Simon Samsonian

Fauvist Pastel by Iranian American modernist Simon Samsonian

1991

Leonardo Nierman (Mexican, b. 1932) Springtime, 20th century Watercolor on paper 12 x 18 in. Framed: 19 1/2 x 25 1/3 in. Signed lower left: NIERMAN Provenance: Collection of Harry Glass, Long Island A leader in modern Mexican art...

Untitled, c. 20th Century Acrylic on paper 20 x 16 1/4 in. Matte: 24 x 20 in. Signed center: Shapiro

Eiko Taniguchi Kahn (b. 1929) Untitled, c. 1960s Watercolor on board Each panel: 33 x 11 in. Framed: 45 1/2 x 32 x 1 in. Each panel signed bottom These stunning watercolor panels are beautifully mounted in a period frame. The frame needs some minor restoration but this would be a worthy repair, as it matches the artwork so nicely. Eiko Taniguchi Kahn was Japanese Artist who was born on January 24, 1929 in Fukuoka, Kyushu, Japan, to Tosuke Yamashita and Masano Taniguchi. She came to the United States in 1955, and was naturalized in 1958. She was the recipient of the President's award at the National Arts...

David Novros (American, b. 1941) Untitled (Home Savings Study), 1986 Watercolor on paper Framed: 35 1/4 x 86 3/4 x 1 3/4 in. Each panel: 30 x 42 in. From Los Angeles and working fro...

Unknown Artist Untitled, c. 1960s Ink on paper Sight size: 10 x 7 in. Framed: 15 1/4 x 12 1/4 in. Signed illegibly lower right: Jack Bl...?

