1950s Art

Discover a stunning black and white heliogravure print by the renowned Marc Chagall, capturing his unique interpretation of a biblical theme with his signature dreamlike style. Thi...

• An authenticated work This work is authenticated by Paloma Ruiz Picasso and Diana Widmaier Ruiz Picasso, who issued a certificate of authenticity on October 7, 2024. • A dated wor...

Vibrant mid century modern abstracted figurative in orange, red and black by Bay Area artist Paul Sheppard. Dated 1959 and signed "Sheppard." Presented i...

Pablo Picasso "Portrait of Jacqueline, Right Profile" Original Lithograph The 3rd and final state, executed on zinc Hand signed in pencil, numbered 21/50 from the edition of 50 Paper...

Porfirio Salinas (1910-1973) San Antonio Artist Image Size: 25 x 30 Frame Size: 34 x 39 Medium: Oil on Canvas Circa 1950 "Lazy Day Blues" Texas Bluebonnet Biography Porfirio Salinas (1910-1973) Porfirio Salinas was a self-taught artist who painted landscapes of Central Texas with an emphasis on the vast bluebonnet fields that grow there in the springtime. Born in 1910 in Bastrop, Texas, he attended public schools in San Antonio. He also observed works in progress by the director of the San Antonio Art School, Jose Arpa, as well as landscape painter, Robert Wood. Wood is said to have paid Salinas five dollars a picture to paint bluebonnets because "he hated to paint bluebonnets". Salinas served in the military from 1943 to 1945. Although he was assigned to Fort Sam Houston, he was allowed to live at home. At the fort, Colonel Telesphor Gottchalk assigned him to paint murals for the officer's lounge and various other projects, and Salinas continued to be able to paint during his entire conscripted period. Even before he achieved notoriety among galleries, dealers, and museums, Salinas was widely followed and appreciated by many Texans, including former President Lyndon B. Johnson, who may be considered responsible for launching Salinas popularity beyond the boundaries of Texas. In 1973, Texas capital, Austin, honored Salinas for having "done much to bring the culture of Mexico and Texas closer together with his paintings". Salinas died in April 1973 in San Antonio, Texas. From the years of the Great Depression through President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society of the 1960s, Texan Porfirio Salinas (1910-1973) remained one of the Lone Star State's most popular artists. Today, his works remain popular with Texas collectors and those who love landscapes of the beautiful "Hill Country" that lies in the center of the state. One of the first Mexican American painters to become widely recognized for his art, Salinas was a favorite of President Lyndon Johnson and his wife, Lady Bird Johnson, as well as of Sam Rayburn, the longest-serving Speaker of the House of Representatives, and Texas Governor John Connelly. In fact, President Johnson was so enamored with his Salinas paintings that the artist will forever be associated with America's first Texas-born President. Works by Porfirio Salinas is in a number of museum collections, grace the halls of the Texas State Capitol and the Governor's Mansion in Austin, and are included in virtually every major private collection of Early Texas Art. Porfirio Salinas was born on November 6, 1910, near the small town of Bastrop, Texas, about thirty miles from Austin. His father, Porfirio G. Salinas (1881-1967), and his mother, Clara G. Chavez, struggled to make a hardscrabble living as tenant farmers, but eventually were forced to give up farming. The family moved to San Antonio, where Salinas' father was able to get a job working as a laborer for the railroad, but the scenic area around Bastrop, with its pine trees and the wide expanse of the Rio Grande River, would forever remain a touchstone for the artist. For the rest of his life, Salinas and his brothers went back frequently to visit their grandmother in her little farmhouse. When in Bastrop, Porfirio painted on the banks of the Rio Grande or in the groves of pine trees. The Salinas family was close-knit, and Porfirio was the middle child of five children, so he had an older brother and sister as well as a younger brother and sister. His mother was a native of Mexico, so throughout his childhood the family made the long drive to Mexico to visit Clara Salinas' family. As a child growing up in the bi-lingual section of San Antonio, Salinas drew and painted incessantly and by the time he was ten, he was already producing work that was mature enough to sell to his schoolteachers. Many years later in an article in the New York Times he was described as a "boy whose textbooks were seldom opened and whose sketchbook was never closed." Instead of studying, the young artist spent his spare time watching artists paint in and around San Antonio. As an aspiring painter, Salinas was fortunate to grow up in the historic city, which had the most active art scene in Texas. It was his exposure to older, professional painters that encouraged the precocious young painter to leave school early in order to help his family and pursue a career as a professional artist, despite his father's inability to see art as a career with any future for his son. When Salinas was about fifteen he came to know the artist Robert W. Wood (1889-1979). He met Wood while he was employed in an art supply store and he soon began to work as an assistant to the English-born painter, who had moved from Portland to San Antonio in 1924. Although the diminutive Englishman was already an established professional artist, he did not have a great deal of formal art training and so he was then studying with the academically trained Spanish painter Jose Arpa (1858-1952) in order to augment his knowledge and give his work a more polished look. Salinas was an eager young man, and while working in Wood's downtown San Antonio studio he learned to stretch canvases, frame paintings and to sketch in larger compositions from small plein-air studies for the English artist. He began to accompany Wood and Arpa to the hills outside San Antonio, where they painted small Plein-air studies of fields of blue lupin - the state flower, the famous "Bluebonnets" of Texas - in the springtime and scenes of the gnarled Red Oaks as they changed color in the fall. He was soon assisting Wood in the tedious work of painting the tiny blue flowers that collectors wanted to see in the landscapes they purchased of central Texas. According to a 1972 newspaper story, "Legend has it that one day in the 1920s artist Robert Wood decided he could not bear to paint another bluebonnet in one of his landscapes. He hired young Porfirio Salinas to paint them in for him at five dollars a painting." Whether this story is accurate or apocryphal isn't clear, but the ambitious and independent young Salinas wasn't destined to be anyone's assistant for very long. The formative event of Porfirio Salinas' teenage years was the Texas Wildflower Competitive Exhibitions, a Roaring-Twenties dream of the eccentric oilman Edgar B. Davis (1873-1951). These competitive shows of paintings of wildflowers and Texas life were mounted in San Antonio from 1927 to 1929. Held at the newly opened Witte Museum each spring, the exhibition featured large cash prizes donated by the philanthropic Davis, which were an inducement for artists to travel from all over the United States to paint in the Hill Country of Texas. The "Davis Competitions," as they were known, helped to cement San Antonio's reputation as an art center, a legacy that remains with the "River City" today. The shows generated a great deal of excitement in the area, helping to make celebrities of the some of the artists who had already settled there and encouraging others to make San Antonio their home. Over the three years that the wildflower competitions were held, more than 300 paintings were exhibited, and many thousands of viewers saw the paintings at the Witte Museum and on tours throughout the state and in New York. Each year Davis would generously purchase the winning paintings and then donate them to the San Antonio Art League. Young Porfirio Salinas would have been able to not only watch his two mentors - Robert W. Wood and Jose Arpa - paint the works that they entered in the Davis Competitions, he would have been able to see Arpa take several of the major prizes, receiving the judge's accolades for "Verbena," "Cactus Flower" and "Picking Cotton," works that are still on view at the San Antonio Art League Museum today. Unfortunately, Davis eventually put his donations to work in other charitable endeavors, bringing to an end the wildflower events, but only after they inspired Salinas and other young painters and had helped to make wildflower paintings the most sought-after subject for traditionalist Texas collectors. In 1930, when he was only twenty, