20th Century Portrait Paintings

Pierre DE MARIA (1896-1984) Homme d'armes, 1968 Oil on painting Signed upper left Dated and titled on the back 25 x 20 cm tiny cracks, tiny paint jumps visible on photos ; frame in e...

Portrait of Woman in Red Dress - Figurative Study Watercolor and gouache figurative study of a woman in a red dress by Bay area artist (possi...

This portrait of a clown by Maurice Kish is part from a series of carnival figures, circus clowns and carousel horses and riders that he did in the 30s and 40s. The artist uses a vibrant color palette and controlled brushstrokes to depict the subject in a realistic way. The imagery of Maurice Kish (1895-1987), whether factories or carousels, reliably subverts expectations. His vision hovers just around the unraveling edge of things, where what is solid and clear becomes ambiguous. He is fascinated, often delighted, by the falling apart. This unexpected, fresh perspective results in oddly affecting pictures of a now long-gone New York. Born Moishe in a town called Dvinsk, Russia (what is now Daugavpils, Latvia), Kish came with his family to New York when he was in his teens. The family settled in Brownsville, and for the rest of Kish’s life Brooklyn remained his home, though he moved from one neighborhood to another. He was close to his parents, who recognized his talent and supported his desire to become an artist. Kish attended the National Academy of Design as well as Cooper Union. His fellow students included many other immigrants and children of immigrants who were particularly receptive to the Modernism coming from Europe. As his career progressed, Kish himself applied different strains of Modernism to different purposes. For him, the story was held above all else. For years, Kish used the skills he acquired in art school to earn his living at a Manhattan glass...

Beautiful Balanise Portrait of a girl with garlands of flowers in her hair by DULLAH (1919-1996). Dullah was an Indonesian artist who painted many portraits and is in all museums. ...

This superb Royal Academy exhibited portrait oil painting is by British artist James Cleaver ARCA. It was painted in 1937 and exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1939 entitled 'Carolin...

At work. 1950, oil on cardboard, 49x69 cm Socrealist artworks, women are sorting sprats Alfejs Bromults (1913.3.IV - 1991.11.I) His first professional education was at National Uni...

Who am I to be your secret lover? Figurative large format Landscape with figures in fairy-tale setting. Acrylic on canvas. Author: Igor Fomin. Measurements in centimeters: 195 x 195 cm. / In inches: 76.77 x 76.77" In this painting, Igor Fomin not only tells us the story of a couple who keep their love secret, he also tells us about that beautiful old place, a witness to their love affairs, and those neighbors, who should not find out and who make their lives. An entire city, with a splendid aqueduct in the background, through whose arches the view is lost. The set is endowed with a magnificent color and a complex structure, full of planes to stop at all those characters that fill the author's pictorial and literary imaginary. From the tow...

Hayley Lever was an Australian born artist who lived much of his life, as well as died, in Mt.Vernon, New York. His work as a painter, etcher, lecturer and art teacher strongly embra...

Medium: Oil Painting Signature: Unsigned Contact for dimensions.

A minimalist portrait of young Helen, gazing with intent to the left. Well-presented in a complimenting pale pink frame. Signed and titled verso. On canvas on stretchers.

Naturalistic painting of a pastoral farm life scene. The work features a central figure dressed in a hat with a basket slung across his hip as he is throwing seeds into a field. Poss...

49.5 x 35 cm Artwork unsigned - Christo 1955 Provenance Private collection, Bulgaria This artwork hasn't been exposed for 70 years. This portrait artwork had been awarded with the ...

A fine Russian School portrait from the mid 20th Century showing a handsome young man in military cadet attire. He has a shock of auburn hair sticking out f...

This painting is a beautiful example of Spanish luminist painting. It shows a boy returning from fishing for two lobsters on the Valencian beaches. The painting is reminiscent of Sor...

Jose Mitjans Pico (1904-1991). Portrait of a Young Woman Oil on canvas 20 x 16 in, 27 x 23 in (framed). Signed right margin.

On the bench 1970, cardboard, mixed media, 18.3x19.5 cm Atis Ievins (1946) The exhibition by artist Atis Ieviņš reminds the very origins of serigraphy technique in Latvian art in t...

Young boy by Max Band (1901-1974) Oil on canvas 81.2 x 54.4 cm (32 x 21³/₈ inches) Signed lower left Max Band Provenance Private collection, London

Reflecting the role that ancestor worship played in Chinese culture, this Qing-dynasty painting depicts several generations of family, dressed in intrica...