Francesco Spicuzza (American, 1883-1962) Untitled Landscape, 20th century Pastel on paper Sight size: 24 x 30 in. Framed: 26 1/4 x 32 3/8 in. Signed lower right: Spicuzza Italian-born Francesco Spicuzza was primarily a Wisconsin painter who did portraits, still-lives and local landscapes. He spent the first part of his life in near-poverty to become a painter. An eternal optimist, in 1917, the artist reported: "I am happy and my only ambition now is to paint better and better until I shall have reached the measure of the best of which I am capable." (Spicuzza, 1917, p. 22). His predilection for beach scenes germinated early: reportedly, the five-year-old boy first drew the outlines of his father's fishing boat in the sand on the seashore near their home in Sicily. After setting himself up as a fruit peddler in Milwaukee, Spicuzza's father sent for his family when Francesco was eight years old. For the following six years the boy was unable to attend school because of his job in his father's fruit and vegetable business. The poor lad suffered a caved-in shoulder from carrying a heavy wooden crate. The young Spicuzza was aided by moral and financial support from a sympathetic Milwaukee businessman named John Cramer, publisher and editor of the Evening Wisconsin, who raised Spicuzza's salary as a newspaper assembler so that he could attend school. In 1899 or 1900, Spicuzza began studying drawing and anatomy under Robert Schade (1861-1912), a painter of panoramas who had been trained in Munich under Carl Theodor von Piloty. Spicuzza was also taught by Alexander Mueller (1872-1935), a product of the Weimar and Munich academies. Mueller realized Spicuzza was a colorist and encouraged that orientation (Madle, 1961). Spicuzza found it beneficial to accept an apprenticeship in a lithographic studio for $8 a week, which demanded most of his time. During the St. Louis Universal Exposition in 1904, still a struggling student, Spicuzza attended the fair, thanks to Cramer. It was not long before Spicuzza received a twenty-five dollar portrait commission, and this inaugural success led to new commissions and allowed him to continue as a painter. The earliest influences in his work appear to be from Edward H. Potthast and Maurice Prendergast, though Spicuzza never mentioned either artist. Already in August 1910, Spicuzza was described in a newspaper as "one of the most talented of Milwaukee's rising workers." He undoubtedly received lasting inspiration from his one summer study period in 1911 with John F. Carlson at the Art Students League's Summer School in Woodstock, New York. Certainly Spicuzza would have picked up spontaneity in handling the brush from Carlson. Although he executed numerous still-lives and an occasional religious work, Spicuzza is best known for his Milwaukee beach scenes populated with frolicking bathers in multi-colored attire, not unlike the images of Potthast, who used a similar technique. Many of these are small, preparatory works on canvas board executed between 1910 and 1915. Frequently with even greater animation than Potthast, Spicuzza produced moving images of youthful energy and uninhibited child's play. These beach genre scenes reflect the attitude of American impressionists who depicted the more pleasant side of life. Spicuzza manipulated a successful balance of rich pigment applied in varying degrees of impasto texture with subtle nuances of hue. Working all'aperto, he sought "the soft enticing shades of yellow, blue, green, pink and lavender . . . to get the effects of bright glistening summer air." (L.E.S., n.d.). As a painter whose color not only derived from direct observation but also from a personal theory of color symbolism, Spicuzza traded the linear approach of lithography for dynamic patches of brilliant color. Like Prendergast, he would often tilt the angle of the picture plane to bring the viewer's position above the scene. Spicuzza was unable to enter the 1913 Armory Show or the Panama-Pacific International Exposition two years later but he did submit work to the annual exhibitions of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and those of the Art Institute of Chicago. His first important award was the bronze medal presented by the St. Paul Institute in 1913, which was followed by the silver medal two years later. Before long, Spicuzza had acquired a greater sense of security in his profession and was described by a writer in International Studio (April 1917) as "an independent artist with an assured future. His pastels and water-colours are poetic and joyous bits of nature with a genuine out-of-door feeling." In 1918, his Spirit of Youth, exhibited at the National Academy of Design, sold for $112.50. Four years later, the artist achieved his greatest local recognition by winning the gold medal from the Milwaukee Art Institute. Spicuzza spent a great deal of time painting en plein air and by 1925 he began summering at Big Cedar Lake, near West Bend, Wisconsin to gather his subject matter. Easter Morning (1926) owes something to the Symbolist movement, with its figure of Christ appearing over a seascape. During the difficult era of the Depression, patrons came to Spicuzza's aid and during the 40s, he taught housewives, businessmen and students at the Milwaukee Art Institute, the Milwaukee Art Center, and in his private studio. In the following decade, although his kind of art was no longer popular in the "make-it-or-break-it" New York gallery world, Spicuzza enjoyed regular patronage and sales. His beach scenes became more static and he would experiment with modernist techniques. Spicuzza died at the age of seventy-eight. Sources: L.E.S., "Do Colors Change a Person's disposition? Experiments of a Milwaukee Artist...

