American Realist Drawings and Watercolor Paintings

Awards 2013 Loring W. Coleman Award for Watercolor/ Allied Artists of America, 100th Annual Exhibition at the National Arts Club 2011 Mary Bryan Memorial Medal / Allied Artis...

"Good Health Week" WPA American Scene Mid 20th Century Modern Social Realism Jo Cain (1904 – 2003) Good Health Week 10 ½ x 15 1/2 inches Oil on pape...

Meticulously and carefully rendered period piece that reenact this magicaly moment. Works on Paper, Gouache, Watercolor over traces of pencil heightened with white on illustration ...

This artwork "Winter Landscape " c.1930 is a watercolor by noted American artist Raphael Senseman, 1870-1966 It is signed at the lower left corner by the artist. The artwork size is ...

This drawing reveals the artist's mastery of the medium and her connection to her subjects. In this one, we peek beach-strewn seashells from her travels to Sanibel Island boast bubbl...

Untitled (Two Workhorses), c. 20th Century Ink on paper Sight: 4 x 4 3/4 in. Framed: 7 5/8 x 8 3/8 x 1/2 in. Initialed lower left: W.H.H.S. This ink drawing masterfully captures to ...

Original Painting Cathedral Interior New Yorker Cover Proposal 1939 Jesus Church Antonio Petruccelli (1907 – 1994) Cathedral New Yorker cover proposa...

This artwork titled "Port Stephenson" c.1950 is a watercolor by noted American maritime artist Rockwell Smith Brank Jr. 1917-2007. It is signed at the lower right corner by the artis...

Represented by George Billis Gallery, NYC & LA --RUSS HAVARD Artist Statement I'm drawn towards nature imagery that depicts isolated elements in their continual struggle to flourish ...

Beautiful mid-century landscape watercolor with a tall, stately tree in the foreground, its many forking branches depicted with exceptional detail, and a verdant background of rollin...

Vibrant watercolor, pen and ink floral study of Peruvian lilies, with brilliant attention to detail and a signature delicate style, by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b.194...

A pastel drawing of Mickey Mantle by Jack Lane from 1986. A classic sports illustration of the legendary Mickey Mantle of the New York Yankees at bat. Fr...

This artwork "Landscape with Cattle" c.1930 is a watercolor by noted American artist Raphael Senseman, 1870-1966 It is signed at the lower right ...

