1930s Art
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Period: 1930s
"Beached"
Located in Lambertville, NJ
Jim’s of Lambertville is proud to offer this artwork by:
John R. Grabach (1886 - 1981)
John Grabach was a highly regarded New Jersey artist, teacher, and author of the classic text...
Category
American Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Anthony Thieme Mackerel Fleet
Located in Dallas, TX
Anthony Thieme, Netherlands (1888-1954).
Titled: 'Mackerel Fleet' oil on canvas, Circa 1930
Signed lower right A, Thieme and on verso Anthony Thieme / 1803B Mackerel Fleet.
Mounted ...
Category
Aesthetic Movement 1930s Art
Materials
Paint
1930's Wintry American Modernist Flat Iron NYC street scene
Located in New York, NY
New York City Wintry Street Scene of the Flat Iron Building from the 1930's by Margit De Corini (1897-1982). Oil on Canvas. Signed lower right. D...
Category
American Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil
Whimsical Fishing Illustration Cartoon 1938 Mt Tremblant Ski Lodge William Steig
Located in Surfside, FL
Lighthearted Illustration of Outdoor Pursuits This one of a fisherman signed "W. Steig"
Provenance: from Mrs. Joseph B. Ryan, Commissioned by Joe Ryan for the bar at his ski resort, Mount Tremblant Lodge, in 1938.
Mont Tremblant, P.Q., Canada
Watercolor and ink on illustration board, sights sizes 8 1/2 x 16 1/2 in., framed.
In 1938 Joe Ryan, described as a millionaire from Philadelphia, bushwhacked his way to the summit of Mont Tremblant and was inspired to create a world class ski resort at the site. In 1939 he opened the Mont Tremblant Lodge, which remains part of the Pedestrian Village today. This original illustration is on Whatman Illustration board. the board measures 14 X 22 inches. label from McClees Galleries, Philadelphia, on the frame backing paper.
William Steig, 1907 – 2003 was an American cartoonist, sculptor, and, in his later life, an illustrator and writer of children's books. Best known for the picture books Sylvester and the Magic Pebble, Abel's Island, and Doctor De Soto, he was also the creator of Shrek!, which inspired the film series of the same name. He was the U.S. nominee for both of the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Awards, as a children's book illustrator in 1982 and a writer in 1988.
Steig was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1907, and grew up in the Bronx. His parents were Polish-Jewish immigrants from Austria, both socialists. His father, Joseph Steig, was a house painter, and his mother, Laura Ebel Steig, was a seamstress who encouraged his artistic leanings. As a child, he dabbled in painting and was an avid reader of literature. Among other works, he was said to have been especially fascinated by Pinocchio.He graduated from Townsend Harris High School at 15 but never completed college, though he attended three, spending two years at City College of New York, three years at the National Academy of Design and a mere five days at the Yale School of Fine Arts before dropping out of each.
Hailed as the "King of Cartoons" Steig began drawing illustrations and cartoons for The New Yorker in 1930, producing more than 2,600 drawings and 117 covers for the magazine. Steig, later, when he was 61, began writing children's books. In 1968, he wrote his first children's book. He excelled here as well, and his third book, Sylvester and the Magic Pebble (1969), won the Caldecott Medal. He went on to write more than 30 children's books, including the Doctor DeSoto series, and he continued to write into his nineties. Among his other well-known works, the picture book Shrek! (1990) formed the basis for the DreamWorks Animation film Shrek (2001). After the release of Shrek 2 in 2004, Steig became the first sole-creator of an animated movie franchise that went on to generate over $1 billion from theatrical and ancillary markets after only one sequel. Along with Maurice Sendak, Saul Steinberg, Ludwig Bemelmans and Laurent de Brunhofff his is one of those rare cartoonist whose works form part of our collective cultural heritage.
