American Realist Figurative Paintings

An oil painting of an antique pair of tongs, meant for use during ice fishing. Suspended from a small rope, hanging from a single nail, against a grey backdrop. Brushstrokes can be seen in the gray of the background, but are harder to make out on the subject. Morfis paints in an extremely refined, realist approach. Painting dimensions: 25 x 19 inches Framed dimensions: 30 x 24 x 1.5 inches Available at Grenning Gallery. BIOGRAPHY John Morfis was born in Glen Cove, Long Island in 1976. His humble beginnings made pursuing a career in art difficult and paradoxically necessary. Fixated on making things aesthetically pleasing, John made an extreme departure from his family life when he chose to base his life on art. Surrounded by mechanics, welders, and otherwise trade workers John had a tough time expressing his interest in a world much more utilitarian and much less expressive and impractical. With an extraordinary desire to be an artist and a grant awarded, John was able to earn a Bachelor of Fine Arts with a concentration in painting from the University of Hartford in 1998. While there John studied oil painting under American realist Stephen Brown. John’s first solo show took place in 2007 at the Ellen Traut Collection Gallery in Hartford, CT and was a near sell out. Since then John has had success up and down the northeastern coast of the United States working with various galleries and collectors. His work has also appeared in various group shows at the New Britain Museum of American Art in Connecticut. ARTIST STATEMENT Each painting, although a portrait of a tired hand...

Arnold Friedman worked as a clerk for decades at the Station Y, the branch at 3rd Avenue and East 67th Street in New York City. This present work was done two years after his retirem...

Colonel Bates Leads the 30th Colored Infantry at the Battle of the Crater Watercolor on Paper Circa 1903 15 ½ x 21 ½ Inches 25 ½ x 33 ½ Inches Framed LR: Graves This rare portrait of African American troops serving in battle during the Civil War depicts the 30th United States Colored Infantry at the Battle of the Crater, at Petersburg, Virginia. The regiment was composed of African American enlisted men commanded by white officers and was authorized by the Bureau of Colored Troops which was created by the United States War Department on May 22, 1863. The Battle of the Crater, July 30th, 1864, was part of the Siege of Petersburg, fought between the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, commanded by General Robert E. Lee and the Union Army of the Potomac, commanded by Maj. Gen. George G. Meade (under the direct supervision of the general-in-chief, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant). At the top of the painting, Colonel Delevan Bates raises his saber to lead the charge of the 30th United States Colored Infantry. Bates was promoted to this command just prior to this battle, having served with distinction in the 121st New York Infantry at the Battles of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. Though the Battle of the Crater would eventually be won by the Confederacy, it was here that Bates and 23 other troops would be award the United States highest award for bravery during combat, the Medal of Honor. After weeks of preparation, on July 30, Union forces exploded a mine in Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside's IX Corps sector, blowing a gap in the Confederate defenses of Petersburg, Virginia. From this propitious beginning, everything deteriorated rapidly for the Union attackers. Unit after unit charged into and around the crater, where soldiers milled in confusion. Grant considered the assault "the saddest affair I have witnessed in this war." The Confederates quickly recovered and launched several counterattacks led by Brig. Gen. William Mahone. The breach was sealed off, and Union forces were repulsed with severe casualties. Brig. Gen. Edward Ferrero's division of black soldiers...

Hector Garrido is an American book cover illustrator. He illustrated numerous science fiction, horror and adventure book covers, including all the covers for the Baroness series of pulp novels, and covers for the Destroyer series. He also illustrated romance and gothic novels, and Nancy Drew and Hardy...

"Secret Beach" is an oil painting of a path towards the beach, and a lighthouse in the distance. Dunes make up the foreground, and a sandy path leads us to a body of water. Small painting with a vertical orientation. Signed "MKW" in upper right corner. Painting dimensions: 12 x 8 inches Framed dimensions: 14 x 10 inches Matthew Weigle...

