Arthur Smith

Circus Performers by WPA Artist Arthur Smith

20th Century

Alice Helen Waugh (American, 20th century) Untitled, late 20th century Oil on board 19 3/4 x 23 3/4 in. Framed: 24 x 28 x 2 1/2 in. Signed lower left: Alice Waugh A painter and prof...

Framed Maurice Kish (American, 1895-1987) Genre painting of a man carrying water buckets Signed lower left: Maurice Kish Framed dimensions: 12 1/8 x 9 1/8 in. Maurice Kish, painter and poet, was born in Dvinsk, Russia (also known as Denenburg while under Russian rule) which is now known as Daugavpils, Latvia. Dvinsk was one of the leading Jewish cities in Russia in the 19th century, and a center of Jewish culture and debate. It was also a poor city where an estimated 30% of the Jewish population applied for aid in 1898. (1) Maurice (Moishe) Kish was born February 19, 1895 (2). A census conducted 2 years earlier indicated 330 industrial establishments owned by Jews, and 99 owned by non Jews. The dominant trades were tailoring and shoemaking. (1) "Kish… immigrated to New York in his teens. He pursued studies in art at Cooper Union and the National Academy of Design, gaining a foundation solid enough to support himself as a painter and to place his work in exhibitions, by the late 1930's, at such prestigious venues as the Corcoran Gallery of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art." (3) Kish also exhibited at the New York World's Fair in 1939, and by 1945 had exhibited 13 times at the National Academy and won 30 art prizes. He was a member of numerous art associations, including the Educational Alliance, the American Veteran Society of Artists, and the Brooklyn Art Alliance. (4) During the Depression Kish often portrayed "factory and street scenes in New York with the tired faces of workers revealing the weight of wage-labor upon their lives." (5) Kish himself was no stranger to the proletarian life - he was a skilled craft worker for decades in a factory which made glass vases. He was short and sturdy, a former amateur boxer, and also served as a dance instructor in the Catskills. In the 1970's, at the age of 75, he was still playing handball in the famous Brighton courts. (6) By the last decade of his life, however, he had lost his eyesight and was infirm. Kish lived most of his adult life in Brooklyn, initially in Brownsville but mainly in Williamsburg, and then Brighton Beach where he became enchanted by Coney Island...

Antique American modernist nocturnal street scene oil painting by Jerome Myers (1867 - 1940). Oil on board. Framed. Signed. Measuring 16 by 18 inches overall and 9 by 11 painting al...

Signed lower left, 'Freda L. Hansen' (American, 20th century) and painted circa 1965; bearing, verso, Alameda Art Association label with artist information and titled, 'Ladies in a G...