Ernest Fiene

NYC Cityscape American Scene WPA Modern Realism Mid 20th Century Architectural

1930

"6th Avenue El" American Scene Social Realism Mid-20th Century New York City Ernest Fiene (1894-1965) "6th Avenue El" 12 1/4 x 14 1/4 Oil on canvas board, c. 1940s Signed lower righ...

Cityscape Mid-20th Century Modern Social Realism American Scene Regionalism WPA Samuel Thal (1903 to 1964) "Cityscene" 12 x 16 inches Oil on board, c. 1940s Signed verso Framed: 19...

Herman Rose (1909 - 2007) Manhattan Looking East (View from Midtown), 1952-54 Oil on canvas 26 x 28 inches Signed lower right Fairfield Porter wrote an essay in ArtNews on this exact painting in 1955. Please inquire for a copy of the article. Literature: Fairfield Porter, "Herman Rose Paints a Picture," ArtNews, April 1955 Volume 54, Number 2, illustrated. Herman Rose was best known for his depictions of cityscapes of New York City. Herman Rappaport was born in Brooklyn, New York. in 1909. Herman Rose was the professional pseudonym of Herman Rappaport. Originally trained as a draftsman and studied at the National Academy of Design from 1927 to 1929, he was later employed by the Works Progress Administration's Murals Division under Arshile Gorky from 1934 until 1939. In 1939, after experimenting with a variety of contemporary expressionistic styles, Rose decided to paint from life. Working mostly in East New York and East Canarsie in Brooklyn, and in Manhattan, Rose began to paint roof tops and street scenes. Rappaport began using the name Herman Rose when he held his first solo art exhibition in 1946 at the Charles Egan Gallery in New York City. Although he initially began as an Expressionistic painter, he became known for small, light-filled Impressionist paintings of still life, cityscapes and skies by the early 1950s. His paintings and images were often composed of very small dabs of paint and tiny, blurry "squares," which combined to create the image on canvas, his favorite medium. Often described as a "lyrical painter" Rose's work "interpreted traditional subjects: landscape, still life and the figure like the Post-Impressionists from whom he developed his own style, Rose built up forms from distinct touches of color that don't entirely blend in the viewer's eye. This gives his surfaces an active quality that flattens forms, one of the great lessons of modernism." Herman Rose's work received official recognition when Ms. Dorothy Miller of Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) included his work in an exhibition called, "15 Americans," alongside work by Clyfford Still, Mark Rothko and Jackson Pollock. New York Times art critic Hilton Kramer wrote of Rose's work in 1981, "{he} must surely be counted among the most beautiful works anyone has produced in this challenging medium for many years." The Art in America art critic Lawrence Campbell...

Howard Cook, 'Financial District', lithograph, 1931, edition 75, Duffy 155. A fine, richly-inked impression, on cream wove paper, the full sheet with wide margins (2 3/4 to 5 5/8 inches), in excellent condition. Image size 13 5/16 x 10 3/8 inches (338 x 264 mm); sheet size 23 x 16 inches (584 x 406 mm). Matted to museum standards, unframed. Literature: 'American Master Prints from the Betty and Douglas Duffy Collection', the Trust for Museum Exhibitions, Washington, D.C., 1987. Collections: Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Library of Congress, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Smithsonian American Art Museum. ABOUT THE ARTIST Howard Norton Cook (1901-1980) was one of the best-known of the second generation of artists who moved to Taos. A native of Massachusetts, he studied at the Art Students League in New York City and at the Woodstock Art Colony. Beginning his association with Taos in 1926, he became a resident of the community in the 1930s. During his career, he received two Guggenheim Fellowships and was elected an Academician in the National Academy of Design. He earned a national reputation as a painter, muralist, and printmaker. Cook’s work in the print mediums received acclaim early in his career with one-person exhibitions at the Denver Art Museum (1927) and the Museum of New Mexico (1928). He received numerous honors and awards over the years, including selection in best-of-the-year exhibitions sponsored by the American Institute of Graphics Arts, the Brooklyn Museum, the Society of American Etchers, and the Philadelphia Print Club. His first Guggenheim Fellowship took him to Taxco, Mexico in 1932 and 1933; his second in the following year enabled him to travel through the American South and Southwest. Cook painted murals for the Public Works of Art Project in 1933 and the Treasury Departments Art Program in 1935. The latter project, completed in Pittsburgh, received a Gold Medal from the Architectural League of New York. One of his most acclaimed commissions was a mural in the San Antonio Post Office in 1937. He and Barbara Latham settled in Talpa, south of Taos, in 1938 and remained there for over three decades. Cook volunteered in World War II as an Artist War Correspondent for the US Navy, where he was deployed in the Pacific. In 1943 he was appointed Leader of a War Art Unit...