Eileen Lake Crayon on paper, early1930's Initialed in pencil lower right (see photo) Titled and annotated verso "Eileen Lake, early 1930s girlfriend" Note: Eileen Hall Lake was an American poet and Adolf Dehn's girlfriend in the early 1930s. Provenance: Estate of the artist By descent Adolf Dehn, American Watercolorist and Printmaker, 1895-1968 Adolf Dehn was an artist who achieved extraordinary artistic heights, but in a very particular artistic sphere—not so much in oil painting as in watercolor and lithography. Long recognized as a master by serious print collectors, he is gradually gaining recognition as a notable and influential figure in the overall history of American art. In the 19th century, with the invention of the rotary press, which made possible enormous print runs, and the development of the popular, mass-market magazines, newspaper and magazine illustration developed into an artistic realm of its own, often surprisingly divorced from the world of museums and art exhibitions, and today remains surprisingly overlooked by most art historians. Dehn in many regards was an outgrowth of this world, although in an unusual way, since as a young man he produced most of his illustrative work not for popular magazines, such as The Saturday Evening Post, but rather for radical journals, such as The Masses or The Liberator, or artistic “little magazines” such as The Dial. This background established the foundation of his outlook, and led later to his unique and distinctive contribution to American graphic art. If there’s a distinctive quality to his work, it was his skill in introducing unusual tonal and textural effects into his work, particularly in printmaking but also in watercolor. Jackson Pollock seems to have been one of many notable artists who were influenced by his techniques. Early Years, 1895-1922 For an artist largely remembered for scenes of Vienna and Paris, Adolf Dehn’s background was a surprising one. Born in Waterville, Minnesota, on November 22, 1895, Dehn was the descendent of farmers who had emigrated from Germany and homesteaded in the region, initially in a one-room log cabin with a dirt floor. Adolf’s father, Arthur Clark Dehn, was a hunter and trapper who took pride that he had no boss but himself, and who had little use for art. Indeed, during Adolf’s boyhood the walls of his bedroom and the space under his bed were filled with the pelts of mink, muskrats and skunks that his father had killed, skinned and stretched on drying boards. It was Adolf’s mother, Emilie Haas Dehn, a faithful member of the German Lutheran Evangelical Church, who encouraged his interest in art, which became apparent early in childhood. Both parents were ardent socialists, and supporters of Eugene Debs. In many ways Dehn’s later artistic achievement was clearly a reaction against the grinding rural poverty of his childhood. After graduating from high school in 1914 at the age of 19—an age not unusual in farming communities at the time, where school attendance was often irregular—Dehn attended the Minneapolis School of Art from 1914 to 1917, whose character followed strongly reflected that of its director, Munich-trained Robert Kohler, an artistic conservative but a social radical. There Dehn joined a group of students who went on to nationally significant careers, including Wanda Gag (later author of best-selling children’s books); John Flanagan (a sculptor notable for his use of direct carving) Harry Gottlieb (a notable social realist and member of the Woodstock Art Colony), Elizabeth Olds (a printmaker and administrator for the WPA), Arnold Blanch (landscape, still-life and figure painter, and member of the Woodstock group), Lucille Lunquist, later Lucille Blanch (also a gifted painter and founder of the Woodstock art colony), and Johan Egilrud (who stayed in Minneapolis and became a journalist and poet). Adolf became particularly close to Wanda Gag (1893-1946), with whom he established an intense but platonic relationship. Two years older than he, Gag was the daughter of a Bohemian artist and decorator, Anton Gag, who had died in 1908. After her husband died, Wanda’s mother, Lizzi Gag, became a helpless invalid, so Wanda was entrusted with the task of raising and financially supporting her six younger siblings. This endowed her with toughness and an independent streak, but nonetheless, when she met Dehn, Wanda was Victorian and conventional in her artistic taste and social values. Dehn was more socially radical, and introduced her to radical ideas about politics and free love, as well as to socialist publications such as The Masses and The Appeal to Reason. Never very interested in oil painting, in Minneapolis Dehn focused on caricature and illustration--often of a humorous or politically radical character. In 1917 both Dehn and Wanda won scholarships to attend the Art Students League, and consequently, in the fall of that year both moved to New York. Dehn’s art education, however, ended in the summer of 1918, shortly after the United States entered World War I, when he was drafted to serve in the U. S. Army. Unwilling to fight, he applied for status as a conscientious objector, but was first imprisoned, then segregated in semi-imprisonment with other Pacifists, until the war ended. The abuse he suffered at this time may well explain his later withdrawal from taking political stands or making art of an overtly political nature. After his release from the army, Dehn returned to New York where he fell under the spell of the radical cartoonist Boardman Robinson and produced his first lithographs. He also finally consummated his sexual relationship with Wanda Gag. The Years in Europe: 1922-1929 In September of 1921, however, he abruptly departed for Europe, arriving in Paris and then moving on to Vienna. There in the winter of 1922 he fell in love with a Russian dancer, Mura Zipperovitch, ending his seven-year relationship with Wanda Gag. He and Mura were married in 1926. It was also in Vienna that he produced his first notable artistic work. Influenced by European artists such as Jules Pascin and Georg Grosz, Dehn began producing drawings of people in cafes, streets, and parks, which while mostly executed in his studio, were based on spontaneous life studies and have an expressive, sometimes almost childishly wandering quality of line. The mixture of sophistication and naiveté in these drawings was new to American audiences, as was the raciness of their subject matter, which often featured pleasure-seekers, prostitutes or scenes of sexual dalliance, presented with a strong element of caricature. Some of these drawings contain an element of social criticism, reminiscent of that found in the work of George Grosz, although Dehn’s work tended to focus on humorous commentary rather than savagely attacking his subjects or making a partisan political statement. Many Americans, including some who had originally been supporters of Dehn such as Boardman Robinson, were shocked by these European drawings, although George Grocz (who became a friend of the artist in this period) admired them, and recognized that Dehn could also bring a new vision to America subject matter. As he told Dehn: “You will do things in America which haven’t been done, which need to be done, which only you can do—as far at least as I know America.” A key factor in Dehn’s artistic evolution at this time was his association with Scofield Thayer...