"The Embroidery Lesson" is a masterful representation of Gustave De Jonghe’s ability to capture the elegance and intimacy of domestic life. Through his sophisticated use of color, me...

Patrick Boudon. Inner Family. Post-war Expressionism. 1970s. Patrick Boudon. Art Informel. Ecole de Paris. Technique: oil on cardboard. This painting by Patrick Boudon from the 197...

Heinz-Otto Laub was born 1944 in Cologne (Germany), studied at the KA Munich under Mac Zimmermann and is actually working in Bonn. He is known in the first place for his surrealistic...

Female Portrait - Giacomo Moretti Oil on Canvas Painting signed lower right, Italy White lacquered wooden frame

A striking 20th Century oil showing a young couple engaged in a passionate and fiery flamenco. The man raises his hands in a dramatic clap and the young woman swirls her red skirts a...

Artist: David Stern Title: Portrait Year: 1997 Medium: Acrylic & Mixed Media on Paper, signed l.r. Size: 30 x 22 inches (76.2 x 55.88 cm)

This superb vibrant Orientalist Post Impressionist oil painting is by noted British artist Gerald Spencer Pryse. It was painted about 1925 when Pryse was visiting Morocco and Norther...

"Global Marine Oil Workers" Artist: Robert Lavin Medium: Oil on Canvas Size: 39" x 64" Framed In 1980, Charles Russel Luigs, CEO of Global Marine Inc. commissioned painter Robert La...

Long, Red-Haired Portrait of a Man - Acrylic on Paper in the style of Modigliani A bold contrasting portrait of a red-haired, topless man against a stark indigo background, by acclaimed bluegrass musician Katherine...

Artist: Jeno Gussich, Hungarian (1905 - ??) Title: Rabbi with a Fur Hat Medium: Oil on Canvas, signed lower right Size: 24 x 20 inches Frame Size: 30.5 x...

Richard Hayley Lever (1876-1958) Original portrait done on paper and mounted on cardboard. Signed on back of the cardboard by artist. Lever was born in Australia studied art in bo...

UBUs CHILDHOOD x3

Simka Simkhovitch (Russian/American 1893 - 1949) This came with a small grouping from the artist's family, some were hand signed some were not. These were studies for larger paintings. Simka Simkhovitch (Симха Файбусович Симхович) (aka Simka Faibusovich Simkhovich) (Novozybkov, Russia May 21, 1885 O.S./June 2, 1885 N.S.—Greenwich, Connecticut February 25, 1949) was a Ukrainian-Russian Jewish artist and immigrant to the United States. He painted theater scenery in his early career and then had several showings in galleries in New York City. Winning Works Progress Administration (WPA) commissions in the 1930s, he completed murals for the post offices in Jackson, Mississippi and Beaufort, North Carolina. His works are in the permanent collections of the Dallas Museum of Art, the National Museum of American Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Born outside Kyiv (Petrograd Ukraine) into a Jewish family who owned a small department store. During a severe case of measles when he was seven, Simcha Simchovitch sketched the views outside his window and decided to become an artist, over his father's objections. Beginning in 1905, he studied at the Grekov Odessa Art School and upon completion of his studies in 1911 received a recommendation to be admitted to the Imperial Academy of Arts. Though he enrolled to begin classes in architecture, painting, and sculpture at the Imperial Academy, he was dropped from the school roster in December because of the quota on the number of Jewish students and drafted into the army. Simchovitch served as a private in the 175th Infantry Regiment Baturyn [ru] until his demobilization in 1912. Re-enrolling in the Imperial Academy, he audited classes. Simka Simkhovitch exhibited paintings and sculptures in 1918 as part of an exhibition of Jewish artists and in 1919 placed 1st in the competition "The Great Russian Revolution" with a painting called "Russian Revolution" which was hung in the State Museum of Revolution. In 1922, Simkha Simkhovitch exhibited at the International Book Fair in Florence (Italian: Fiera Internazionale del Libro di Firenze). In 1924, Simkhovitch came to the United States to make illustrations for Soviet textbooks and decided to immigrate instead. Initially he supported himself by doing commercial art and a few portrait commissions. In 1927, he was hired to paint a screen for a scene in the play "The Command to Love" by Fritz Gottwald and Rudolph Lothar which was playing at the Longacre Theatre on Broadway. Art dealers began clamoring for the screen and Simkhovitch began a career as a screen painter for the theater. Catching the attention of the screenwriter, Ernest Pascal, he worked as an illustrator for Pascal, who then introduced him to gallery owner, Marie Sterner. Simkhovitch's works appeared at the Marie Sterner Gallery beginning with a 1927 exhibit and were repeated the following year. Simkhovitch had an exhibit in 1929 at Sterner's on circus paintings. In 1931, he held a showing of works at the Helen Hackett Gallery, in New York City and later that same year he was one of the featured artists of a special exhibit in San Francisco at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park. The exhibit was coordinated by Marie Sterner and included four watercolors, including one titled "Nudes". He is of the generation of Russian Soviet artists such as Isaac Pailes, Serge Charchoune, Marc Chagall, Chana Orloff, Isaac Ilyich Levitan, and Ossip Zadkine. In 1936, Simkhovitch was selected to complete the mural for the WPA Post office project in Jackson, Mississippi. The mural was hung in the post office and courthouse in 1938 depicted a plantation theme. Painted on the wall behind the judge’s bench, “Pursuits of Life in Mississippi”, a depiction of black workers engaged in manual labor amid scenes of white professionals and socialites, was eventually covered over in later years during renovations due to its stereotypical African American imagery. The following year, his painting "Holiday" won praise at an exhibition in Lincoln, Nebraska. In 1940, Simkhovitch's second WPA post office project was completed when four murals, "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat", "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright", "Sand Ponies" and "Canada Geese" were installed in Beaufort, North Carolina. The works were commissioned in 1938 and did not generate the controversy that the Jackson mural had. The main mural is "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright" and depicts a shipwreck which had occurred in Beaufort in 1866. "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat" depicted the lighthouse built in 1859 and the mail boat that was running mail during the time which Simkhovitch was there. The boat ran mail for the area until 1957. "Sand Ponies" shows the wild horses common to the North Carolina barrier islands and "Canada Geese" showed the importance of hunting and fishing in the area. All four murals were restored in the 1990s by Elisabeth Speight, daughter of two other WPA muralists, Francis Speight...