The sacrificial ceremony, Freemans The Collection of Philip Desind Signed Three times Riggs l.r. A powerful account of moments a tribe member is cut open and the heart is handed over to a young brave, There is a reason why there are few contemporary painters who can paint a portrait this good. It's hard to do. It's easy to throw some paint or spray a mess of graffiti on canvas. That's easy. To execute a portrait with a great depth of anatomy and structure takes years of academic training. In Riggs's time there were teachers who knew how to pass on this knowledge. He studied at the Art Students League and the Académie Julian . Today, they are very few and far between. - Robert Riggs was a Gay Artist...

A walk through any major museum will reveal paintings that depict or legitimate only certain kinds of experience. Despite the good intentions of critical theorists questioning the va...

What makes this work important? It's not that it's a commissioned artwork for a men's 60s pulp adventure magazine depicting the instant a soldier is shot. The big point of the painting is how brilliantly the formal elements are thought out, designed, and executed. John McDermott tells a story using a complex figural composition in an unexpected wide-angle vision. The work is as abstract as it is representation. His use of light is significant because it creates a high-contrast two-color style that bears the mark of its creator. This is a work done by a master artist/illustrator without peers compared to artists living today. If the contemporary art world gave awards for draftsmanship, painting technique, and graphic design .... John McDermott would win the highest accolades. Initialed lower left - unframed John McDermott (August 30, 1919 – April 20, 1977), also known under the pen names J.M. Ryan and Mariner, was an American illustrator and author noted for action and adventure illustrations.[1] McDermott worked as an in-between and effects animator for Walt Disney Studios and as a US Marine combat artist,before establishing himself as a cover illustrator for 1950s paperbacks and pulp magazines such as Argosy, American Weekly, and Outdoor Life. Under his J.M. Ryan pen name, he wrote the novels The Rat Factory (1971), a derogatory satire of Walt Disney and the Disney studio; Brooks Wilson Ltd (1967), on which the 1970 film Loving was based; and Mother's Day (1969) about Ma Barker. Under his own name, he novelized director-writer Bo Widerberg's screenplay for the 1971 film Joe Hill, which would be his final published book. Early life John Richard McDermott was born 30 August 1919 in Pueblo, Colorado, the younger of two sons of Henry McDermott, an oil broker. McDermott was a young child when his father committed suicide.[4] The family eventually moved to Los Angeles where McDermott's mother, Hazel, worked in a beauty parlor. He graduated from Hollywood High School in 1936. Although he had had no formal art education, he took a job as an artist at Walt Disney Animation Studios. Career Disney At Disney, McDermott worked as an in-betweener and effects animator on Brave Little Tailor, Pinocchio, The Reluctant Dragon and Fantasia. His experiences while working at Disney, particularly during the time of the 1941 Disney animators' strike, would later become the basis for his 1969 satirical novel The Rat Factory. McDermott left Disney to fight with US forces during World War II. US Marines McDermott World War II sketch titled "Buddy is Wounded" On September 29, 1942, McDermott enlisted with the US Marine Corps. He served as a "pistol and palette" combat artist assigned to the map-making section. As a sergeant with the III Amphibious Corps, McDermott was involved in battles in the South Pacific theater of war, documenting the Guam, Okinawa and the Guadalcanal Campaigns. McDermott considered his wartime years to be his art education. "In the Marines, as a combat artist, I traveled with the troops and for three years got all the drawing opportunity anyone could want. My work changed enormously during this time and I’m sure it was due to constant drawing, every single day, from life, just putting down what I saw around me. In a few instances it was a dangerous kind of scholarship." According to the Marine Corps history journal Fortitudine, McDermott was so prolific that his contemporary style pen-and-ink sketches became easily recognizable to both Marines, from published work in Leatherneck Magazine, and civilians, from glossy copies supplied by the Marine Corps to the nation's press.His wartime art appears in World War II history books and is displayed at the Pentagon and the National Museum of the Marine Corps. Illustration Following the end of World War II, McDermott moved from California to New York City to work as a freelance illustrator. McDermott made his reputation drawing modern action, war and adventure scenes. His work adorned the covers and inside story pages of popular pulp magazines of the 1950s such as Argosy, Adventure, Blue Book, Outdoor Life and American Weekly. McDermott's illustrations appeared on numerous covers of 1950s paperback novels published by Dell, Fawcett Gold Medal, Bantam Mystery and others. His action graphics were geared toward thriller and detective genres, such as Donald Hamilton's Matt Helm books Murderers' Row and The Betrayers. He also created covers for science fiction comic titles such as Voyage to the Deep[citation needed] and horror-themed paperbacks such as the classic 1955 science fiction novel The Body Snatchers...