Vibrant watercolor, pen and ink floral study of red begonia, with brilliant attention to detail and a signature delicate style, by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b.1943). ...

Two Men on a Street Early 20th Century w/c Fauvism Social Realism American Scene Note: We have three similar in style works from 1911 available now on 1stDibs. All are framed identi...

Stephan Hoffpauir’s photorealistic watercolors invite viewers to contemplate spaces that, while familiar, are largely ignored by those who fleetingly pass through them. Among his sub...

Represented by George Billis Gallery, NYC & LA --RUSS HAVARD Artist Statement I'm drawn towards nature imagery that depicts isolated elements in their continual struggle to flourish ...

Fighter Boxing Woodstock American Scene WPA Era Mid 20th Century Social John Ruggles (1907-1991) Sight: 17 1/2 x 13 1/3 inches. Framed: 22 x 18 inches...

Irises by Texas artist Julie England is an Ink and Watercolor, Oil on Yupo paper. The size of Irises is Image 26” x 40” Framed 31 ¼” x 45 ¼” Art is...

Published Thayer Stroller advertisement, 1951 Watercolor and gouache on board Signed lower left

Aaron Berkman was born in Hartford, Connecticut in 1900. In 1916 Berkman attended the Connecticut League of Art Students, founded by Charles Noel Flagg. Beginning in 1919 he studied under Albertus E. Jones at the Hartford Art School. Berkman was influenced during this time by George Inness and John Singer Sargent and the Old Masters. He received a scholarship to the Museum Art School of Boston in 1921 and then traveled to Europe, remaining there from 1924 through 1925. He spent time in France, Italy, Spain, Holland and Belgium. In 1929 Berkman moved to New York City, continuing a friendship and painting relationship with Milton Avery. He was appointed by the W.P.A. as Director of the WPA Art Center at the 92nd Street Y in New York City. Berkman helped established the A.C.A. Gallery in New York City at 52 West 8th St., the first Artist Cooperative Gallery in New York City. He spent summers on Monhegan Island in...

Dianna Aldana (Born 1950) Image Size: 10 x 7 Frame Size: 11.5 x 11 Medium: Watercolor 2022 "Crimson Rumped Toucanet" Dianna is a self-taught artist, whose only training was in her hi...

Larry #5 2016 Charcoal on paper 22 x 10.5 inches Jessica Keiser currently resides in New Haven, Connecticut. Keiser's style is Naturalistic, concerned with the intimacy of the cre...

Al Hirschfeld (1903-2003) "Beat the Band" 22 x 26 1/2 inches ink on board published in The New York Times, October 11, 1942 The unframed work comes directly from the Al Hirschfeld F...

Signed lower right, 'Maria Winkler' (American, 20th century) and dated 1991. Professor Emeritus of the Art Department at California State University, Sacramento, Maria Winkler earne...

Stephan Hoffpauir’s photorealistic watercolors invite viewers to contemplate spaces that, while familiar, are largely ignored by those who fleetingly pass through them. Among his sub...

Winold Reiss The Red Silo Signed lower left Watercolor on paper 20 x 29 inches Winold Reiss (1886-1953) was an artist and designer who emigrated to the United States from Germany in 1913. Probably best known as a portraitist, Reiss was a pioneer of modernism and well known for his brilliant work in graphic and interior design. A compassionate man who greatly respected all people as human beings, he believed that his art could help break down racial prejudices. Like his father Fritz Reiss (1857-1915), who was also an artist and who was his son's first teacher, Winold Reiss was artistically moved by diverse cultures. The elder Reiss focused on folk life in Germany while Winold drew substantial inspiration from a range of cultures, particularly Native American, Mexican, and African-American. As did many young aspiring artists, Winold Reiss studied with the esteemed painter and teacher Franz von Stuck at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, which was at that time a center of the decorative and fine-arts movement. It is not known whether Reiss met E. Martin Hennings...

Artist: Thomas Strickland, American (1923 - 1999) Title: Woman in Blue Year: circa 1970 Medium: Pastel on Paper, signed Size: 21.5 in. x 17 in. (54.61 cm x 43.18 cm) Frame: 27 x 22.5...

Bridge Painter WPA American Modernism Mid 20th-Century Realism Industrial Worker. Sight size: 18 x 23 1/4 inches. Estate stamped verso. This drawing is the study for a large oil we ...