Everett Spruce (1908 - 2002) Austin Artist Image Size: 18 x 15 Frame Size: 28 x 25 Medium: Oil on paper / Mixed Exhibited at a University of Texas Faculty art show in 1947 Unsigned Biography Everett Spruce (1908 - 2002) The following, submitted by a researcher of the Ashworth Collection of Native American and Western Art, is from the artist's obituary in the Fort Smith, Arkansas "Times Record" newspaper, October 20, 2002. Everett F. Spruce, well-known artist, teacher, professor emeritus, died Friday, Oct. 18, 2002, at age 94. Everett Spruce was born on a farm in Conway to William E. and Fannie McCarty Spruce. He came to Dallas, at age 17, on a scholarship to study at the Dallas Art Institute, under Olin Travis and Thomas M. Stell Jr. In 1931, he became gallery assistant at the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts and in 1934 married Alice V. Kramer, a fellow art student. He was one of the "Dallas Nine" group of Southwest artists...

Modern abstract female nude painting in neutral tones. The work has Oris Robertson's signature textured surface that creates an uneven painting surface. ...

Some artists immediately stand out for the singularity of their work. While very little is known about the 20th-century French painter Santini Poncini,...

Mid Century Portrait of Raymond L. Hanson, Large-Scale Photo-Realist Figurative Refined and austere large-scale by W.S. Bylityplis (American/France, 19th-20th Century), dated 1963 with California crest. This photo-realistic portrait depicts the subject, Raymond L. Hanson, with impressive realistic detail. Signed and dated lower right corner. Unframed. Measures: 48"H x 36"W. About the artist: W.S. Bylityplis (American/France, 19th-20th Century), was an illustration and portrait artist during the 19th and early 20th century. About the subject: Portrait subject Raymond Hanson, was a lawyer whom establish the Hanson...

An original oil on canvas by Sir James Jebusa Shannon. The painting depicts Lady Ruthven in a stunning silk and lace dress. It dates to the Edwardian period and depicts a bold Britis...

