Préfète Duffaut

Jacmel Harbor

1956

This is a Post-Post-Impressionist, Post-Expressionist, Post- Fauve depiction of a West African landscape by an African American artist. It is characterized by flat pattens of bold co...

Wonderful Fauve Landscape with blocky areas of punchy bold reds and yellows. This was done the same year of the Armory Show in which both William Zor...

A young man at a crowded upper-class Haitian swimming pool attracts attention. We see him only from the back in a Magritte-like pose. The transfixed expressions of some of the nubile bare-breasted bathing beauties and one man with his hands down his pants give us a clue that the mystery man is special. This is a fascinating work packed with drama and overflowing with pent-up emotion.
Bigaud's narrative is as complex as his figural composition of lookers and swimmers. Notice the sight lines of the lookers go back to front while the two swimmers go from left to right. The twenty-two figures are contained in the rectangular shape of the pool, which is pushed to the front of the picture plane. The cars of the pool partygoers are seen in the background with one witness. He is fully clothed and is most likely a chauffeur. The fully clothed female at the pool offering food is a servant. A boxy-looking radio with a pack of cigarettes and the style of the cars give glue to the date. Most Haitian art depicts average working people. The pool party departs from that tradition and shows life of the Haitian upper class. Most likely, this was painted in Petion-Ville. The higher the elevation in Port-au-Prince the more wealthy the homes. Although the artist's painting technique may be described as naive or lacking polish.
 t's one of the reasons why the work radiates charm and interest. The painting is oversized with huge dimensions of 55 x 48 and will be a statement in any room. Wilson Bigaud is considered to be a Haitian master. The condition is good. Three repaired one-inch issues on the extreme center and upper right edge. Visible only on close inspection. Otherwise presents very well and is elegantly framed, ______________________________________ Haitian master Wilson Bigaud is renowned for works portraying everyday life and rites of passage—vodou rituals, fortune-tellers, weddings, cockfights, and carnivals—with voluminous figures and lucid colors. Born in Port-au-Prince, in 1946 Bigaud was among the first to attend DeWitt Peters’s Le Centre d’Art d’Haïti, where he studied with Hector Hyppolite...

When it comes to abstract painting, the creation date is important. At the height of Abstraction Expressionism, overlooked Academic Artist John Atherton created a wonderfully complex painting that embodies many of the characteristics of what was going on in Mid-Century American Art. The work is simultaneously abstract as it is representational. Like a Bento Box, it's divided into sections by dividers. On close inspection, each section stands on it's own as a beautiful mini-painting yet coalesces as part of the whole. From a distance, it is eye-pleasing, but as the view gets closer and closer, new structures and details gloriously reveal themselves. This is an important painting and not unlike the work of Joaquín Torres-García. It was done in the last year of the artist's life. Signed lower right. Canvas is relined. Framed size: 30 x 41.25. The work is best viewed with top gallery lights to bring out color. Color will look different under different lighting conditions. Atherton exhibited at the famous Julien Levy Gallery in New York and his fine art is mainly associated with Magic Realism. He participated in the seminal 1943 Museum of Modern Art exhibition, American Realists and Magic Realists. The Museum of Modern Art has 4 Atherton paintings in its collection. As an Illustrator, Atherton did covers for the Saturday Evening Post, Fortune and Holiday Magazine...

Prefate Duffaut (1923-2012) Haitian Folk Art painting. Oil on canvas, circa 1960. Signed lower right. Measures: 23 1/2" H x 19 1/2" W. Frame: 25" H x 21" W. Excellent condition. Tit...

At its height in 1950s Haiti, the Naïve art movement drew upon scenes from daily life such as this rural landscape that somehow manages to make backbreaking farm labor upbeat. The vi...

'The Bay of Fort-de-France, Martinique', oil on canvas, by Robert Humblot (1959). A delightfully panoramic view of one of the most beautiful bays in the...

Haitian artist Jacksin Mésidor painted this from his Caribbean coastal hometown of Cap-Haitien in the north of his native land. As Haitian folk art, the painting delivers an archityp...