In 1984, Steig's film adaptation of Doctor DeSoto directed by Michael Sporn was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. As one of the most admired cartoonists of all time, Steig spent seven decades drawing for the New Yorker magazine. He touched generations of readers with his tongue–in–cheek pen–and–ink drawings, which often expressed states of mind like shame, embarrassment or anger. Later in life, Steig turned to children's books, working as both a writer and illustrator.
Steig's children's books were also wildly popular because of the crazy, complicated language he used—words like lunatic, palsied, sequestration, and cleave. Kids love the sound of those words even if they do not quite understand the meaning. Steig's descriptions were also clever. He once described a beached whale as "breaded with sand."
Throughout the course of his career, Steig compiled his cartoons and drawings into books. Some of them were published first in the New Yorker. Others were deemed too dark to be printed there. Most of these collections centered on the cold, dark psychoanalytical truth about relationships. They featured husbands and wives fighting and parents snapping at their kids. His first adult book, Man About Town, was published in 1932, followed by About People, published in 1939, which focused on social outsiders. Sick of Each Other, published in 2000, included a drawing depicting a wife holding her husband at gunpoint, saying, "Say you adore me."
According to the Los Angeles Times, fellow New Yorker artist...
Category
American Modern 1930s Art
Materials
India Ink, Watercolor, Illustration Board
Jean Harlow
Located in Chatsworth, CA
This piece is an original vintage photograph from the original negative, shot by Clarence Sinclair Bull in 1936. This piece depicts Jean Harlow, who was a...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Photographic Paper
Bread Bakers oil painting by John Barber
By John Barber
Located in Hudson, NY
Measures 22" x 18" and framed 27" x 24" x 3".
About this artist:
Born in Galatz, Romania, John Barber became a modernist painter of figures and scenes of...
Category
Cubist 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Jean Cocteau - White Book - Original Handcolored Lithograph
By Jean Cocteau
Located in Collonge Bellerive, Geneve, CH
Jean Cocteau
White Book - Autobiography about Cocteau's discovery of his homosexuality. The book was first published anonymously and created a scandal.
Original Handcolored Lithograp...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
"Maine Coast, Ogunquit, " Ernest Albert, American Impressionism, Seascape
Located in New York, NY
Ernest Albert (1857 - 1946)
Maine Coast, Ogunquit, 1937
Oil on canvasboard
18 x 20 inches
Signed and dated lower right; titled on a label on the reverse
A distinguished theatrical and scenic designer who also became a landscape painter and muralist, Ernest Albert worked in New York, St. Louis, and Chicago.
He was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1857, and showing early talent, received the Graham Art...
Category
American Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Board
THE CLINIC
By Peggy Bacon
Located in Portland, ME
Bacon, Peggy. THE CLINIC. Flint 109. Drypoint, 1932. Edition size not known, but likely very small as the print is rare. 4 15/16 x 6 7/8 inches, plus wide margins (the sheet is 11 x ...
Category
American Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Drypoint
Boatyard
Located in Buffalo, NY
An original oil on board by American artist Julius Richter.
Julius Richter, was a physician, surgeon and educator. He was born Dec. 19,1876, in Alleghany, Pennsylvania. He was educ...
Category
Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Board
"Corse", 1931, Oil on Canvas, Kamesuke Hiraga
Located in Long Island City, NY
Artist: Kamesuke Hiraga, Japanese (1889 - 1971)
Title: Corse
Year: 1931
Medium: Oil on Canvas, signed, titled and dated l.l.
Size: 25 x 21 in. (63.5 x 53.34 cm)
Frame Size: 33.5 x 29...
Category
Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil
Abstract Cubist Construction Collage Mid 20th Century American Modernism Cubism
Located in New York, NY
Abstract Cubist Construction Collage Mid 20th Century American Modernism Cubism
Vaclav Vytacil (1892 - 1984)
Abstract Construction #2
Caesin on board collage
11 x 13 1/2 th inches
S...