"Civil Rights." Evergood's early commentary on racial issues in the 1950s depicts four black men gagged, roped and hanging from a tree. In the background, imprisoned blacks look on through a barbed-wire fence. Whites watch in horror but do nothing to help. Meanwhile, a two-legged and three-headed serpent wraps himself around the tree that physically and symbolically separates the races. This is an important work in the history of American art. It may be one of the very earliest examples of a major American painter doing a major work that challenges racial segregation and injustice at a time when no one else would. The title of the work is inspired by a Historic Supreme Court decision on racial segregation. The Little Rock...

Saturday Evening Post interior illustration Signed lower right

Scott Duce Biography American, b. 1956 Scott Duce is an international artist working in New York. Duce’s work is included in many corporate, museum, and private collections. Notable...

Watercolor on paper executed by German-American artist Richard Veenfliet "My Old Kentucky Home" references one of the ballads written by American composer Stephen Foster in 1852.

Two paintings by Wes Hempel, Calling, 44x32" and Unexpected Blessing II, 48x32"

Kevin Frank is represented by George Billis Gallery. Kevin Frank statement: For me, combining the techniques of the ancient Greco-Roman painters with those of the old and new master...

Kevin Frank statement: For me, combining the techniques of the ancient Greco-Roman painters with those of the old and new masters help to create unique modern images. As with all enc...

Female artist Louise Lue Osborne paints a classic composition with an interaction of two women and a child soaked in golden late light. The figural gro...

Kevin Frank statement: For me, combining the techniques of the ancient Greco-Roman painters with those of the old and new masters help to create unique modern images. As with all enc...

McLean's consummate skill as a portrait artist, graphic designer and master of composition is on full display in the complex narrative work. This work contains 41 portraits including those of Bette Midler, Jimi Hendrix, and Benny Goodman...

Born in New York City in 1959, Max Ferguson started as a filmmaker, making award-winning animated films as a teenager. But it was while he was a visiting student at an art school in ...

A walk through any major museum will reveal paintings that depict or legitimate only certain kinds of experience. Despite the good intentions of critical theorists questioning the va...

Mid-century female illustrator/artist Gladys Rockmore Davis paints a compelling portrait of a contemplative beauty who looks like Elizabeth Taylor. Frontal and lateral forces work together in this pyramidal composition. The sitter stares down at the viewer creating a frontal tension. Her hypnotic gaze is counterbalanced by the lateral movement of her crossed hands and triggers an emotional response. Gladys Rockmore Davis is both a work-for-hire illustrator and a fine artist- She was an illustrator for clients such as Upjohn, Munsingwear, Elgin Watches, and Johnson & Johnson. Davis had a show at the prestigious Midtown Gallery and Babcock Gallery in New York. She studied at the California School of Fine Arts, Art Institute of Chicago, and Art Students League. William R. French Gold Medal...

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...

Kevin Frank statement: For me, combining the techniques of the ancient Greco-Roman painters with those of the old and new masters help to create unique modern images. As with all enc...

Kevin Frank statement: For me, combining the techniques of the ancient Greco-Roman painters with those of the old and new masters help to create unique modern images. As with all enc...

