef Vincent Lombardo, the first major book on Gross, came out in 1949 and included a catalogue raisonne of his sculpture. In the 1950s Gross began to make more...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

HOMAGE TO SIGMUND FREUD Signed Lithograph, Surreal Portrait, Psychoanalysis
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
HOMAGE TO SIGMUND FREUD, is an original hand drawn, stone lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. HOMAGE TO SIGMUND FREUD was hand proofed and printed from hand drawn lithographic stones on archival Arches paper in shades of warm yellow for the background texture and red brown for the master drawing. HOMAGE TO SIGMUND FREUD is a surrealistic portrait composition depicting Sigmund Freud's face(one portraying him with spectacles) surrounded by symbolic imagery including swirling birds, a child opening a heart-shaped lock, an embracing couple, fingers and bare leg. HOMAGE TO SIGMUND FREUD expresses an intriguing variety of visualized psychological references. This original, hand printed lithograph measures 18.5" x 22", registration marks are visible in print margins as evidence of the master printer's use of age-old printing methods first utilized in fine art lithography printmaking. HOMAGE TO SIGMUND FREUD is unframed, in excellent condition, pencil signed, dated and inscribed B.A.T., Trial Proof aside from the edition by Chaim Gross. Edition was published in 1976 as a fundraiser for the Hebrew University in Israel. Print size - 18.5 x 22 in., unframed, very fine condition, from the master printer's private collection Printer - Joseph Kleineman, J K Fine Art Editions Co. NYC Chaim Gross,(1904 - 1991) was a sculptor, artist, and teacher, known for his wood carvings, sculptures of moving human figures, religious imagery, acrobats, mothers and children. Chaim was born on March 17, 1904 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia. During World War I, Russian forces invaded Austria-Hungary; amidst the turmoil, the Grosses fled Kolomyia. They returned when Austria retook the town in 1915, refugees of the war. When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest, where Gross attended the city's art academy and studied with painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna shortly before emigrating to New York City in 1921. In the U.S., Gross's studies continued at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied sculpture with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League, with sculptor Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky. In the late 1920s and early 1930s Gross exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club (the precursor to the Whitney Museum of American Art). In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. Also in 1932, Gross married Renee Nechin (1909-2005), and they had two children, Yehuda and Mimi (Mimi Gross is a New York-based artist, and was married to the artist Red Grooms from 1963-1976). In 1933, Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures for schools and public colleges, and created works for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the 1937 Exposition universelle in Paris. Chaim Gross, Sculptor by Josef Vincent Lombardo, the first major book on Gross, came out in 1949 and included a catalogue raisonne of his sculpture. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