Category
Abstract 1930s Art
Materials
Casein, Board
Woman in Blue Hat
Located in Boston, MA
Signed lower right: "S. Simkhovitch". Estate stamp on backing board verso.
Category
Realist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Board
Red Rocks Park 1930s Oil Painting – Snow-Capped Mountain Landscape Artwork
Located in Denver, CO
"Red Rocks Park" – an original circa 1935 oil painting by noted Denver artist Eula Ray, capturing a serene winter landscape of the iconic Red Rocks of Colorado. Rendered in oil on bo...
Category
American Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil
Farm in the Woods
Located in New York, NY
Werner Drewes (1899-1983), Farm in the Woods, woodcut, 1933, signed and dated in pencil lower right (also numbered 1-xxx and titled lower left). Reference: Rose 83. In very good cond...
Category
American Realist 1930s Art
Materials
Woodcut
Louis Osman FRIBA Lincoln Cathedral architectural ink sketches 1960 Bishop Choir
By Louis Osman
Located in London, GB
As Goldsmith Osman designed the Crown for the Investiture of the Prince of Wales in 1969, and as architect he commissioned Jacob Epstein's chef d'oeuvre, the Madonna and Child on the...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Ink, Pen, Watercolor
Vintage American School Abstract Expressionist Artist Studio Modern Oil Painting
Located in Buffalo, NY
Vintage American modernist abstract interior painting. Oil on canvas, circa 1930. No signature found. Image size, 20L x 16H. Framing available.
Category
Abstract 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Original 1930's French Vintage Jazz Poster Featuring a Drummer by James Rassiat
Located in Boca Raton, FL
In this charming image we see a drummer happily playing what appears to be a modern looking set of drums. The poster was created in the 1930’s by an unknown artist Rassiat. The poste...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
Greenwich Village NYC WPA Mid 20th Century American Scene Ashcan Modern Realism
Located in New York, NY
Greenwich Village NYC WPA Mid 20th Century American Scene Ashcan Modern Realism
Alfred Mira (1900-1981)
Greenwich Village NYC
14 x 17 inches
Oil on board,...
Category
American Realist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Board
"Solebury Spring"
Located in Lambertville, NJ
Jim's of Lambertville Fine Art Gallery is proud to present this piece by John Fulton Folinsbee (1892 - 1972).
One of the finest painters to embark upon the New Hope Art Colony, John...
Category
American Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
"The Narrows"
Located in Lambertville, NJ
Jim’s of Lambertville Fine Art Gallery is proud to present this piece by Walter Emerson Baum (1884 - 1956).
Born in Sellersville, Pennsylvania, Walter Baum was one of the only membe...
Category
American Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Exclusive & Attractive 1930s poster design - George M Hammer furniture London
Located in London, GB
One of a series of designs we have listed for Geo. M Hammer. To see them - and our other architectural and design-related drawings, scroll down to "More from this Seller" and below it click on "See all from this Seller" and then search.
Douglas L Hadden (British, 20th century)
Design for Poster/Showcard 'Attractive & Exclusive'
32x24cm
Pen and ink c. 1930
Hadden was a senior designer for Geo M Hammer, designers and retailers of school and ecclesiastical furniture...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Watercolor
Original Vintage Cherry Maurice Chevalier Poster by Roger de Valerio c1930
Located in Boca Raton, FL
Maurice Chevalier, French superstar of theatre, film, and stage, is also the star of this charming 1930s poster. The cherry flavored extra-dry brandy is dwarfed by Chevalier's charm ...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
"New York Harbor Nocturne" Leon Dolice, Mid-Century New York Nocturnal Landscape
By Leon Dolice
Located in New York, NY
Leon Dolice
New York Harbor Nocturne
Signed lower right
Pastel on paper
12 x 19 inches
The romantic backdrop of Vienna at the turn of the century had a life-long influence upon the...