Kevin Frank statement: For me, combining the techniques of the ancient Greco-Roman painters with those of the old and new masters help to create unique modern images. As with all enc...

Kevin Weckbach's (US based) "The Grinder" is an original, hand made egg tempera painting that depicts an industrial Gristmill made up of metal buildings, a elevator and a grain silo ...

Gregory Block's (US based) "Porcupine" is an oil painting that depicts a Porcupine skull and wooden shelf floating among clouds and a bright blue sky. Gregory was born in Kansas Ci...

Hector Garrido is an American book cover illustrator. He illustrated numerous science fiction, horror and adventure book covers, including all the covers for the Baroness series of pulp novels, and covers for the Destroyer series. He also illustrated romance and gothic novels, and Nancy Drew and Hardy...

'Dissent' 2005 by American artist, Chester Arnold. Oil on canvas, 46 x 54 in. This painting presents a richly painted, aerial view of protesters circa 2005, in the midst of the Iraq ...

Represented by George Billis Gallery, NYC & LA -- For decades, Wes Hempel has been committed to re-envisioning the depiction of masculinity in contemporary art. By setting psychologically acute portraits of modern-day men against backdrops appropriated from such disparate sources as neoclassical history...

A walk through any major museum will reveal paintings that depict or legitimate only certain kinds of experience. Despite the good intentions of critical theorists questioning the va...

Alex Roulette’s paintings depict false realities. The artist constructs landscapes from numerous source photographs, which he uses as references to create his finely-tuned oil painti...

The old west depicted in a graphic and dramatic manner. Paperback Novel Cover Painting Original Art (Avon, 1963). Work has a matted image area of 12.5" ...

A walk through any major museum will reveal paintings that depict or legitimate only certain kinds of experience. Despite the good intentions of critical theorists questioning the va...

Scott Duce Biography American, b. 1956 Scott Duce is an international artist working in New York. Duce’s work is included in many corporate, museum, and private collections. Notable...

This illustration was commissioned for the 1984 Olympic Games by the US postal service. Signed and dated lower right Work is framed framed under acrylic to an overall size of 31.5 ...

The artist invents and then captures a moment of a peak drama with soldiers being shot and bombs exploding. It's beautifully rendered in Künstler signature style showcasing his deep ...

"My work is often described as realism, and sometimes photorealism, but I don’t think of it that way. I do use photographs as reference, and the finished paintings have a photographi...

Alex Roulette’s paintings depict false realities. The artist constructs landscapes from numerous source photographs, which he uses as references to create his finely-tuned oil painti...

Represented by George Billis Gallery, NYC & LA -- Alex Roulette’s paintings depict false realities. The artist constructs landscapes from numerous source photographs, which he uses a...

Pruett Carter captures the quintessential look of the 1950's in this loosely rendered but charming work for Redbook. Bright, punchy colors define each object and are arranged in a simplified but complex composition of intersecting and overlapping planes of color. The double portrait of the girl expresses a peak moment of introspection. She ponders her situation while preparing to get dressed for her special occasion. The whole scene is imbued with suspense about her future. Carter is a great academic painter. With just a few light touches of the brush, he quickly defines the form of the subject and achieves the X factor of the work. The profile and frontal view of the girl clearly are the same person. He nails her look. This is hard to do. Do not underestimate it. Sadly, there is a reason why there are very few contemporary artists can actually paint and draw without tracing photographs or resort to naive painting. It's hard to do. It's hard to be a painter. You can not fake...

Mabel Rollins Harris was among other things an illustrator who specialized Children's art. Looking at her work today her pictures take on an almost surreal quality. She posed ...

Harry Lemon Parkhurst American, 1876–1962 was a pulp illustrator for crime and detective stories. The works depicts an art thief caught at a pe...

Ernest Hamlin Baker is one of America's greatest artist that no one has ever heard of. Take a look at his full body of work. If you haven't noticed, Ernest Hamlin Baker is an excepti...