Coloured inks and pastel on paper Signed Gestural abstraction Outsider art Artist’s statement : "Painting, for me, is an expressive endeavor in which one depicts the evolution of the various facets of the artistic self. There is, on each canvas, a tension where violence and stillness naturally coexist. By playing with different materials, I seek to establish a sort of unexpected dialogue between these states, and aspire to express this tension through profusion of color. The canvas is the stage that allows me to unite narration with the action of painting the fantastic—even the outrageous---and the everyday. I develop scenarios borrowed from the imagination, which join fantasy, even fables, with the everyday. Pulling threads from each domain, I bring together the mythical and the quotidian, so that the worlds of reality and fantasy merge. I rely on “creatures,” improbable little characters that could exist in some other realm or dimension. They materialize, issuing forth from the surprising, unbelievable and wondrous world of childhood. Human or animal, both find themselves entangled in inextricable and melancholic situations. These inextricable situations create distance; the humor comes through this breach. It is the absurdity of their predicaments that manifests the humor in the work. In each of my paintings, the sentiments are heightened by an intentional, provocative tone that transforms the work. An Otherness is attributed to objects; objects become personified, and by their very presence, they become witnesses or guinea pigs torn between and bound to their dilemma. The titles of my paintings, whether invented or quotations taken out of context, come from literature, theater, or song lyrics. Accident and chance are often major actors in my work.” Emmanuelle Messika BIOGRAPHY : Emmanuelle Messika was born in France in 1979. She works and lives in Paris. STUDIES 1999-2005 École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris Diplômée en Juin 2005 2004 Échange universitaire à Hunter College, New York NY, USA 1993-1999 Ateliers des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris, Montparnasse PERSONAL EXHIBITIONS : 2019 Claire Corcia Gallery, Paris 2018 Claire Corcia Gallery, Paris Outsider Art Fair, Paris 2012 Art Contemporain Sèvres, "La Chartreuse", Sèvres 2011 Espace Seven, Galerie De Vos, Paris 2010 Les Trois Baudets, Paris Galerie Mariska Hammoudi, Paris Galerie Crous -Beaux-Arts, Paris L'Apparemment Café, Paris 2009 Espace Rachi, Paris 2008 Galerie Console, Paris 2007 Exposition Place du Québec, Mairie du sixième, Paris 2006 Galerie Eonnet-Dupuis, Paris 2005 Galerie Crous Beaux Arts, Paris 2004 The Mark Bar, "Bring your own flashlight", Brooklin, New York 2003 Le Glaz’art, Paris 2002 9 rue Dauphine, Paris 2001 Galerie Gauche, École des Beaux-Arts, Paris 2000 La grosse caisse, Paris La liberté, Paris GROUP SHOWS 2011 Chic Art Fair, Galerie Mariska Hammoudi Galerie De Vos, Espace Seven 2010 Galerie Mariska Hammoudi, Paris Chic Dessin, avec Cherry Gallery...

Coloured inks and pastel on paper Signed Gestural abstraction Outsider art Artist’s statement : "Painting, for me, is an expressive endeavor in which one depicts the evolution of the various facets of the artistic self. There is, on each canvas, a tension where violence and stillness naturally coexist. By playing with different materials, I seek to establish a sort of unexpected dialogue between these states, and aspire to express this tension through profusion of color. The canvas is the stage that allows me to unite narration with the action of painting the fantastic—even the outrageous---and the everyday. I develop scenarios borrowed from the imagination, which join fantasy, even fables, with the everyday. Pulling threads from each domain, I bring together the mythical and the quotidian, so that the worlds of reality and fantasy merge. I rely on “creatures,” improbable little characters that could exist in some other realm or dimension. They materialize, issuing forth from the surprising, unbelievable and wondrous world of childhood. Human or animal, both find themselves entangled in inextricable and melancholic situations. These inextricable situations create distance; the humor comes through this breach. It is the absurdity of their predicaments that manifests the humor in the work. In each of my paintings, the sentiments are heightened by an intentional, provocative tone that transforms the work. An Otherness is attributed to objects; objects become personified, and by their very presence, they become witnesses or guinea pigs torn between and bound to their dilemma. The titles of my paintings, whether invented or quotations taken out of context, come from literature, theater, or song lyrics. Accident and chance are often major actors in my work.” Emmanuelle Messika BIOGRAPHY : Emmanuelle Messika was born in France in 1979. She works and lives in Paris. STUDIES 1999-2005 École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris Diplômée en Juin 2005 2004 Échange universitaire à Hunter College, New York NY, USA 1993-1999 Ateliers des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris, Montparnasse PERSONAL EXHIBITIONS : 2019 Claire Corcia Gallery, Paris 2018 Claire Corcia Gallery, Paris Outsider Art Fair, Paris 2012 Art Contemporain Sèvres, "La Chartreuse", Sèvres 2011 Espace Seven, Galerie De Vos, Paris 2010 Les Trois Baudets, Paris Galerie Mariska Hammoudi, Paris Galerie Crous -Beaux-Arts, Paris L'Apparemment Café, Paris 2009 Espace Rachi, Paris 2008 Galerie Console, Paris 2007 Exposition Place du Québec, Mairie du sixième, Paris 2006 Galerie Eonnet-Dupuis, Paris 2005 Galerie Crous Beaux Arts, Paris 2004 The Mark Bar, "Bring your own flashlight", Brooklin, New York 2003 Le Glaz’art, Paris 2002 9 rue Dauphine, Paris 2001 Galerie Gauche, École des Beaux-Arts, Paris 2000 La grosse caisse, Paris La liberté, Paris GROUP SHOWS 2011 Chic Art Fair, Galerie Mariska Hammoudi Galerie De Vos, Espace Seven 2010 Galerie Mariska Hammoudi, Paris Chic Dessin, avec Cherry Gallery...