NEW IMMIGRANTS Signed Lithograph, Refugees, Boat, Humanitarian Aid, Sun
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
NEW IMMIGRANTS 1984 is a hand drawn lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross printed in 11 colors on archival Arches printmaking paper. NEW IMMIGRANTS 1984 depicts a figurative image of new immigrants arriving by boat against a background of blue sky and yellow sun rising. A city skyline is visible on the left while humanitarian aid workers attend to the needs of the people - a nurse holding a young boy, food being distributed, a mother cradling a baby in her arms. Chaim Gross' NEW IMMIGRANTS was specially commissioned by The World Federation of UN Associations (WFUNA) in 1984 as a limited edition lithograph for the UN International Conference On Population. Print is pencil signed by the artist on lower right corner. Print size - 11.0" x 8.5" unframed, vivid colors, excellent condition, Printers Proof aside from the edition of 1000. Chaim Gross,(1904 - 1991) was a sculptor, artist, and teacher, known for his wood carvings, sculptures of moving human figures, religious imagery, acrobats, mothers and children. Chaim was born on March 17, 1904 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia. During World War I, Russian forces invaded Austria-Hungary; amidst the turmoil, the Grosses fled Kolomyia. They returned when Austria retook the town in 1915, refugees of the war. When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest, where Gross attended the city's art academy and studied with painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna shortly before emigrating to New York City in 1921. In the U.S., Gross's studies continued at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied sculpture with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League, with sculptor Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky. In the late 1920s and early 1930s Gross exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club (the precursor to the Whitney Museum of American Art). In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. Also in 1932, Gross married Renee Nechin (1909-2005), and they had two children, Yehuda and Mimi (Mimi Gross is a New York-based artist, and was married to the artist Red Grooms from 1963-1976). In 1933, Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures for schools and public colleges, and created works for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the 1937 Exposition universelle in Paris. Chaim Gross, Sculptor by Josef Vincent Lombardo, the first major book on Gross, came out in 1949 and included a catalogue raisonne of his sculpture. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Three Girls Bronze Relief Sculpture Plaque Chaim Gross Modernist WPA Era Artist
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
Chaim Gross Three little girls, three Graces. 1981. Bronze sculptural relief plaque mounted to verdigris marble. signed and dated on marble Marble approx 7.5" x 7" x 1.5". Bronze: 5.25" x 4" x 1" Chaim Gross, born in Wolowa, Austria in 1904, was educated at the Beaux Arts Institute of Design and at the Art Student's League in New York. Chaim Gross's work was greatly influenced by his experiences during a period of international conflict, World War II. He had moved to Kolomyia from Wolowa to get a better education, but the Germans came to occupy, killing, raping, and looting. Gross and his family were chased from one village to the next. He wrote, "We were sleeping on roofs and in the fields, with the sound of cannon fire always in the distance,". Eventually, he ended up in Budapest with his two brothers, where Anti­ Semitism was not as severe, and that is where he began to sculpt and draw. He even had a few odd jobs there as a gold­ and silversmith. When he was seventeen, Gross immigrated to America where his older brother was. There he was a student and then a teacher at the Educational Alliance on the Lower East Side. Teaching became a big part of his philosophy, as he believed that an artist must pass on the knowledge which he had received from others in his artwork. He was part of an artist emigre community which included Raphael Soyer, Moses Soyer, Arnold Newman, Max Weber and David Burliuk. His daughter is the artist Mimi Grooms and his son in law was Red Grooms. Chaim Gross works reflect his Jewish and Austrian roots and his Hasidic Jewish upbringing. The figures in his art reflect the Hasidic spirit of being happy and making other people happy. This opiece has children playing and is perfect for a kids room. In his pieces, Jews sing and dance in celebration of the Jewish Sabbath and festivals. They are shown rejoicing in the great gifts of love and life. Chaim Gross was honored with a number of prestigious awards including: the Award of Merit Medal from the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1963, and the Gold Medal award from the National Academy of Design in 1985. He often used his creative abilities to explore and experiment with media. In his artwork he retains an optimistic philosophy, even when facing somber issues such as war, depression, and the Holocaust. Gross was born to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa (now known as Mezhgorye, Ukraine), in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia (which was annexed into the Ukrainian USSR in 1939 and became part of newly independent Ukraine in 1991). When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest to join their older siblings Sarah and Pinkas. Gross applied to and was accepted by the art academy in Budapest and studied under the painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna, Austria shortly before immigrating to the United States in 1921. Gross's studies continued in the United States at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League of New York, with Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky, at the same time as Moses Soyer and Peter Blume. In 1926 Gross began teaching at The Educational Alliance, and continued teaching there for the next 50 years. Louise Nevelson was among his students at the Alliance (in 1934), during the time she was transitioning from painting to sculpture. In the late 1920s and early 1930s he exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club. In 1929, Gross experimented with printmaking, and created an important group of 15 linocuts and lithographs of landscapes, New York City streets and parks, women in interiors, the circus, and vaudeville. The entire suite is now in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gross returned to the medium of printmaking in the 1960s, and produced approximately 200 works in the medium over the next two decades. In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. For a short time they represented Gross, as well as his friends Milton Avery, Moses Soyer, Ahron Ben-Shmuel and others. Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Other direct carvers in early 20th-century American art include William Zorach, Jose de Creeft, and Robert Laurent. Works by Chaim Gross can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings (27 sculptures) at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. A key work from this era, now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is the 1932 birds-eye maple Acrobatic Performers, which is also only one and one quarter inch thick. In 1933 Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which Gross worked for later in the 1930s. Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures that were placed in schools and public colleges, made work for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the Exposition universelle de 1937 in Paris, and in 1942, with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Artists for Victory" exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. In 1949 Gross sketched Chaim Weizmann, President of Israel, at several functions in New York City where Weizmann was speaking, Gross completed the bust in bronze later that year. Gross returned to Israel for three months in 1951 (the second of many trips there in the postwar years) to paint a series of 40 watercolors of life in various cities. This series was exhibited at the Jewish Museum (Manhattan) in 1953. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. At the end of the decade Gross was working primarily in bronze which allowed him to create open forms, large-scale works and of course, multiple casts. Gross's large-scale bronze The Family, donated to New York City in 1991 in honor of Mayor Ed Koch, and installed at the Bleecker Street Park at 11th street, is now a fixture of Greenwich Village. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African sculpture, formed since the late 1930s, was exhibited at the Worcester Art Museum in the show The Sculptor's Eye: The African Art Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross. Gross was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1981. In 1984, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, with Jacob Lawrence and Lukas Foss. In the fall of 1991, Allen Ginsberg gave an important tribute to Gross at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which is published in their Proceedings. In 1994, Forum Gallery, which now represents the Chaim Gross estate, held a memorial exhibition featuring a sixty-year survey of Gross's work. Gross was a professor of printmaking and sculpture at both the Educational Alliance and the New School for Social Research in New York City, as well as at the Brooklyn Museum Art School, the MoMA art school, the Art Student's League and the New Art School (which Gross ran briefly with Alexander Dobkin, Raphael Soyer and Moses Soyer). Gross was a member of the New York Artists Equity Association and the Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors. He was a founder and served as the first president of the Sculptors Guild. He is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art; the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel.He is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art; the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel. And the EIN HAROD Museum's Holdings: Israeli art is represented by the works of Reuven Rubin, Zaritzky, Nahum Gutman, Mordechai Ardon, Aharon Kahana, Arie Lubin, Yehiel Shemi, Yosl Bergner and others. The graphic arts collection contains drawings and graphic works by Pissaro, Amedeo Modigliani, Jules Pascin, Marc Chagall (almost all of his graphic work), and numerous other artists. The sculpture collection includes works by Jewish sculptors from all over the world including leading Israeli sculptors; Ben Zvi, Lishansky, David Palombo, Yehiel Shemi, Aharon Bezalel and Igael Tumarkin. Many Jewish sculptors from all parts of the world, beginning with Mark Antokolsky, are represented in the collection. In the sculpture courtyard there are works by Chana Orloff, Jacob Epstein (the works he bequeathed to the Museum), Enrico Glicenstein, Loutchansky, Joseph Constant and Leon Indenbaum from Western Europe; Glid from Yugoslavia; William Zorach, Chaim Gross and Minna Harkavy from the United States; and most of the outstanding sculptors of Israel : Zeev Ben-Zvi, Lishansky, Ziffer, Rudi Lehmann, Dov Feigin, Sternschuss, David Palombo ( who executed the iron...
Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Marble, Bronze

RECLINING NUDES, Signed Original Watercolor Drawing, Warm Gray, Graphite
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
RECLINING NUDES, Signed Original Watercolor Drawing Chaim Gross (Austrian American, 1902-1991) Original mixed media - watercolor and graphite on paper, hand signed in pencil by Chaim Gross on lower right, very good condition, off-white cream archival acid-free mat, warm metallic pewter color wood frame. Framed size - 20 x 23 in., 2.5 inch, Image area 12.5 x 16 in. Frame is included. About the artist - Chaim Gross (1902-1991) was a modern American sculptor working in New York City from 1921 until his death in 1991. He was born in 1902 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia. During World War I, Russian forces invaded Austria-Hungary; amidst the turmoil, the Grosses fled Kolomyia. They returned when Austria retook the town in 1915, refugees of the war. When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest, where Gross attended the city's art academy and studied with painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna shortly before immigrating to New York City in 1921. In New York City, Gross's studies continued at the Educational Alliance Art School on the Lower East Side, led by Russian-American etcher Abbo Ostrowsky. Gross first began to exhibit his work as a student at the Alliance in 1922 (in the late 1920s, he joined their faculty). Gross also attended the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design from 1922-25, where he studied sculpture with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League in 1926, with sculptor Robert Laurent. In 1926, Gross began to exhibit his sculpture at the Jewish Art Center (then in the Bronx), and in 1927, at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries at 59th Street and Park Avenue. Beginning in 1928, he exhibited at the Whitney Studio Club at 10 West 8th Street (the precursor to the Whitney Museum of American Art), showing a watercolor "Circus" in their 13th Annual Exhibition of Paintings. In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition of sculpture at Gallery 144 in New York City. Also in 1932, Gross married Renee Nechin (1909-2005), and they had two children, Yehudah and Mimi (Mimi Gross is a New York-based artist, and was married to the artist Red Grooms from 1963-1976). In 1933, Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures for schools and public colleges, and created works for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the 1937 Exposition universelle in Paris. Chaim Gross, Sculptor by Josef Vincent Lombardo, the first major book on Gross, came out in 1949 and included a catalogue raisonne of his sculpture. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Watercolor, Mixed Media, Graphite