42nd Street NYC 1923 Deco WPA Ashcan American Modern Cityscape Realism Broadway. 10 x 7 1/2 inches. Graphite on paper. Signed, titled "42nd Street" and dated July 26, 1923, lower l...

The key element to this work is that it is much larger that most of the other works on paper by Lachaise and somewhat more delineated and refined . The figure exudes sexuality has a...

Original Painting Life Mag Published 1953 Birds Animals Illustration Mid Century Antonio Petruccelli (1907 - 1994) The World We Live In Birds of Paradise Life Magazine Illustration ...

"They Say Every Little Gesture Has a Meaning", Playboy cartoon illustration, August 1968 Pen and watercolor on board 12.5 x 9.5 in. (image) Signed...

Represented by George Billis Gallery, NYC & LA --RUSS HAVARD Artist Statement I'm drawn towards nature imagery that depicts isolated elements in their continual struggle to flourish ...

Noel Daggett, American (1925 - 2005) - Spoils from Mexico (Apache), Year: 1988, Medium: Gouache on Board, signed and dated, Size: 13 in. x 10 in. (33.02 cm x 25.4 cm), Frame Size:...

Railroad Worker Industrial WPA American Scene Mid Century Modern Social Realism Jo Cain (1904 - 2003) Railroad worker 36 ¼ x 27 inches Oil on paper c. 1930s S...

Lets Find the Way #1 Watercolor on Arches wove paper, 2021 Signed with the artist's initials lower right Signed, titled and dated in pencil verso This watercolor is related to the ar...

Represented by George Billis Gallery, NYC & LA --RUSS HAVARD Artist Statement I'm drawn towards nature imagery that depicts isolated elements in their continual struggle to flourish ...

Coral Reef Painting Life Mag Published 1953. Mid Century Modern American Scene Antonio Petruccelli (1907 – 1994) The World We Live In Coral Reef ...

Anthony Baus is an alumnus and instructor of the Grand Central Atelier in Long Island City, New York. His unique artistic vision, which mines the world of the Old Masters and antiqui...

Original Painting New Yorker Mag Cover proposal. Army Wedding American Scene WPA Antonio Petruccelli (1907 – 1994) Army Wedding New Yorker cover proposal, c. 1939 11 1/2 X 8 inches ...

Derek Buckner is represented by George Billis Gallery NYC and LA. Born in 1970, Derek Buckner lives in Brooklyn, NY, with his wife, novelist Joanna Hershon, their twin sons and daughter. The artist graduated from LaGuardia High School of Music and Art, as well as Vassar College, The Art Students League of New York and received a B.F.A. from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. During his career, Buckner has discovered many different themes, but the one to which he has most often returned is the urban landscape. In these paintings, he allows the viewer a distinctive look into his everyday surroundings, often including factory rooftops, bridges and the rapidly changing Gowanus Canal...

"Cafe au Lait" is a still life watercolor painting featuring hues of grey, brown and yellow. Kathryn Keller is inspired by the works of George Inness, Edward Hopper, Giorgio Morandi & Alexander Drysdale. Kathryn Keller is a painter based in New Orleans and Alexandria, Louisiana. She received a BA in Fine Art and English from the University of the South...

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 ...

Watercolor on handmade Richard de Bas "fleurs" paper Agnes Murray has an extensive exhibition history and she is represented in both private and public collections. Ms. Murray is a p...

"Bleak House 4-26-2021" is an interior watercolor painting featuring hues of blue, purple, pink and yellow. Kathryn Keller is inspired by the works of Ge...

Stella, Joseph. STUDY OF A MAN WITH A HAT AND OVERCOAT. Blue, red and black crayon on tan wove paper, c. 1920. 6 7/8 x 4 3/4 inches; 173 x 120 mm. Signe...

RUSS HAVARD Artist Statement I'm drawn towards nature imagery that depicts isolated elements in their continual struggle to flourish under desolate circumstances. The seemingly bleak...

Classic mid-century watercolor seascape of the incoming tide, waves crashing on rocks by Joseph Yeager (early-mid 20th Century), c. 1940s-1950s. Painted on heavy bond watercolor paper with ragged edges. No frame. Unfinished work...