"Unemployed" WPA American Scene Social Realism Mid 20th Century Modern William Gropper (1898 - 1977) Unemployed 20 x 16 inches Oil on canvas, 1937 Signed lower right Provenance: Estate of the artist Bio Throughout his life, William Gropper used his artistic talents to protest social injustice. Born in New York City, he grew up there in poverty and left high school to work as a dishwasher and delivery boy. He eventually began a career in art and was able to study with Robert Henri and George Bellows from 1912 to 1915. He adopted their realistic painting style, and his own work expressed sympathy for common laborers and outrage at society's ills. In 1919 Gropper established a reputation as a political cartoonist working for the New York Tribune. His blunt, forceful style attracted the attention of other publications, and he provided illustrations and cartoons for a variety of magazines, from the left-wing New Masses to mainstream Vanity Fair. Like many social realist artists of the 1930s, Gropper supported liberal political causes, depicting subjects such as the plight of migrant laborers and striking factory workers. In his first gallery exhibition in 1936 at ACA Galleries, Gropper's work was so well received by critics, collectors, and artists that the following year he had two one-man exhibitions at ACA Galleries. In 1937, Gropper traveled west on a Guggenheim Fellowship and visited the Dust Bowl and the Hoover and Grand Coulee Dams, sketching studies for a series of paintings and a mural he painted for the Department of the Interior. That same year he had paintings purchased by both the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art. Gropper exhibited at the 1939 New York World's Fair, Whitney Museum of American Art (1924-55), Art Institute of Chicago (1935-49), Carnegie International (1937-50), Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (1939-48), and National Academy of Design (1945-48). He was a founder of the Artists Equity Association and member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. From 1940 to 1945 William Gropper was preoccupied with anti-Nazi cartoons...

Artist: Robert Philipp, American (1895 - 1981) Title: Seated Girl Year: circa 1960 Medium: Oil on Canvas, signed l.r. Size: 22.5 in. x 18 in. (57.15 cm x 45.72 cm) Frame Size: 27 x 2...

A fine 20th Century oil depiction of a tired man leaning on a wooden staff. The artist has signed and dated to the lower right corner and the painting has been presented in a simple ...

Sheila Holland 1932-2002 Self Portrait Oil on canvas, signed lower right Image size: 30 x 22 inches This is a wonderfully dynamic self portrait by the female artist Shelia Holland. ...

Acrylic on canvas painting. Hand signed and titled on front by Theo Tobiasse. Frame size approx 33 x 41 inches. Artwork is in excellent condition. Certificate of authenticity incl...

The Artists Mother by Etienne Auguste Krier (French, 1875-1953) oil painting on board, framed framed: 11 x 15.5 inches board: 9 x 13 inches condition: very good provenance: private c...

Nicely painted mid century modernist interior portrait oil painting by Sadie Skoletsky Rosenblum 1899-1987. Great color and composition. Framed.

Portrait of a Shepherd dog, oil painting on canvas early 20th c. Extra info about the painting : Title: Portrait of a Shepherd dog Materials : oil on canvas Signature: bottom le...

signed on the lower left The painting can be categorised in the tradition of New Objectivity. The picture shows a real scene, the woman depicted stares into space with a serious and...

A delightful oil study depicting a young woman in fashionable 19th century dress waiting for a carriage on the verge of a country road. The style shows inspiration from impressionist...

Louise H. "Louie" Burrell (née Luker 1873 – 1971) was an English-born artist who also lived in Canada and the United States. The daughter of William and Ada Luker, both artists, Bur...

This captivating post-Impressionist portrait is by American artist David L Swasey circa 1953. The painting depicts a seated woman, turning to look at the artist with stunning blue ey...

Summer in La Baule 12 - Sunny Indifference Scene: Women enjoying sunbathing in La Baule ⭐Figures⭐: Each of the four women is uniquely styled, showcasing a mix of retro and modern ...

Mid 20th Century Oil Portrait of a Fashionable Young Woman by Barrow c.1970 Bright, bold and colorful painting - Classic vintage oil portrait Or...

Artist: Andre Gisson (1921-2003) Title: Young Girl in Summer Year: circa 1973 Medium: Oil on Canvas Size: 9 x 12 inches Condition: Excellent Inscription: Signed, recto ANDRE GISSON ...

Louis Icart Portrait de Fanny Icart Excellent Condition Original oil painting on canvas Hand-signed in paint in the lower right by Icart 1935 31 1/2 X 39 inches Framed in an antique ...

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...

The Artists Model French Impressionist, circa 1900's oil on canvas, unframed indistinctly signed with initials to the corner canvas: 51.5 x 35.5 inches Provenance: private collection...

Pierre GARCIA FONS Fauvism : Dreaming Model , c. 1965 Original oil painting Signed upper right corner Signed and titled on the back On canvas 50 x 61 cm (c. 20 x 24 inch) PROVENAN...

This charming oil painting is by British female artist Agnes L Reid. Painted circa 1920 the painting is of a little boy playing on the floor with his train set, with balloons and a b...

Illustration celebrating important women throughout history, published in McCall's magazine, May 1959. This large canvas by Stanley Meltzoff presents a compelling tribute to influen...

Signed center right, 'Ketcham' for Hank Ketcham (American, 1920-2001) and dated 1990. Hank Ketcham, the creator of Dennis the Menace, was born in Seattle...