PROVINCETOWN SIDE STREET Signed Lithograph, New England Cape Cod White Clapboard
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
PROVINCETOWN SIDE STREET is a limited edition lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. PROVINCETOWN SIDE STREET was printed using traditional lithography methods on a...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Rare Belgian Marble Jewish American Modernist Sculpture Chaim Gross Art Deco
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
This is a wonderful original hand carved unique marble sculpture by one of America's most treasured artists, Chaim Gross. For more than sixty years Chaim Gross's art has expressed op...
Category

20th Century American Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Marble

Peace Mid-Century Modern Pop Art Enamel Painting Chaim Gross Modernist Ltd Ed
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
Mod, Hippie era Peace art. Chaim Gross, born in Wolowa, Austria in 1904, was educated at the Beaux Arts Institute of Design and at the Art Student's League in New York. Chaim Gross's work was greatly influenced by his experiences during a period of international conflict, World War II. He had moved to Kolomyia from Wolowa to get a better education, but the Germans came to occupy, killing, raping, and looting. Gross and his family were chased from one village to the next. He wrote, "We were sleeping on roofs and in the fields, with the sound of cannon fire always in the distance,". Eventually, he ended up in Budapest with his two brothers, where Anti­ Semitism was not as severe, and that is where he began to sculpt and draw. He even had a few odd jobs there as a gold­ and silversmith. When he was seventeen, Gross immigrated to America where his older brother was. There he was a student and then a teacher at the Educational Alliance on the Lower East Side. Teaching became a big part of his philosophy, as he believed that an artist must pass on the knowledge which he had received from others in his artwork. He was part of an artist emigre community which included Raphael Soyer, Moses Soyer, Arnold Newman, Max Weber and David Burliuk. His daughter is the artist Mimi Grooms and his son in law was Red Grooms. Chaim Gross works reflect his Jewish and Austrian roots and his Hasidic Jewish upbringing. The figures in his art reflect the Hasidic spirit of being happy and making other people happy. In his pieces, Jews sing and dance in celebration of the Jewish Sabbath and festivals. They are shown rejoicing in the great gifts of love and life. Chaim Gross was honored with a number of prestigious awards including: the Award of Merit Medal from the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1963, and the Gold Medal award from the National Academy of Design in 1985. He often used his creative abilities to explore and experiment with media. In his artwork he retains an optimistic philosophy, even when facing somber issues such as war, depression, and the Holocaust. He is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art; the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel. And the EIN HAROD Museum's Holdings: Israeli art is represented by the works of Reuven Rubin, Zaritzky, Nahum Gutman, Mordechai Ardon, Aharon Kahana, Arie Lubin, Yehiel Shemi, Yosl Bergner and others. The graphic arts collection contains drawings and graphic works by Pissaro, Amedeo Modigliani, Jules Pascin, Marc Chagall (almost all of his graphic work), and numerous other artists. The sculpture collection includes works by Jewish sculptors from all over the world including leading Israeli sculptors; Ben Zvi, Lishansky, David Palombo, Yehiel Shemi, Aharon Bezalel and Igael Tumarkin. Many Jewish sculptors from all parts of the world, beginning with Mark Antokolsky, are represented in the collection. In the sculpture courtyard there are works by Chana Orloff, Jacob Epstein (the works he bequeathed to the Museum), Enrico Glicenstein, Loutchansky, Joseph Constant and Leon Indenbaum from Western Europe; Glid from Yugoslavia; William Zorach, Chaim Gross and Minna Harkavy from the United States; and most of the outstanding sculptors of Israel : Zeev Ben-Zvi, Lishansky, Ziffer, Rudi Lehmann, Dov Feigin, Sternschuss, David Palombo ( who executed the iron gate...
Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Metal

MOTHER AND CHILD Signed Lithograph, Mother Daughter Pencil Drawing Portrait
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
MOTHER and CHILD is an original hand drawn lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross printed using hand lithography techniques on archival Arches printmaking paper, 100% acid free. MOTHER and CHILD is an endearing figurative portrait study of a mother with her young daughter hand printed from lithographic plates in shades of pale lavender and dark graphite gray. Sensitive sculptural composition of a reclining curly haired woman, balancing her cherub faced child on her lap. Print size - 7.5 x 17 inches, unframed in excellent condition, pencil signed by Chaim Gross Edition size - 75, plus proofs Year published - 1985 Printer - JK Fine Art Editions Co., NY Chaim Gross,(1904 - 1991) was a sculptor, artist, and teacher, known for his wood carvings, sculptures of moving human figures, religious imagery, acrobats, mothers and children. Chaim was born on March 17, 1904 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph is from the rare 1954 "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 1954 Spr...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph is from the rare 1954 "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 1954 Spr...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1953 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1953 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph is from the rare 1951 "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 1951 Spr...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

original lithograph
By Chaim Gross
Located in Henderson, NV
Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1952 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...
Category

1950s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

MOTHER AND CHILDREN PLAYING Signed Lithograph Mom with Daughters Watercolor
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
MOTHER and CHILDREN PLAYING, is an original hand drawn lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. Endearing watercolor figure study of a mother posed horizontally with h...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

SABBATH ANGELS Signed Lithograph, Watercolor Portrait, Angels, Candlesticks
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
SABBATH ANGELS is an original hand drawn lithograph(not a photo reproduction or digital print) by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross, presenting an impressive sculptural drawing of two majestic female angels welcoming the sabbath as two lit candlesticks glow beneath the wings of the yellow angel. SABBATH ANGELS was hand proofed and printed from lithographic plates on archival Arches paper, 100% acid free. SABBATH ANGELS is a contemporary style angel portrait measuring 14 x 20.5 inches, image size is 9.25 x 15 inches, a very fine impression pulled from hand drawn lithography plates. Printed in transparent watercolor shades of light blue, light brown red, yellow and graphite black for the pencil drawing using the age-old hand printing methods first used in fine art lithography printmaking. Chaim Gross,(1904 - 1991) was a sculptor, artist, and teacher, known for his wood carvings, sculptures of moving human figures, religious imagery, acrobats, mothers and children. Chaim was born on March 17, 1904 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia. During World War I, Russian forces invaded Austria-Hungary; amidst the turmoil, the Grosses fled Kolomyia. They returned when Austria retook the town in 1915, refugees of the war. When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest, where Gross attended the city's art academy and studied with painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna shortly before emigrating to New York City in 1921. In the U.S., Gross's studies continued at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied sculpture with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League, with sculptor Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky. In the late 1920s and early 1930s Gross exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club (the precursor to the Whitney Museum of American Art). In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. Also in 1932, Gross married Renee Nechin (1909-2005), and they had two children, Yehuda and Mimi (Mimi Gross is a New York-based artist, and was married to the artist Red Grooms from 1963-1976). In 1933, Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures for schools and public colleges, and created works for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the 1937 Exposition universelle in Paris. Chaim Gross, Sculptor by Josef Vincent Lombardo, the first major book on Gross, came out in 1949 and included a catalogue raisonne of his sculpture. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1963, Gross and his family moved from their longtime residence at 30 W. 105th Street to Greenwich Village, following the purchase of a four-story historic townhouse at 526 LaGuardia Place, which is now the Renee & Chaim Gross Foundation. In 1974, the Smithsonian American Art Museum held the exhibition, Chaim Gross: Sculpture and Drawings, and in 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

