Edward Wilson Currier

Chinatown, San Francisco

1903

'Parisian Street Scene', watercolour on art paper, by Roland DuBuc (circa 1970s). This artwork is a delightful depiction of a Parisian street which scales the hill to the neighbourhood of Montmartre, the home of the basilica of Sacré-Cœur. DuBuc's artworks serve as a love letter to the city of Paris and are recognised by his incredibly charming style. The signed artwork is in good overall condition and has been newly framed with anti-reflective glass. Please enjoy the many photos accompanying this listing. Upon request a video of the piece may be provided. About the Artist: Roland DuBuc (1924-1998), French artist, the sixth of 13 children and son of a construction worker. The very precariousness of the family's financial situation forced him to go to work at the age of 14. In extreme poverty, he moved to Rouen where he was lodged by the Salvation Army. During that time he struck up friendships with several artists who gave him advice and taught him techniques of drawing. He moved to other cities later where he met painters including, among others, Fred Pailhès...

'Cherry Blossoms in Japan', pencil, ink and gouache on card stock, French School (Mid 20th Century). Cherry blossoms (Sakura) symbolise springtime, a time of renewal and the fleeting...

'Chez Maxim's', pastel and gouache on fine art paper, by André Meurice (circa 1950s - 60s). The artist depicts the glamorous clientele at the entryway to...

'The Port of Le Havre', pencil on art paper, by French artist Fred Pailhès (circa 1950s). Le Havre was only a fishing village until 1517, when Francis I h...

Ernest Fiene China Town, 1925 Signed and dated to lower right ‘Ernest Fiene 1925’. Watercolor on paper 18 1/2 x 14 5/8 inches Ernest Fiene was born in Elberfeld, Germany in 1894. As a teenager, Fiene immigrated to the United States in 1912. He studied art at the National Academy of Design in New York City from 1914 to 1918, taking day classes with Thomas Maynard and evening classes with Leon Kroll. Fiene continued his studies at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design in New York from 1916 to 1918, adding classes in printmaking at the Art Students League in 1923. Fiene began his career as an artist in 1919 with his first exhibition of watercolors at the MacDowell Club arranged by his mentor Robert Henri. In 1923 the Whitney Studio Club mounted a large exhibition of his works. The following year he had an exhibition at the New Gallery in New York, which completely sold out all fifty-two works, including paintings, watercolors, drawings, and etchings. With the proceeds of sales from the New Gallery exhibition, Ernest Fiene and his younger brother Paul, a sculptor, built studios in Woodstock, New York in 1925. In the early Twenties Ernest Fiene painted mostly landscapes of Woodstock and both the Ramapo and Hudson River Valleys. The first monograph from the Younger Artists Series was published on Fiene in 1922. Published in Woodstock, the series went on to include Alexander Brook, Peggy Bacon, and Yasuo Kuniyoshi. The book reproduced 1 illustration in color and another 27 reproductions in black and white. Around 1925 Fiene became fascinated with the intensity, excitement, and opportunities for color harmonies New York City offered as a subject. His paintings shifted to urban and industrial themes with architecture, industry, and transportation becoming his subjects. By 1926 Fiene had attracted the dealer Frank K.M. Rehn, who gave him a one-man exhibition that year, which travelled to the Boston Arts Club. C.W. Kraushaar Galleries gave Fiene a one-man exhibition of urban, landscape, portrait, and still life paintings in 1927. Julianna Force, the director of the Whitney Studio Club and first director of the Whitney Museum of American Art, included two of Fiene’s paintings in a fall exhibition in 1928. The Whitney Studio Club showed Fiene’s paintings in a two-man exhibition with Glenn O. Coleman that year and acquired three of Fiene’s paintings. Also in 1928 Fiene became affiliated with Edith Halpert’s Downtown Gallery where he had an exhibition of 20 lithographs in the spring. Fiene sold his house in Woodstock in 1928 to spend more of his time in New York City. With so many successful exhibitions, Fiene returned to Paris in 1928-29 where he rented Jules Pascin's studio and studied at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. In France, Fiene painted both landscape and urban subjects developed from ideas influenced by Cubist geometry and the use of flat areas of broad color. Upon returning to New York in 1930, Fiene used this new approach to continue to paint New York skyscraper and waterfront subjects, as well as to begin a series of paintings on changing old New York based on the excavations for Radio City Music Hall and the construction of the Empire State Building. Frank K.M. Rehn Galleries exhibited this series, titled “Changing Old New York,” in 1931. Fiene also has solo exhibitions at Rehn Galleries in 1930 and 1932. Fiene’s oil paintings are exhibited at the Chicago Arts Club in 1930 as well. Fiene was included in the Museum of Modern Art’s exhibition Painting and Sculpture by Living Americans in December of 1931. Visiting New York, Henri Matisse saw the exhibition and called Fiene’s Razing Buildings, West 49th Street the finest painting he had seen in New York. Fiene had two mural studies from his Mechanical Progress series exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art’s exhibition Murals by American Painters and Photographers in 1932. Fiene sent View from my Window which depicts Fiene working on a lithograph stone while looking out his window to the newly completed Empire State Building to the Carnegie International in 1931. In 1932 Fiene participated in the first Biennial of American Painting at the Whitney Museum and his prints were included in exhibitions at the Downtown Gallery and the Wehye Gallery. In the same year, Fiene was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship to further study mural painting in Florence, Italy. On his return from Italy in 1933 Fiene re-engaged himself in New York City life and won several public and private mural projects. Fiene resumed his active exhibition schedule, participating in two group exhibitions at the Whitney Museum and a one-man exhibition of recent paintings at the Downtown Gallery in January 1934. In 1933 he purchased a farm in Southbury, Connecticut, which added Connecticut scenes to his landscape subjects. This was also the year Fiene began to spend summers on Monhegan Island, Maine, where he painted seascapes, harbor scenes, and still lifes. Fiene’s landscape paintings attracted numerous commissions as part of the American Scene movement. Through the fall and winter of 1935-36, Fiene took an extended sketching trip through the urban, industrial, and farming areas of Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Most of the twenty-four Pennsylvania urban and rural paintings from this trip were featured in an exhibition held at the First National Bank in Pittsburgh in October of 1937 by the Pittsburgh Commission for Industrial Expansion. Fiene said of these works that he formed rhythm, opportunity for space and color, and integrity in the Pennsylvania mill and furnace paintings. Fiene received the silver medal for one of the Pittsburgh paintings...

