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Dean Cornwell
Land Where Men Forget the Past, The Coconut Pearl

1925

About the Item

Original Oil on Canvas Illustration for Hearst/Cosmopolitan Aug. 1925 "Land Where Men Forget the Past, The Coconut Pearl" Caption: " 'Anyone who's knocked around the pearling islands,' said Bobby Young, 'knows a thing or two that knowbody'd believe.' " 22 x 48 inches (canvas) 29 x 54 inches (framed) Signed and Dated Lower Right Born in Louisville, Kentucky, Dean Cornwell became a premier illustrator and teacher of illustration and also a muralist. He received his first training from Paul Plaschke at the local YMCA, and by age 18, he was a cartoonist for the Louisville Herald. In 1911, he moved to Chicago where he worked in the art department for the Chicago Tribune and studied at the Art Institute of Chicago. In 1914, he received his first major commission, which was for The Red Book Magazine, and in 1915, he moved to New York and enrolled in the Art Students League and then at Harvey Dunn's school of illustration in Leonia, New Jersey. His illustration work included Redbook and Cosmopolitan and was based on his theory that good illustration had its basis in good painting, so all of his illustrations were initially paintings. In New York, he was also a protege of Nicolai Fechin, the Russian portraitist who had arrived in New York in 1923, and some of this conviction about painting may have come from Fechin. Wanting to become a muralist, Cornwell went to London to study with Frank Brangwyn. In 1927, he began a five-year period of mural painting in California including the Los Angeles Public Library and the Lincoln Memorial Shrine in Redlands. and he assisted David Siqueiros with the Olvera Street mural, América Tropical. He also did murals at The Bethlehem Steel Company, New York's General Motors Building, the 1939 World's Fair, the Lincoln Memorial in Redlands, California, and Rockefeller Center. He died in New York City where he had been a member of the Salmagundi Club. Sources: Edan Hughes, Artists in California Before 1940 Bozeman Bulger, 'A Black Angel', The Red Book Magazine Arthur Millier."Huge Fresco for El Paseo," Los Angeles Times (August 24, 1932, p.15.)
  • Creator:
    Dean Cornwell (1892 - 1960, American)
  • Creation Year:
    1925
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 29 in (73.66 cm)Width: 54 in (137.16 cm)Depth: 1 in (2.54 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    Missouri, MO
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU74734766092
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