John La Farge Art

"Men in Barracks" WPA Mid 20th Century American Scene Realism Gay Modernism WWII. 18 x 24 inches Watercolor on paper. c. 1940s. Signed lower right. BIO ...

NYC Subway Riders Mid 20th Century American Scene Social Realism WPA Modern 1930s Daniel Celentano (1902 - 1980) Subway Scene, 1930s 8 x 9 inches Ink and wash on paper Singed lower ...

Lionel S. Reiss (1894 - 1988) Lobstermen in Gloucester, Massachusetts, circa 1943 Watercolor on paper Sight 17 1/2 x 23 inches Signed lower left Provenance: Private Collection, Las Vegas, Nevada In describing his own style, Lionel Reiss wrote, “By nature, inclination, and training, I have long since recognized the fact that...I belong to the category of those who can only gladly affirm the reality of the world I live in.” Reiss’s subject matter was wide-ranging, including gritty New York scenes, landscapes of bucolic Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and seascapes around Gloucester, Massachusetts. However, it was as a painter of Jewish life—both in Israel and in Europe before World War II—that Reiss excelled. I.B. Singer, the Nobel Prize winner for Literature, noted that Reiss was “essentially an artist of the nineteenth century, and because of this he had the power and the courage to tell visually the story of a people.” Although Reiss was born in Jaroslaw, Poland, his family immigrated to the United States in 1898 when he was four years old. Reiss's family settled on New York City’s Lower East Side and he lived in the city for most of his life. Reiss attended the Art Students League and then worked as a commercial artist for newspapers and publishers. As art director for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he supposedly created the studio’s famous lion logo. After World War I, Reiss became fascinated with Jewish life in the ‘Old World.’ In 1921 he left his advertising work and spent the next ten years traveling in Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. Like noted Jewish photographers Alter Kacyzne and Roman Vishniac, Reiss depicted Jewish life in Poland prior to World War II. He later wrote, “My trip encompassed three main objectives: to make ethnic studies of Jewish types wherever I traveled; to paint and draw Jewish life, as I saw it and felt it, in all aspects; and to round out my work in Israel.” In Europe, Reiss recorded quotidian scenes in a variety of media and different settings such as Paris, Amsterdam, the Venice ghetto, the Jewish cemetery in Prague, and an array of shops, synagogues, streets, and marketplaces in the Jewish quarters of Warsaw, Lodz, Krakow, Lublin, Vilna, Ternopil, and Kovno. He paid great attention to details of dress, hair, and facial features, and his work became noted for its descriptive quality. A selection of Reiss’s portraits appeared in 1938 in his book My Models Were Jews. In this book, published on the eve of the Holocaust, Reiss argued that there was “no such thing as a ‘Jewish race’.” Instead, he claimed that the Jewish people were a cultural group with a great deal of diversity within and between Jewish communities around the world. Franz Boas...

A serene Hudson River scene by a student of Louis Comfort Tiffany. Anna May Walling was born in 1881, a native of Goshen, New York. She was a graduate of the Blair Academy, and Prat...

Industrial Man Working Mid 20th Century American Scene Social Realism Modern WPA Jo Cain (1904 - 2003) Hammering Nails 39 x 50 ½ inches Gouache on paper c. 19...

WPA Post Office Mural Study Native American Scene Regionalism Social Realism Louise Emerson Ronnebeck (1901 - 1980) Proposal Sketch for Worland Wyoming Post Office WPA Mural Project Image: 7 x 15 inches Board 14 x 22 inches Watercolor on paper, attached to black/gray cardboard/thick paper c. 1937 Signed lower right Written in Louise's hand on mounting paper in white chalk/pencil: "Sketch for Mural...

"Painter" 20th Century American Scene Social Realism Working Man Modern WPA Era Jo Cain (1904 - 2003) Painter 41 ½ x 36 3/4 inches (sight) Gouache on paper c. 1930s Signed lower rig...

Chemists American Scene Mid 20th Century Modern Social Realism WPA Science Mural Jo Cain (1904 - 2003) Chemists 40 ½ x 31 ¾ inches Oil on paper, c. 1930s Signed lower right 49 x 40 ...

Surveyors WPA American Scene Mid 20th Century Modern Social Realism Men Working Jo Cain (1904 - 2003) Surveyors 30 ½ x 40 ¼ inches (sight) Gouache on paper c. 1930s Signed lower rig...

Image dimensions: 29 ¼ x 21 ½ inches Framed dimensions: 45 x 37 inches Signed and dated at lower left: SSYoung / 99' Island Games (Lucky Shot) depicts a pair of young Bahamian boys engaged in a game of marbles, one of the artist's signature themes. Scholar William Gerdts writes: In these works, Scott not only depicts young individuals engaging in a popular activity but shows their intensity and competitiveness while conveying their camaraderie. The pictures are not so much about "winners" and "losers" as about the boys' concentration on the game and the interest shown by onlookers....The sense of community evoked in the series suggests that playing marbles...

"Tobacco Road" Mid 20th Century Realism 1940 Drawing from the Novel WPA Literary 19 1/4 x 11 1/2 (sight), Signed David Fredenthal lower right. Framed by ...

Figure study drawing with two nudes by Michael William Eggleston (American, 20th Century). Signed with the initials "MWE" in the lower right co...