Category
American Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Paper, Pastel
SUBWAY - THREE PEOPLE
Located in Portland, ME
Marsh, Reginald. SUBWAY - THREE PEOPLE. S. 149. Etching, 1934. 9 x 7 inches; 228 x 178 mm. Numbered "10b," and signed in pencil "Reginald Marsh (F.M.)" b...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Etching
Romantic Couple In Wartime Paris on Rainy Parisian Night
Located in Miami, FL
The technique and subject matter work well together in this loosely but masterfully rendered World War 1 romantic illustration of a Soldier and a Parisian woman. Even though this wo...
Category
Romantic 1930s Art
Materials
Ink, Watercolor, Pencil
George Hurrell, "Robert Taylor", original photograph from original negative
Located in Chatsworth, CA
An original photograph from the original negative shot by George Hurrell in 1936 and printed at a later date. It depicts the late iconic actor, Robert Taylor...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Photographic Paper
Composition, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Marie Laurencin
Located in Auburn Hills, MI
Lithograph in colors on vélin de Rives BFK à la forme paper. Paper Size: 9.84 x 11.81 inches. Inscription: Signed in the plate and unnumbered, as issued. Notes: From the album, Alice...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
1930s Surrealist Still Life with Hammer, Palette and Chopper by Jan Matulka
By Jan Matulka
Located in Chicago, IL
A 1930s graphite on pencil drawing of Surrealist still life of an egg beater by notable artist Jan Matulka. Artwork size: 8 1/2". x 11". Matted size: 14...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Paper, Graphite
Whimsical Illustration "Snow" Cartoon, 1938 Mt Tremblant Ski Lodge William Steig
Located in Surfside, FL
Lighthearted Illustration of Outdoor Pursuits This one being cross country Snow Shoes signed "W. Steig"
Provenance: from Mrs. Joseph B. Ryan, Commissioned by ...
Category
American Modern 1930s Art
Materials
India Ink, Watercolor, Illustration Board
Early 20th Century California Industrial Scene Landscape
By Erle Loran
Located in Soquel, CA
Vibrant California modernist industrial landscape by Erle Loran (American, 1905-1999). Signed and dated lower left "Erle Loran '37." Presented in a gilt wood frame, with faux suede liner, giltwood fillet and off white archival mat. Image, 15”H x 19”L.
Erle Loran was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He studied at the Minneapolis School of Art under the direction of Cameron Booth...
Category
American Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Watercolor, Gouache, Archival Paper
untitled (Fishing Boats, Normandy)
Located in Fairlawn, OH
untitled (Fishing Boats, Normandy)
Soft Ground Etching, 1930
Signed and dated in pencil by the artist
Sealed by the artist
Annotated "Paris"
Possibly a view of a fishing port in Norm...
Category
French School 1930s Art
Materials
Etching
'Hungry Elephant' Limited Edition Photographic Print by Getty, 20x30
Located in San Rafael, CA
An elephant named Mae West accepts an apple from a passing tram driver while taking her morning exercise along Gray's Inn Road, London, 16th December 1936. Mae is helping to publicis...
Category
Contemporary 1930s Art
Materials
Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin
Antique American School Large Cubist Abstract Signed Original Oil Painting
Located in Buffalo, NY
Antique American school cubist abstract oil painting. Oil on canvas. Signed.
Category
Cubist 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Claude Muncaster (1903-1974) RWS, ROI, RBA. Chap Wells, Cumbria oil c1936
Located in Frome, Somerset
Claude Muncaster ( 1903-1974) PRSMA, RWS, ROI, RBA British. Chap Wells and Chap Fell, Cumbria (The Lake District). Oil on board circa 1936. Signed , and old London...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Oil
Gilbert Ledward - 1930s Watercolour Design for a Decorative Sculptural Frieze
Located in London, GB
GILBERT LEDWARD, RA, PRBS
(1888-1960)
Tennis, Golf, Shooting, Ice-Skating, Dreaming – Proposed Design for Decorative Frieze in the Italian Drawing Room at Eltham Palace, commissioned by Stephen Courtauld
Signed and dated July 9th 1933
Watercolour and pencil
12.5 by 49.5 cm., 5 by 19 ½ in.