OPERATION MOSES Signed Lithograph, Historic 1984 Airlift Ethiopian Falasha Jews
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
OPERATION MOSES is an original hand drawn lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross, hand proofed and printed from lithographic plates on archival Arches paper, 100% acid free. OPERATION MOSES is a contemporary style figurative watercolor drawing created to commemorate the evacuation of African Jews to Israel here represented by visual elements including colorful doves, a yellow menorah, an out stretched hand, city of Jerusalem, the US White House, stone tablets, and a group of seated Ethiopian people studying Torah. Printed in watercolor shades of light blues, reds, yellow, green, salmon pink, purple, browns and graphite black for the pencil drawing using the age-old hand printing methods first used in fine art lithography printmaking. OPERATION MOSES is a very unique, extremely limited edition lithograph created in commemoration of the historic airlift of Ethiopian Jews to Israel in 1984. Operation Moses refers to the covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews (known as the "Beta Israel" community or "Falashas") from Sudan during a civil war that caused a famine in 1984. Print size - 16 x 20 inches Image size - 10.5 x 15 1/8 inches Edition size - 10 Printer - JK Fine Art Editions Co. NY Chaim Gross,(1904 - 1991) was a sculptor, artist, and teacher, known for his wood carvings, sculptures of moving human figures, religious imagery, acrobats, mothers and children. Chaim was born on March 17, 1904 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia. During World War I, Russian forces invaded Austria-Hungary; amidst the turmoil, the Grosses fled Kolomyia. They returned when Austria retook the town in 1915, refugees of the war. When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest, where Gross attended the city's art academy and studied with painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna shortly before emigrating to New York City in 1921. In the U.S., Gross's studies continued at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied sculpture with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League, with sculptor Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky. In the late 1920s and early 1930s Gross exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club (the precursor to the Whitney Museum of American Art). In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. Also in 1932, Gross married Renee Nechin (1909-2005), and they had two children, Yehuda and Mimi (Mimi Gross is a New York-based artist, and was married to the artist Red Grooms from 1963-1976). In 1933, Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures for schools and public colleges, and created works for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the 1937 Exposition universelle in Paris. Chaim Gross, Sculptor by Josef Vincent Lombardo, the first major book on Gross, came out in 1949 and included a catalogue raisonne of his sculpture. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1963, Gross and his family moved from their longtime residence at 30 W. 105th Street to Greenwich Village, following the purchase of a four-story historic townhouse at 526 LaGuardia Place, which is now the Renee & Chaim Gross Foundation. In 1974, the Smithsonian American Art Museum held the exhibition, Chaim Gross: Sculpture and Drawings, and in 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Rare Early Nude Drawing American Modernist Sculptor
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
This is a wonderful drawing by one of America's most treasured artists, Chaim Gross. Throughout his lifetime Gross has gone through tragedy and a real test of faith however, he has the unique ability to focus and direct his expression to the most joyful and beautiful works of art, such as the present lot. For more than sixty years Chaim Gross's art has expressed optimistic, affirming themes. His acrobats, cyclists, and mothers and children convey joyfulness, exuberance, love, and intimacy. This aspect of his work remained consistent with his Hasidic heritage, which teaches that "only in his childlike happiness is man nearest to God." Chaim Gross, born in Wolowa, Austria in 1904, was educated at the Beaux Arts Institute of Design and at the Art Student's League in New York. Chaim Gross's work was greatly influenced by his experiences during a period of international conflict, World War II. He had moved to Kolomyya from Wolowa to get a better education, but the Germans came to occupy, killing, raping, and looting. Gross and his family were chased from one village to the next. He wrote, "We were sleeping on roofs and in the fields, with the sound of cannon fire...
Category

20th Century American Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Charcoal, Pastel, Pencil