"Civil Rights." Evergood's early commentary on racial issues in the 1950s depicts four black men gagged, roped and hanging from a tree. In the background, imprisoned blacks look on through a barbed-wire fence. Whites watch in horror but do nothing to help. Meanwhile, a two-legged and three-headed serpent who symbolizes evil - wraps himself around the tree that physically and symbolically separates the races. This is an important work in the history of American art. It may be one of the very earliest examples of a major American painter doing a major work that challenges racial segregation and injustice at a time when no one else would. The title of the work is inspired by a Historic Supreme Court decision on racial segregation. The Little Rock...

O MARA'S MUNICIPAL TAVERN - Saturday Evening Post Illustration Supreme technical skill allows the artist to realistically capture an...

Cuteness personified. An innocent young child holds a cute doll in one hand, and in the other, she has a leashed, soft furry little lamb - while she attends an outdoor concert of si...

High drama and fear is exressed on the faces of 5 kids as they anticipate the outcome a scary event. Signed lower left From the Estate of Charles Martignette. Most likey for the Sa...

An illustrator for Time, Life, Look, True, True West, Saturday Evening Post, Good Housekeeping, Readers Digest, and others, he also painted for adverti...

Signed (lower right): Quincy

There is a reason why there are few contemporary painters who can paint a portrait this good. It's hard to do. It's easy to throw some paint or spray a mess of graffiti on canvas. That's easy art. Executing a portrait with a great depth of anatomy and structure takes years of academic training. In Riggs's time, there were teachers who knew how to pass on this knowledge. He studied at the Art Students League and the Académie Julian . Today, they are very few and far between. Tempera mixed with gum arabic and alcohol on Renaissance Panel - Robert Riggs was a Gay Artist...

Baby caring a horse shoe on his shoulders reminiscent of the famous J. C. Leyendecker Baby covers for the Saturday Evening Post. This is a cover illustration/ painting for Collie...

An illustrator for Time, Life, Look, True, True West, Saturday Evening Post, Good Housekeeping, Readers Digest, and others, he also painted for adverti...

"Robert Riggs was awarded the Gold Medal for Excellence by the New York Art Directors Club for ten consecutive years and received many additional awards." He was elected to the Society of Illustrators' Hall of Fame. His work is in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Philadelphia Museum of Fine Arts and the U.S. Library of Congress. Riggs's compositons are "monumental" Walt Reed - work is unframed. - Riggs was a Gay Artist.

Archivally Matted to 17.75 x 16.75 inches Signed lower left

There is a reason why there are few contemporary painters who can paint a portrait this good. It's hard to do. It's easy to throw some paint or spray a mess of graffiti on canvas. ...

Tempera mixed with gum arabic and alcohol on Renaissance Panel "Robert Riggs was awarded the Gold Medal for Excellence by the New York Art Directors Club for ten consecutive years and received many additional awards." He was elected to the Society of Illustrators' Hall of Fame. His work is in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Philadelphia Museum of Fine Arts and the U.S. Library of Congress. Riggs's compositons are "monumental" Walt Reed Riggs was a Gay Artist...

Tempera mixed with gum arabic and alcohol on Renaissance Panel "Robert Riggs was awarded the Gold Medal for Excellence by the New York Art Directors Club for ten consecutive years and received many additional awards." He was elected to the Society of Illustrators' Hall of Fame. His work is in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Philadelphia Museum of Fine Arts and the U.S. Library of Congress. Riggs's compositons are "monumental" Walt Reed Riggs was a Gay Artist...

This work is meticulously and brilliantly rendered to capture not only the likeness of the sitter but spirit as well. The image is pushed to the forefront of the composition and s...

Meticulously rendered account of three prospectors trying to rustle up some water before they can dig up some gold. Magazine Illustration of the Old West, American West, Cowboys Casein on board, Western / Frontier Art...