(frame size 36 by 67 cm., 14 ¼ by 26 ¼ in.)
Exhibited:
The artist’s daughter;
London, The Fine Art Society, A Centenary Tribute, Feb 1988, no. 43.
Gilbert Ledward was born in London. He was educated at St Mark’s College, Chelsea. In 1905 he entered the Royal College of Art to study sculpture under Edouard Lanteri and in 1910 he entered the Royal Academy Schools. In 1913 he won the Prix de Rome for sculpture, the Royal Academy’s travelling award and gold medal, which allowed him to travel in Italy until the outbreak of the Wold War I. During the war he served as a lieutenant in the Royal Garrison Artillery and was appointed as an official war artist in 1918.
Following the war he was largely occupied as a sculptor of war memorials including the Guards Division memorial in St James’s Park and the Household Division’s memorial in Horse Guards Parade. In 1934, supported by Eric Gill and Edwin Lutyens, he established a company called Sculptured Memorials and Headstones, which promoted better design of memorials in English churchyards. His war memorials after World War II include one in Westminster Abbey to the Submarine Service, Commandos and Airborne Forces.
Ledward was Professor of Sculpture at the Royal College of Art (1927-1929) and in 1937 was elected at Royal Academician. He became President of the Royal Society of British Sculptors and a trustee of the Royal Academy.
The present work is a design for an intended decorative frieze for the Italian Drawing Room of Eltham Palace. In 1935 the remains of the medieval royal palace of Eltham was rescued from decay by Stephen and Virginia Courtald who built an ultra modern Art Deco house to adjoin the existing Great Hall. They employed the architects John Seeley and Paul Edward Paget and the fashionable Mayfair interior designer the Marchese Peter Malacrida to design the strikingly glamorous 1930s interiors of the new house. The dramatic entrance hall was created by the Swedish designer Rolf Engstromer...
Category
Art Deco 1930s Art
Materials
Watercolor
Nu (Nude) by Moïse Kisling - Oil painting
Located in London, GB
*PLEASE NOTE UK BUYERS WILL ONLY PAY 5% VAT ON THIS PURCHASE.
Nu (Nude) by Moïse Kisling (1891-1953)
Oil and crayon on canvas
22 x 16 cm (8 ⁵/₈ x 6 ¹/₄ inches)
Signed lower right, K...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Crayon, Oil
Homage to the Spanish Republic 1938 oil painting by Julio De Diego
Located in Hudson, NY
An early work by Julio De Diego embodies the deep love he had for his homeland of Spain, combined with his strong emotions against war. The peacefulness of the couple holding hands l...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Masonite, Oil
Frida with Granizo - Black and White Portrait, Frida Kahlo, Celebrity, Animal
Located in Denton, TX
Frida with Granizo by Nickolas Muray is a black and white portrait of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo with her pet fawn, Granizo. Frida crouches down to place her hand on the small deer ...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Platinum
Art Deco nude young woman in mirror Modernist portrait
Located in Wilton Manors, FL
Laura M. GREENWOOD (1897-1951).
Nude Woman with Tropical Plant Interior, ca. 1930's
Oil on artist panel, 16 x 20 inches.
Signed lower right. Would benefit from a cleaning. Origi...
Category
Art Deco 1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Board
"Shattered" WPA Mid 20th Century Modernism American Scene Surrealism Figurative
By Leon Bibel
Located in New York, NY
"Shattered" WPA Mid 20th Century Modernism American Scene Surrealism Figurative
Estate stamp on the stretcher, verso. Provenance: Estate of the artist. 20 x 24 inches.