Chaim Gross Mid Century Mod Judaica Jewish Watercolor Painting Rabbis WPA Artist
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
Chaim Gross (American, 1904-1991) Watercolor painting Rabbinical Talmudic Discussion Hand signed 17 x 29 framed, paper 10 x 22 Chaim Gross (March 17, 1904 – May 5, 1991) was an American modernist sculptor and educator. Gross was born to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa (now known as Mezhgorye, Ukraine), in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia (which was annexed into the Ukrainian USSR in 1939 and became part of newly independent Ukraine in 1991). When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest to join their older siblings Sarah and Pinkas. Gross applied to and was accepted by the art academy in Budapest and studied under the painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna, Austria shortly before immigrating to the United States in 1921. Gross's studies continued in the United States at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League of New York, with Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky, at the same time as Moses Soyer and Peter Blume. In 1926 Gross began teaching at The Educational Alliance, and continued teaching there for the next 50 years. Louise Nevelson was among his students at the Alliance (in 1934), during the time she was transitioning from painting to sculpture. In the late 1920s and early 1930s he exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club. In 1929, Gross experimented with printmaking, and created an important group of 15 linocuts and lithographs of landscapes, New York City streets and parks, women in interiors, the circus, and vaudeville. The entire suite is now in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gross returned to the medium of printmaking in the 1960s, and produced approximately 200 works in the medium over the next two decades. For more than sixty years Chaim Gross's art has expressed optimistic, affirming themes, Judaica, balancing acrobats, cyclists, trapeze artists and mothers and children convey joyfulness, modernism, exuberance, love, and intimacy. This aspect of his work remained consistent with his Jewish Hasidic heritage, which teaches that only in his childlike happiness is man nearest to God. In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. For a short time they represented Gross, as well as his friends Milton Avery, Moses Soyer, Ahron Ben-Shmuel and others. Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Other direct carvers in early 20th-century American art include William Zorach, Jose de Creeft, and Robert Laurent. Works by Chaim Gross can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings (27 sculptures) at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. A key work from this era, now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is the 1932 birds-eye maple Acrobatic Performers, which is also only one and one quarter inch thick. In 1933 Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which Gross worked for later in the 1930s. Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures that were placed in schools and public colleges, made work for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the Exposition universelle de 1937 in Paris, and in 1942, with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Artists for Victory" exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. In 1949 Gross sketched Chaim Weizmann, Israeli President, at several functions in New York City where Weizmann was speaking, Gross completed the bust in bronze later that year. Gross returned to Israel for three months in 1951 (the second of many trips there in the postwar years) to paint a series of 40 watercolors of life in various cities. This series was exhibited at the Jewish Museum (Manhattan) in 1953. He also did some important Hebrew medals. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. At the end of the decade Gross was working primarily in bronze which allowed him to create open forms, large-scale works and of course, multiple casts. Gross's large-scale bronze The Family, donated to New York City in 1991 in honor of Mayor Ed Koch, and installed at the Bleecker Street Park at 11th street, is now a fixture of Greenwich Village. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African sculpture, formed since the late 1930s, was exhibited at the Worcester Art Museum in the show The Sculptor's Eye: The African Art Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross. Gross was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1981. In 1984, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, with Jacob Lawrence and Lukas Foss. In the fall of 1991, Allen Ginsberg gave an important tribute to Gross at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which is published in their Proceedings. In 1994, Forum Gallery, which now represents the Chaim Gross estate, held a memorial exhibition featuring a sixty-year survey of Gross's work.In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. For a short time they represented Gross, as well as his friends Milton Avery, Moses Soyer, Ahron Ben-Shmuel and others. Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Other direct carvers in early 20th-century American art include William Zorach, Jose de Creeft, and Robert Laurent. Works by Chaim Gross can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings (27 sculptures) at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. A key work from this era, now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is the 1932 birds-eye maple Acrobatic Performers, which is also only one and one quarter inch thick. In 1933 Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which Gross worked for later in the 1930s. Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures that were placed in schools and public colleges, made work for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the Exposition universelle de 1937 in Paris, and in 1942, with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Artists for Victory" exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. In 1949 Gross sketched Chaim Weizmann, President of Israel, at several functions in New York City where Weizmann was speaking, Gross completed the bust in bronze later that year. Gross returned to Israel for three months in 1951 (the second of many trips there in the postwar years) to paint a series of 40 watercolors of life in various cities. This series was exhibited at the Jewish Museum (Manhattan) in 1953. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. At the end of the decade Gross was working primarily in bronze which allowed him to create open forms, large-scale works and of course, multiple casts. Gross's large-scale bronze The Family, donated to New York City in 1991 in honor of Mayor Ed Koch, and installed at the Bleecker Street Park at 11th street, is now a fixture of Greenwich Village. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African sculpture, formed since the late 1930s, was exhibited at the Worcester Art Museum in the show The Sculptor's Eye: The African Art Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross. Gross was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1981. In 1984, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, with Jacob Lawrence and Lukas Foss. In the fall of 1991, Allen Ginsberg gave an important tribute to Gross at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which is published in their Proceedings. In 1994, Forum Gallery, which now represents the Chaim Gross estate, held a memorial exhibition featuring a sixty-year survey of Gross's work. Gross was a professor of printmaking and sculpture at both the Educational Alliance and the New School for Social Research in New York City, as well as at the Brooklyn Museum Art School, the MoMA art school, the Art Student's League and the New Art School (which Gross ran briefly with Alexander Dobkin...
Category

Mid-20th Century American Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Paper, Watercolor

FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION Signed Lithograph, Children Jewish Holocaust
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION is a fine art limited edition commemorative poster by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION was printed using four col...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

WOMEN TOGETHER Signed Lithograph Seated Female Figures, Cream, Gray, Terra Cotta
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
WOMEN TOGETHER is a color lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross presenting an endearing figure study of seated female figures printed on archival white paper in watercolor shades of cream, light terra cotta, warm gray, light blue, light red and graphite black for the drawing. WOMEN TOGETHER is a freely expressed group portrait portraying the gathering of women seated together; their rounded cloud like body forms, gentle facial expressions and curly hair seem to flow in unison across the horizontal composition creating an almost heavenly air. Print size - 20 x 29 inches, unframed, pencil signed by Chaim Gross Edition size - 100, plus proofs Year published - 1979 Chaim Gross,(1904 - 1991) was a sculptor, artist, and teacher, known for his wood carvings, sculptures of moving human figures, religious imagery, acrobats, mothers and children. Chaim was born on March 17, 1904 to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia. During World War I, Russian forces invaded Austria-Hungary; amidst the turmoil, the Grosses fled Kolomyia. They returned when Austria retook the town in 1915, refugees of the war. When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest, where Gross attended the city's art academy and studied with painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna shortly before emigrating to New York City in 1921. In the U.S., Gross's studies continued at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied sculpture with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League, with sculptor Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky. In the late 1920s and early 1930s Gross exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club (the precursor to the Whitney Museum of American Art). In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. Also in 1932, Gross married Renee Nechin (1909-2005), and they had two children, Yehuda and Mimi (Mimi Gross is a New York-based artist, and was married to the artist Red Grooms from 1963-1976). In 1933, Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures for schools and public colleges, and created works for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the 1937 Exposition universelle in Paris. Chaim Gross, Sculptor by Josef Vincent Lombardo, the first major book on Gross, came out in 1949 and included a catalogue raisonne of his sculpture. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1963, Gross and his family moved from their longtime residence at 30 W. 105th Street to Greenwich Village, following the purchase of a four-story historic townhouse at 526 LaGuardia Place, which is now the Renee & Chaim Gross Foundation. In 1974, the Smithsonian American Art Museum held the exhibition, Chaim Gross: Sculpture and Drawings, and in 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Rare Chaim Gross Watercolor Painting Manhattan Skyscrapers Train NYC WPA Artist
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
This appears to be dated 1927. It came in with a piece dated 1929. A very early, rare work. Framed 22.5 x 18. Image 14.5 x 9 A great New York city street scene with an El train (elevated subway line) and architectural renderings of buildings. This is a wonderful piece by one of America's most treasured artists, Chaim Gross. Throughout his lifetime Gross has gone through tragedy and a real test of faith however, he has the unique ability to focus and direct his expression to the most joyful and beautiful works of art, such as the present lot. For more than sixty years Chaim Gross's art has expressed optimistic, affirming themes. His acrobats, cyclists, and mothers and children convey joyfulness, exuberance, love, and intimacy. This aspect of his work remained consistent with his Hasidic heritage, which teaches that "only in his childlike happiness is man nearest to God." He often used his creative abilities to explore and experiment with media. In his artwork he retains an optimistic philosophy, even when facing somber issues such as war, depression, and the Holocaust. Chaim Gross (March 17, 1904 – May 5, 1991) was an American sculptor and educator. Gross was born to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa (now known as Mezhgorye, Ukraine), in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia (which was annexed into the Ukrainian USSR in 1939 and became part of newly independent Ukraine in 1991). When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest to join their older siblings Sarah and Pinkas. Gross applied to and was accepted by the art academy in Budapest and studied under the painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna, Austria shortly before immigrating to the United States in 1921. Gross's studies continued in the United States at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League of New York, with Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky, at the same time as Moses Soyer and Peter Blume. In 1926 Gross began teaching at The Educational Alliance, and continued teaching there for the next 50 years. Louise Nevelson was among his students at the Alliance (in 1934), during the time she was transitioning from painting to sculpture. In the late 1920s and early 1930s he exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club. In 1929, Gross experimented with printmaking, and created an important group of 15 linocuts and lithographs of landscapes, New York City streets and parks, women in interiors, the circus, and vaudeville. The entire suite is now in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gross returned to the medium of printmaking in the 1960s, and produced approximately 200 works in the medium over the next two decades. In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. For a short time they represented Gross, as well as his friends Milton Avery, Moses Soyer, Ahron Ben-Shmuel and others. Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Other direct carvers in early 20th-century American art include William Zorach, Jose de Creeft, and Robert Laurent. Works by Chaim Gross can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings (27 sculptures) at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. A key work from this era, now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is the 1932 birds-eye maple Acrobatic Performers, which is also only one and one quarter inch thick. In 1933 Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which Gross worked for later in the 1930s. Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures that were placed in schools and public colleges, made work for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the Exposition universelle de 1937 in Paris, and in 1942, with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Artists for Victory" exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. In 1949 Gross sketched Chaim Weizmann, President of Israel, at several functions in New York City where Weizmann was speaking, Gross completed the bust in bronze later that year. Gross returned to Israel for three months in 1951 (the second of many trips there in the postwar years) to paint a series of 40 watercolors of life in various cities. This series was exhibited at the Jewish Museum (Manhattan) in 1953. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. At the end of the decade Gross was working primarily in bronze which allowed him to create open forms, large-scale works and of course, multiple casts. Gross's large-scale bronze The Family, donated to New York City in 1991 in honor of Mayor Ed Koch, and installed at the Bleecker Street Park at 11th street, is now a fixture of Greenwich Village. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African sculpture, formed since the late 1930s, was exhibited at the Worcester Art Museum in the show The Sculptor's Eye: The African Art Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross. Gross was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1981. In 1984, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, with Jacob Lawrence and Lukas Foss. In the fall of 1991, Allen Ginsberg gave an important tribute to Gross at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which is published in their Proceedings. In 1994, Forum Gallery, which now represents the Chaim Gross estate, held a memorial exhibition featuring a sixty-year survey of Gross's work. Gross was a professor of printmaking and sculpture at both the Educational Alliance and the New School for Social Research in New York City, as well as at the Brooklyn Museum Art School, the MoMA art school, the Art Student's League and the New Art School (which Gross ran briefly with Alexander Dobkin...
Category