Horses Leaving the Barn Watercolor on paper, 1940 Signed and dated lower left corner (see photo) Condition: Excellent Image: 14 1/2 x 21” Frame: 25” x 31” Provenance; Associated American Artists, New York (see photo of label) Mamdouha and Elmer Holmes Bobst Displayed in an original wormy chestnut frame with OP3 Acrylic. Most probably from the AAA Dehn watercolor exhibition of 1940. Vintage original framing chosen by the artist. Note: Elmer Holmes Bobst (1884–1978) was an American businessman and philanthropist who worked in the pharmaceutical industry. His wife, Mamdouha, was also well known philanthropist. Bobst was born in Lititz, Pennsylvania. He aspired to become a doctor, but instead, he taught himself pharmacology. After his wife Ethel composed his interview letter, he became manager and treasurer of the Hoffman-LaRoche Chemical Works by 1920. When Bobst retired from the company in 1944, he was one of the nation's highest paid corporate executives. In 1945 he took charge of the ailing William Warner Company (later Warner–Lambert) and he remained board chairman until his retirement. Bobst had close connections to President Dwight Eisenhower, but was also a close friend of President Richard Nixon. Note: In 1940, the year of this watercolor, Dehn and Elizabeth Timmerman visited Waterville, MN on their way to Colorado Sprint, Colorado where Dehn was to teach lithography and watercolor. This watercolor is obviously a view of the area around Waterville. Adolf Dehn, American Watercolorist and Printmaker, 1895-1968 Adolf Dehn was an artist who achieved extraordinary artistic heights, but in a very particular artistic sphere—not so much in oil painting as in watercolor and lithography. Long recognized as a master by serious print collectors, he is gradually gaining recognition as a notable and influential figure in the overall history of American art. In the 19th century, with the invention of the rotary press, which made possible enormous print runs, and the development of the popular, mass-market magazines, newspaper and magazine illustration developed into an artistic realm of its own, often surprisingly divorced from the world of museums and art exhibitions, and today remains surprisingly overlooked by most art historians. Dehn in many regards was an outgrowth of this world, although in an unusual way, since as a young man he produced most of his illustrative work not for popular magazines, such as The Saturday Evening Post, but rather for radical journals, such as The Masses or The Liberator, or artistic “little magazines” such as The Dial. This background established the foundation of his outlook, and led later to his unique and distinctive contribution to American graphic art. If there’s a distinctive quality to his work, it was his skill in introducing unusual tonal and textural effects into his work, particularly in printmaking but also in watercolor. Jackson Pollock seems to have been one of many notable artists who were influenced by his techniques. Early Years, 1895-1922 For an artist largely remembered for scenes of Vienna and Paris, Adolf Dehn’s background was a surprising one. Born in Waterville, Minnesota, on November 22, 1895, Dehn was the descendent of farmers who had emigrated from Germany and homesteaded in the region, initially in a one-room log cabin with a dirt floor. Adolf’s father, Arthur Clark Dehn, was a hunter and trapper who took pride that he had no boss but himself, and who had little use for art. Indeed, during Adolf’s boyhood the walls of his bedroom and the space under his bed were filled with the pelts of mink, muskrats and skunks that his father had killed, skinned and stretched on drying boards. It was Adolf’s mother, Emilie Haas Dehn, a faithful member of the German Lutheran Evangelical Church, who encouraged his interest in art, which became apparent early in childhood. Both parents were ardent socialists, and supporters of Eugene Debs...

Beautiful original drawing by American artist, Albert Sway (b.1913). Portrait of a young woman, ca. 1935. Ink on paper, measuring 8.5 x 11 inches. Signed lower right. Unframed...

Original collage composed of realistic graphite drawing on old nautical chart of a large sailboat. Signed lower right and dated 1993. Condition is very good. The sailboat is centere...

Hugo Gellert (Hungarian-American, 1892-1985), Study for "The New Masses". Mary Ryan Gallery 4. Signed in ink lower left: "Hugo / Gellert"; inscribed in crayo...

This artwork titled "Evening Fog, Moss Landing, California" 1970, is a watercolor on paper by noted French/American artist Albert Bechely Crundall, 1906-1997. It is signed at the low...

"Bleak House 4-5-20" is an architectural watercolor painting featuring hues of blue, tan, pink and green. Kathryn Keller is inspired by the works of Georg...

American Impressionist