BIO
Leon Bibel continued painting through 1941 and resumed work in both painting and especially wood sculpture by 1960. He worked until his very last day in 1995. His last series of large wood sculptures were modeled on spice boxes, which were miniature buildings...
Category
American Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Miss Carolyn Edmunson
By Leon Kroll
Located in Miami, FL
The art world today does not value traditional academic skills in portrait painting. If it did, this portrait would replace the childlike student-level art that is now achieving two...
Category
Academic 1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Canvas
"Les Roulottes", 20th Century Oil on Wood Panel by Spanish Artist Celso Lagar
By Celso Lagar
Located in Madrid, ES
CELSO LAGAR
Spanish, 1891 - 1966
LES ROULOTTES
signed "Lagar" (lower left)
oil on wood panel
9-1/2 x 13 inches (24 x 33 cm.)
framed: 17-1/8 x 21-1/2 inches (43.5 x 54.5 cm.)
PROVEN...
Category
Fauvist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Wood Panel
The Flowers - Lithograph by Umberto Brunelleschi - 1930s
Located in Roma, IT
The Flowers is a color lithograph on ivory paper, created by the Italian artist Umberto Brunelleschi (Montemurlo 1879- Paris 1949).
Illustration for “Tales and Short Stories” by La ...
Category
Art Nouveau 1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
Portrait of Fanny Icart- Original grand oil on canvas
By Louis Icart
Located in Philadelphia, PA
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 ...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Canvas
'Hungry Elephant' Limited Edition Photographic Print by Getty, 20x16
Located in San Rafael, CA
An elephant named Mae West accepts an apple from a passing tram driver while taking her morning exercise along Gray's Inn Road, London, 16th December 1936. Mae is helping to publicis...
Category
Contemporary 1930s Art
Materials
Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin
Goethe / - Goethe's Will -
Located in Berlin, DE
Hans Harders (1875 Mörel - 1955 Berlin), Goethe (bookend). Patinated brass mounted on a wooden base, 15 x 12 x 6 cm (depiction), 17 x 14.5 x 7 cm (with ba...
Category
Art Deco 1930s Art
Materials
Brass
Never Ending Nicht Endend - Bauhaus German
By Paul Klee
Located in London, GB
This etching is hand signed in pencil by the artist "Klee" at the lower right margin.
It is dated in pencil ‘1930’ in the lower left margin.
It is also inscribed ‘K 10’ in pencil ne...
Category
Bauhaus 1930s Art
Materials
Etching
Eileen Lake
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Eileen Lake
Crayon on paper, early1930's
Initialed in pencil lower right (see photo)
Titled and annotated verso "Eileen Lake, early 1930s girlfriend"
Note: Eileen Hall Lake was an American poet and Adolf Dehn's girlfriend in the early 1930s.
Provenance:
Estate of the artist
By descent
Adolf Dehn, American Watercolorist and Printmaker, 1895-1968
Adolf Dehn was an artist who achieved extraordinary artistic heights, but in a very particular artistic sphere—not so much in oil painting as in watercolor and lithography. Long recognized as a master by serious print collectors, he is gradually gaining recognition as a notable and influential figure in the overall history of American art.
In the 19th century, with the invention of the rotary press, which made possible enormous print runs, and the development of the popular, mass-market magazines, newspaper and magazine illustration developed into an artistic realm of its own, often surprisingly divorced from the world of museums and art exhibitions, and today remains surprisingly overlooked by most art historians. Dehn in many regards was an outgrowth of this world, although in an unusual way, since as a young man he produced most of his illustrative work not for popular magazines, such as The Saturday Evening Post, but rather for radical journals, such as The Masses or The Liberator, or artistic “little magazines” such as The Dial. This background established the foundation of his outlook, and led later to his unique and distinctive contribution to American graphic art.
If there’s a distinctive quality to his work, it was his skill in introducing unusual tonal and textural effects into his work, particularly in printmaking but also in watercolor. Jackson Pollock seems to have been one of many notable artists who were influenced by his techniques.