Mid-20th Century American Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Paper, Watercolor

Chaim Gross Judaica Jewish Watercolor Painting Rabbi Klezmer Music WPA Artist
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
Chaim Gross (American, 1904-1991) Watercolor with pencil painting Rabbi Klezmer music concert, flute player. Hand signed framed: 15 X 28.5, paper: 9.5 X 23 Chaim Gross (March 17, 1904 – May 5, 1991) was an American modernist sculptor and educator. Gross was born to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa (now known as Mezhgorye, Ukraine), in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia (which was annexed into the Ukrainian USSR in 1939 and became part of newly independent Ukraine in 1991). When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest to join their older siblings Sarah and Pinkas. Gross applied to and was accepted by the art academy in Budapest and studied under the painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna, Austria shortly before immigrating to the United States in 1921. Gross's studies continued in the United States at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League of New York, with Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky, at the same time as Moses Soyer and Peter Blume. In 1926 Gross began teaching at The Educational Alliance, and continued teaching there for the next 50 years. Louise Nevelson was among his students at the Alliance (in 1934), during the time she was transitioning from painting to sculpture. In the late 1920s and early 1930s he exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club. In 1929, Gross experimented with printmaking, and created an important group of 15 linocuts and lithographs of landscapes, New York City streets and parks, women in interiors, the circus, and vaudeville. The entire suite is now in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gross returned to the medium of printmaking in the 1960s, and produced approximately 200 works in the medium over the next two decades. For more than sixty years Chaim Gross's art has expressed optimistic, affirming themes, Judaica, balancing acrobats, cyclists, trapeze artists and mothers and children convey joyfulness, modernism, exuberance, love, and intimacy. This aspect of his work remained consistent with his Jewish Hasidic heritage, which teaches that only in his childlike happiness is man nearest to God. In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. For a short time they represented Gross, as well as his friends Milton Avery, Moses Soyer, Ahron Ben-Shmuel and others. Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Other direct carvers in early 20th-century American art include William Zorach, Jose de Creeft, and Robert Laurent. Works by Chaim Gross can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings (27 sculptures) at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. A key work from this era, now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is the 1932 birds-eye maple Acrobatic Performers, which is also only one and one quarter inch thick. In 1933 Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which Gross worked for later in the 1930s. Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures that were placed in schools and public colleges, made work for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the Exposition universelle de 1937 in Paris, and in 1942, with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Artists for Victory" exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. In 1949 Gross sketched Chaim Weizmann, Israeli President, at several functions in New York City where Weizmann was speaking, Gross completed the bust in bronze later that year. Gross returned to Israel for three months in 1951 (the second of many trips there in the postwar years) to paint a series of 40 watercolors of life in various cities. This series was exhibited at the Jewish Museum (Manhattan) in 1953. He also did some important Hebrew medals. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. At the end of the decade Gross was working primarily in bronze which allowed him to create open forms, large-scale works and of course, multiple casts. Gross's large-scale bronze The Family, donated to New York City in 1991 in honor of Mayor Ed Koch, and installed at the Bleecker Street Park at 11th street, is now a fixture of Greenwich Village. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African sculpture, formed since the late 1930s, was exhibited at the Worcester Art Museum in the show The Sculptor's Eye: The African Art Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross. Gross was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1981. In 1984, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, with Jacob Lawrence and Lukas Foss. In the fall of 1991, Allen Ginsberg gave an important tribute to Gross at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which is published in their Proceedings. In 1994, Forum Gallery, which now represents the Chaim Gross estate, held a memorial exhibition featuring a sixty-year survey of Gross's work.In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. For a short time they represented Gross, as well as his friends Milton Avery, Moses Soyer, Ahron Ben-Shmuel and others. Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Other direct carvers in early 20th-century American art include William Zorach, Jose de Creeft, and Robert Laurent. Works by Chaim Gross can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings (27 sculptures) at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. A key work from this era, now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is the 1932 birds-eye maple Acrobatic Performers, which is also only one and one quarter inch thick. In 1933 Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which Gross worked for later in the 1930s. Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures that were placed in schools and public colleges, made work for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the Exposition universelle de 1937 in Paris, and in 1942, with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Artists for Victory" exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. In 1949 Gross sketched Chaim Weizmann, President of Israel, at several functions in New York City where Weizmann was speaking, Gross completed the bust in bronze later that year. Gross returned to Israel for three months in 1951 (the second of many trips there in the postwar years) to paint a series of 40 watercolors of life in various cities. This series was exhibited at the Jewish Museum (Manhattan) in 1953. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. At the end of the decade Gross was working primarily in bronze which allowed him to create open forms, large-scale works and of course, multiple casts. Gross's large-scale bronze The Family, donated to New York City in 1991 in honor of Mayor Ed Koch, and installed at the Bleecker Street Park at 11th street, is now a fixture of Greenwich Village. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African sculpture, formed since the late 1930s, was exhibited at the Worcester Art Museum in the show The Sculptor's Eye: The African Art Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross. Gross was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1981. In 1984, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, with Jacob Lawrence and Lukas Foss. In the fall of 1991, Allen Ginsberg gave an important tribute to Gross at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which is published in their Proceedings. In 1994, Forum Gallery, which now represents the Chaim Gross estate, held a memorial exhibition featuring a sixty-year survey of Gross's work. Gross was a professor of printmaking and sculpture at both the Educational Alliance and the New School for Social Research in New York City, as well as at the Brooklyn Museum Art School, the MoMA art school, the Art Student's League and the New Art School (which Gross ran briefly with Alexander Dobkin...
Category