Coloured inks and pastel on paper Signed Gestural abstraction Outsider art Artist’s statement : "Painting, for me, is an expressive endeavor in which one depicts the evolution of the various facets of the artistic self. There is, on each canvas, a tension where violence and stillness naturally coexist. By playing with different materials, I seek to establish a sort of unexpected dialogue between these states, and aspire to express this tension through profusion of color. The canvas is the stage that allows me to unite narration with the action of painting the fantastic—even the outrageous---and the everyday. I develop scenarios borrowed from the imagination, which join fantasy, even fables, with the everyday. Pulling threads from each domain, I bring together the mythical and the quotidian, so that the worlds of reality and fantasy merge. I rely on “creatures,” improbable little characters that could exist in some other realm or dimension. They materialize, issuing forth from the surprising, unbelievable and wondrous world of childhood. Human or animal, both find themselves entangled in inextricable and melancholic situations. These inextricable situations create distance; the humor comes through this breach. It is the absurdity of their predicaments that manifests the humor in the work. In each of my paintings, the sentiments are heightened by an intentional, provocative tone that transforms the work. An Otherness is attributed to objects; objects become personified, and by their very presence, they become witnesses or guinea pigs torn between and bound to their dilemma. The titles of my paintings, whether invented or quotations taken out of context, come from literature, theater, or song lyrics. Accident and chance are often major actors in my work.” Emmanuelle Messika BIOGRAPHY : Emmanuelle Messika was born in France in 1979. She works and lives in Paris. STUDIES 1999-2005 École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris Diplômée en Juin 2005 2004 Échange universitaire à Hunter College, New York NY, USA 1993-1999 Ateliers des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris, Montparnasse PERSONAL EXHIBITIONS : 2019 Claire Corcia Gallery, Paris 2018 Claire Corcia Gallery, Paris Outsider Art Fair, Paris 2012 Art Contemporain Sèvres, "La Chartreuse", Sèvres 2011 Espace Seven, Galerie De Vos, Paris 2010 Les Trois Baudets, Paris Galerie Mariska Hammoudi, Paris Galerie Crous -Beaux-Arts, Paris L'Apparemment Café, Paris 2009 Espace Rachi, Paris 2008 Galerie Console, Paris 2007 Exposition Place du Québec, Mairie du sixième, Paris 2006 Galerie Eonnet-Dupuis, Paris 2005 Galerie Crous Beaux Arts, Paris 2004 The Mark Bar, "Bring your own flashlight", Brooklin, New York 2003 Le Glaz’art, Paris 2002 9 rue Dauphine, Paris 2001 Galerie Gauche, École des Beaux-Arts, Paris 2000 La grosse caisse, Paris La liberté, Paris GROUP SHOWS 2011 Chic Art Fair, Galerie Mariska Hammoudi Galerie De Vos, Espace Seven 2010 Galerie Mariska Hammoudi, Paris Chic Dessin, avec Cherry Gallery...

Abstracted Bay Area skyline against a pink sunset creates beautiful and soft geometries in this small pastel urban landscape by San Francisco artist Chris Cacciotti (American, 20th C...

Original drawing signed and dated by Aubrey Penny. Aubrey Penny (American 1917-2000) was an innovative California abstract artist who worked in a variety of mediums. Owner of the No...

Edda Renouf Magnet Drawing #4, 1980 Pastel, chalk on paper 34 x 28 inches (sheet) 36 5/8 x 30 1/2 inches (frame) Signed and dated recto