Early Years, 1895-1922
For an artist largely remembered for scenes of Vienna and Paris, Adolf Dehn’s background was a surprising one. Born in Waterville, Minnesota, on November 22, 1895, Dehn was the descendent of farmers who had emigrated from Germany and homesteaded in the region, initially in a one-room log cabin with a dirt floor. Adolf’s father, Arthur Clark Dehn, was a hunter and trapper who took pride that he had no boss but himself, and who had little use for art. Indeed, during Adolf’s boyhood the walls of his bedroom and the space under his bed were filled with the pelts of mink, muskrats and skunks that his father had killed, skinned and stretched on drying boards. It was Adolf’s mother, Emilie Haas Dehn, a faithful member of the German Lutheran Evangelical Church, who encouraged his interest in art, which became apparent early in childhood. Both parents were ardent socialists, and supporters of Eugene Debs. In many ways Dehn’s later artistic achievement was clearly a reaction against the grinding rural poverty of his childhood.
After graduating from high school in 1914 at the age of 19—an age not unusual in farming communities at the time, where school attendance was often irregular—Dehn attended the Minneapolis School of Art from 1914 to 1917, whose character followed strongly reflected that of its director, Munich-trained Robert Kohler, an artistic conservative but a social radical. There Dehn joined a group of students who went on to nationally significant careers, including Wanda Gag (later author of best-selling children’s books); John Flanagan (a sculptor notable for his use of direct carving) Harry Gottlieb (a notable social realist and member of the Woodstock Art Colony), Elizabeth Olds (a printmaker and administrator for the WPA), Arnold Blanch (landscape, still-life and figure painter, and member of the Woodstock group), Lucille Lunquist, later Lucille Blanch (also a gifted painter and founder of the Woodstock art colony), and Johan Egilrud (who stayed in Minneapolis and became a journalist and poet).
Adolf became particularly close to Wanda Gag (1893-1946), with whom he established an intense but platonic relationship. Two years older than he, Gag was the daughter of a Bohemian artist and decorator, Anton Gag, who had died in 1908. After her husband died, Wanda’s mother, Lizzi Gag, became a helpless invalid, so Wanda was entrusted with the task of raising and financially supporting her six younger siblings. This endowed her with toughness and an independent streak, but nonetheless, when she met Dehn, Wanda was Victorian and conventional in her artistic taste and social values. Dehn was more socially radical, and introduced her to radical ideas about politics and free love, as well as to socialist publications such as The Masses and The Appeal to Reason.
Never very interested in oil painting, in Minneapolis Dehn focused on caricature and illustration--often of a humorous or politically radical character. In 1917 both Dehn and Wanda won scholarships to attend the Art Students League, and consequently, in the fall of that year both moved to New York. Dehn’s art education, however, ended in the summer of 1918, shortly after the United States entered World War I, when he was drafted to serve in the U. S. Army. Unwilling to fight, he applied for status as a conscientious objector, but was first imprisoned, then segregated in semi-imprisonment with other Pacifists, until the war ended. The abuse he suffered at this time may well explain his later withdrawal from taking political stands or making art of an overtly political nature. After his release from the army, Dehn returned to New York where he fell under the spell of the radical cartoonist Boardman Robinson and produced his first lithographs. He also finally consummated his sexual relationship with Wanda Gag.
The Years in Europe: 1922-1929
In September of 1921, however, he abruptly departed for Europe, arriving in Paris and then moving on to Vienna. There in the winter of 1922 he fell in love with a Russian dancer, Mura Zipperovitch, ending his seven-year relationship with Wanda Gag. He and Mura were married in 1926. It was also in Vienna that he produced his first notable artistic work.