Mid-20th Century American Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Paper, Watercolor

The Rabbis, Judaica portraits
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
the piece without the original frame measures 18X7.5 inchesThis is a wonderful watercolor by one of America's most treasured artists, Chaim Gross. Throughout his lifetime Gross has gone through tragedy and a real test of faith however, he has the unique ability to focus and direct his expression to the most joyful and beautiful works of art, such as the present lot. For more than sixty years Chaim Gross's art has expressed optimistic, affirming themes. His acrobats, cyclists, and mothers and children convey joyfulness, exuberance, love, and intimacy. This aspect of his work remained consistent with his Hasidic heritage, which teaches that "only in his childlike happiness is man nearest to God." Chaim Gross, born in Wolowa, Austria in 1904, was educated at the Beaux Arts Institute of Design and at the Art Student's League in New York. Chaim Gross's work was greatly influenced by his experiences during a period of international conflict, World War II. He had moved to Kolomyya from Wolowa to get a better education, but the Germans came to occupy, killing, raping, and looting. Gross and his family were chased from one village to the next. He wrote, "We were sleeping on roofs and in the fields, with the sound of cannon fire...
Category

1960s Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Watercolor, Archival Paper

PROVINCETOWN FISHING NETS Signed Lithograph, Cape Cod Fisherman, Blue Sky, Sand
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
PROVINCETOWN FISHING NETS is a limited edition lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. PROVINCETOWN FISHING NETS was printed using traditional lithography methods on...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Large Chaim Gross Mid Century Mod Bronze Sculpture Circus Acrobats WPA Artist
By Chaim Gross
Located in Surfside, FL
Chaim Gross (American, 1904-1991) Patinated cast bronze sculpture, Three Acrobats, signed mounted on black marble plinth 24.5"h x 14"w x 7"d (bronze alone) Chaim Gross (March 17, 1904 – May 5, 1991) was an American modernist sculptor and educator. Gross was born to a Jewish family in Austrian Galicia, in the village of Wolowa (now known as Mezhgorye, Ukraine), in the Carpathian Mountains. In 1911, his family moved to Kolomyia (which was annexed into the Ukrainian USSR in 1939 and became part of newly independent Ukraine in 1991). When World War I ended, Gross and brother Avrom-Leib went to Budapest to join their older siblings Sarah and Pinkas. Gross applied to and was accepted by the art academy in Budapest and studied under the painter Béla Uitz, though within a year a new regime under Miklos Horthy took over and attempted to expel all Jews and foreigners from the country. After being deported from Hungary, Gross began art studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna, Austria shortly before immigrating to the United States in 1921. Gross's studies continued in the United States at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design, where he studied with Elie Nadelman and others, and at the Art Students League of New York, with Robert Laurent. He also attended the Educational Alliance Art School, studying under Abbo Ostrowsky, at the same time as Moses Soyer and Peter Blume. In 1926 Gross began teaching at The Educational Alliance, and continued teaching there for the next 50 years. Louise Nevelson was among his students at the Alliance (in 1934), during the time she was transitioning from painting to sculpture. In the late 1920s and early 1930s he exhibited at the Salons of America exhibitions at the Anderson Galleries and, beginning in 1928, at the Whitney Studio Club. In 1929, Gross experimented with printmaking, and created an important group of 15 linocuts and lithographs of landscapes, New York City streets and parks, women in interiors, the circus, and vaudeville. The entire suite is now in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gross returned to the medium of printmaking in the 1960s, and produced approximately 200 works in the medium over the next two decades. For more than sixty years Chaim Gross's art has expressed optimistic, affirming themes, Judaica, balancing acrobats, cyclists, trapeze artists and mothers and children convey joyfulness, modernism, exuberance, love, and intimacy. This aspect of his work remained consistent with his Jewish Hasidic heritage, which teaches that only in his childlike happiness is man nearest to God. In March 1932 Gross had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 144 in New York City. For a short time they represented Gross, as well as his friends Milton Avery, Moses Soyer, Ahron Ben-Shmuel and others. Gross was primarily a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Other direct carvers in early 20th-century American art include William Zorach, Jose de Creeft, and Robert Laurent. Works by Chaim Gross can be found in major museums and private collections throughout the United States, with substantial holdings (27 sculptures) at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. A key work from this era, now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is the 1932 birds-eye maple Acrobatic Performers, which is also only one and one quarter inch thick. In 1933 Gross joined the government's PWAP (Public Works of Art Project), which transitioned into the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which Gross worked for later in the 1930s. Under these programs Gross taught and demonstrated art, made sculptures that were placed in schools and public colleges, made work for Federal buildings including the Federal Trade Commission Building, and for the France Overseas and Finnish Buildings at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Gross was also recognized during these years with a silver medal at the Exposition universelle de 1937 in Paris, and in 1942, with a purchase prize at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Artists for Victory" exhibition for his wood sculpture of famed circus performer Lillian Leitzel. In 1949 Gross sketched Chaim Weizmann, President of Israel, at several functions in New York City where Weizmann was speaking, Gross completed the bust in bronze later that year. Gross returned to Israel for three months in 1951 (the second of many trips there in the postwar years) to paint a series of 40 watercolors of life in various cities. This series was exhibited at the Jewish Museum (Manhattan) in 1953. In the 1950s Gross began to make more bronze sculptures alongside his wood and stone pieces, and in 1957 and 1959 he traveled to Rome to work with famed bronze foundries including the Nicci foundry. At the end of the decade Gross was working primarily in bronze which allowed him to create open forms, large-scale works and of course, multiple casts. Gross's large-scale bronze The Family, donated to New York City in 1991 in honor of Mayor Ed Koch, and installed at the Bleecker Street Park at 11th street, is now a fixture of Greenwich Village. In 1959, a survey of Gross's sculpture in wood, stone, and bronze was featured in the exhibit Four American Expressionists curated by Lloyd Goodrich at the Whitney Museum of American Art, with work by Abraham Rattner, Doris Caesar, and Karl Knaths. In 1976, a selection from Gross's important collection of historic African sculpture, formed since the late 1930s, was exhibited at the Worcester Art Museum in the show The Sculptor's Eye: The African Art Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross. Gross was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1981. In 1984, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, with Jacob Lawrence and Lukas Foss. In the fall of 1991, Allen Ginsberg gave an important tribute to Gross at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which is published in their Proceedings. In 1994, Forum Gallery, which now represents the Chaim Gross estate, held a memorial exhibition featuring a sixty-year survey of Gross's work. Gross was a professor of printmaking and sculpture at both the Educational Alliance and the New School for Social Research in New York City, as well as at the Brooklyn Museum Art School, the MoMA art school, the Art Student's League and the New Art School (which Gross ran briefly with Alexander Dobkin...
Category