China Town San Francisco 1896 - Watercolor on Paper A vintage watercolor by Theodore Ernest Langguth (German-American, 1861-1952). Presented in a rustic giltwood frame. Signed "T. Langguth" lower right. Watercolor circa 1920-30. Image: 12.5"H x 8.5"W. Painted from the photograph by Arnold Genthe...

Eve Nethercott, American (1925 - 2015) - Chinatown (P4.22), Year: 1961, Medium: Watercolor on Paper, Size: 13.5 x 20.5 in. (34.29 x 52.07 cm), Description: Eve Nethercott's s...

A Street Scene in the Chinese Quarter of San Francisco- Published in The Days' Doings, November 26, 1870. Description: This hand-colored engraving, published in *The Days' Doings* on November 26, 1870, presents a vibrant and detailed view of daily life in the Chinese Quarter (Chinatown) of San Francisco during the late 19th century. The scene captures the bustling atmosphere of a narrow street, lined with wooden buildings, hanging laundry, and small businesses serving the local Chinese community. The foreground features a man carrying two large baskets of produce, balanced on a pole over his shoulders. Behind him, people are seen engaging in various activities—gathering in groups, walking along the street, and conversing on balconies. A wooden sign reading "Tong Wo Doctor" can be seen on the left, advertising a local Chinese medicine shop, while another sign for "Sam Lee, Sam Sing" is displayed above a bridge-like structure connecting two buildings. The narrow street, laundry lines, and multi-story wooden buildings with balconies give the scene a distinctly urban and immigrant quarter feel, reflecting the growing Chinese immigrant community in San Francisco during this time. The engraving captures both the vibrant energy of this neighborhood and the cultural exchanges occurring in the rapidly expanding city. About the Publication and Technique: *The Days' Doings* was a weekly illustrated newspaper that ran from 1870 to 1879, known for its sensationalist coverage of crime, scandals, and interesting stories from both America and Europe. It often depicted lively scenes from everyday life, such as this portrayal of San Francisco’s Chinatown, providing its audience with visual glimpses into different facets of society. The engraving is produced using a wood engraving technique, where an image is carved into a block of wood for printing. Afterward, the image was hand-colored to add vibrancy to the bustling street scene. These prints were then mass-produced and circulated widely through publications like *The Days' Doings*. --- Keywords: San Francisco Chinatown 1870, Chinese Quarter San Francisco, *The Days' Doings* November 26, 1870, Chinese immigrant life 19th century, hand-colored wood engraving, Chinatown street scene engraving, Tong Wo Doctor, Sam Lee Sam Sing, 19th-century San Francisco prints...