Influenced by European artists such as Jules Pascin and Georg Grosz, Dehn began producing drawings of people in cafes, streets, and parks, which while mostly executed in his studio, were based on spontaneous life studies and have an expressive, sometimes almost childishly wandering quality of line. The mixture of sophistication and naiveté in these drawings was new to American audiences, as was the raciness of their subject matter, which often featured pleasure-seekers, prostitutes or scenes of sexual dalliance, presented with a strong element of caricature. Some of these drawings contain an element of social criticism, reminiscent of that found in the work of George Grosz, although Dehn’s work tended to focus on humorous commentary rather than savagely attacking his subjects or making a partisan political statement. Many Americans, including some who had originally been supporters of Dehn such as Boardman Robinson, were shocked by these European drawings, although George Grocz (who became a friend of the artist in this period) admired them, and recognized that Dehn could also bring a new vision to America subject matter. As he told Dehn: “You will do things in America which haven’t been done, which need to be done, which only you can do—as far at least as I know America.”
A key factor in Dehn’s artistic evolution at this time was his association with Scofield Thayer...
Category
American Realist 1930s Art
Materials
Oil Crayon
The Little Puppy - Lithograph by Umberto Brunelleschi - 1930s
Located in Roma, IT
The Little Puppy is a color lithograph on ivory paper, created by the Italian artist Umberto Brunelleschi (Montemurlo 1879- Paris 1949).
Illustration for “Tales and Short Stories” b...
Category
Art Nouveau 1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
Nude - Lithograph by Umberto Brunelleschi - 1930s
Located in Roma, IT
Nude is a color lithograph on ivory paper, created by the Italian artist Umberto Brunelleschi (Montemurlo 1879- Paris 1949).
Illustration for “Tales and Short Stories” by La Fontain...
Category
Art Nouveau 1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
Brunelleschi, Composition, La Leçon d'amour dans un parc (after)
Located in Auburn Hills, MI
Lithograph and stencil on vélin d’Arches paper. Unsigned and unnumbered, as issued. Good condition. Notes: From the volume, La Leçon d'amour dans un parc, 1933. Published by Éditions...
Category
Modern 1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph, Stencil
"She Was in the Captain's Cabin" Original Magazine Story Illustration
Located in Fort Washington, PA
She Was in the Captain's Cabin, magazine story illustration for "Captain's Boy," by Paul Deresco Augsburg, published in American Magazine, October 1938
The full caption reads: "She ...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Oil, Canvas
Preliminary Study for a Saturday Evening Post Cover "Tipping the Porter"
Located in Fort Washington, PA
Medium: Oil on Pencil on Paper
Sight Size 22.00" x 17.50;" Framed 30.00" x 25.50"
Signature: Unsigned
Study for Cover of Saturday Evening Post Magazine, December 18, 1937
Exhibitio...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Paper, Oil, Pencil
Paris roofs. 1930s. Oil on canvas, 60x80 cm
Located in Riga, LV
Paris roofs. 1930s. Oil on canvas, 60x80 cm
Category
Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Vins Camp Romain by Gadoud Original Vintage Art Deco Poster c1930
Located in Boca Raton, FL
This striking art deco style poster was printed C1930 as an advertisement for Vins Camp Romain. Vins Camp Romain, which translates to ‘Camp Roman Wine', was produced in Laudun, Franc...
Category
1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
Les Blés (Wheat Field), Signed Impressionist Lithograph by Raoul Dufy
By Raoul Dufy
Located in Long Island City, NY
Les Blés (Wheat Field)
Raoul Dufy, French (1877–1953)
Date: 1933
Lithograph on Arches, signed and numbered in pencil
Edition of 27/200
Size: 16 x 20.5 in. (40.64 x 52.07 cm)
Category
Impressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Lithograph
Piazza di Spagna Roma
By Yves Brayer
Located in London, GB
'Piazza di Spagna, Roma' oil on canvas, by Yves Brayer (1933). At the bottom of the Spanish Steps, is one of the most famous squares in Rome. It owes ...
Category
Expressionist 1930s Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
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