Mid-20th Century American Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Marble, Bronze

Figural Study
By Chaim Gross
Located in New York, NY
Figural Study, ca. 1949-1959, by Chaim Gross (1902-1991) Ink on fabric 18 x 16 ¼ inches (45.72 x 41.275 cm) 25 x 23 ⅝ inches (63.5 x 60.0075 cm) Inscribed...
Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Ink

Happy Birthday
By Chaim Gross
Located in New York, NY
Happy Birthday, 1950, by Chaim Gross (1902-1991) Ink on paper 5 ¼ x 4 inches unframed (13.335 x 10.16 cm) 11 ¼ x 10 ⅛ inches framed (28.575 x 25.7175 cm...
Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Ink

Portrait or Study for a Bust
By Chaim Gross
Located in New York, NY
Portrait or Study for a Bust, 1959 by Chaim Gross (1902-1991) Ink wash and pencil on paper 8 x 5 inches unframed (20.32 x 12.7 cm) 14 ⅛ x 11 inches framed (35.8775 x 27.94 cm) Signed...
Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Ink, Pencil

Bust of a Man, Bronze Sculpture by Chaim Gross
By Chaim Gross
Located in Long Island City, NY
Artist: Chaim Gross, Austrian/American (1904 - 1991) Title: Bust of a Man Year: 1967 Medium: Bronze Sculpture, signature inscribed Size: 12.5 x 6.5 x 8.5 in. (31.75 x 16.51 x 21.59 c...
Category

1960s Expressionist Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Bronze

HAPPY MOTHER Signed Stone Lithograph, Hand Drawn Portrait Mother and Daughters
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
HAPPY MOTHER, is an original hand drawn, stone lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. Endearing figure study of a woman with a group of young children playing togeth...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

TWO BALLERINAS Signed Lithograph Oval Watercolor Portrait, Ballet Dancers, Tutus
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
TWO BALLERINAS is an original hand drawn lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. Endearing figure study of female dancers, TWO BALLERINAS was hand proofed and printed...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

HAPPY MOTHER Signed Lithograph, Mother and Daughters Portrait Drawing
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
HAPPY MOTHER is an original hand drawn, stone lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. HAPPY MOTHER is an endearing figure study of a mother with her two young daughte...
Category

1980s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Mother Playing
By Chaim Gross
Located in Long Island City, NY
An abstract modern cubist rendition of a mother playing with her child by Chaim Gross (Austrian, 1904 - 1991). Chaim Gross is known for these playful works and similar works can be f...
Category

1970s Modern Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Bronze

THE FAMILY Signed Stone Lithograph, Mother and Children Drawing, Oval Portrait
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
THE FAMILY is an original hand drawn, stone lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. Endearing figure study of a seated woman together with a her children, a young boy and girl. THE FAMILY was hand proofed and printed by master printer Joseph Kleineman from a lithographic stone in light black ink on archival printmaking paper, 100% acid free. THE FAMILY expresses a sensitive black and white oval portrait drawing...
Category

1960s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Mother and Child
By Chaim Gross
Located in Long Island City, NY
Artist: Chaim Gross, Austrian (1904 - 1991) Title: Mother and Child Medium: Bronze Sculpture, signature inscribed Size: 10 x 5 x 5 in. (25.4 x 12.7 x ...
Category

1950s Expressionist Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Bronze

CHILDREN PLAYING Signed Lithograph, Woman and Children Playing, Playground
By Chaim Gross
Located in Union City, NJ
CHILDREN PLAYING, is an original hand drawn, stone lithograph by the American artist/sculptor Chaim Gross. CHILDREN PLAYING is a sensitive figurative com...
Category

1970s Contemporary Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

The Jewish Holidays, Portfolio of 22 lithographs by Chaim Gross 1969
By Chaim Gross
Located in Long Island City, NY
The Jewish Holidays portfolio by Chaim Gross. This portfolio consists of 11 color lithographs plus 11 black and white lithographs of the same images depicting 11 of the Jewish Holid...
Category

1960s Folk Art Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Lithograph

Acrobats, Wood Sculpture by Chaim Gross 1948
By Chaim Gross
Located in Long Island City, NY
Artist: Chaim Gross, Austrian (1904 - 1991) Title: Acrobats Year: 1948 Medium: Hand-carved wood sculpture, signature and date inscribed Size: 21 in. (53.34 cm) tall
Category

1940s Chaim Gross Art

Materials

Wood

Chaim Gross art for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Chaim Gross art available for sale on 1stDibs. You can also browse by medium to find art by Chaim Gross in lithograph, metal, 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 contemporary style. Not every interior allows for large Chaim Gross art, so small editions measuring 3 inches across are available. Customers who are interested in this artist might also find the work of Renato Guttuso, Lester Johnson, and Carol Wax. Chaim Gross art prices can differ depending upon medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $75 and tops out at $12,500, while the average work can sell for $595.

Artists Similar to Chaim Gross

Recently Viewed

View All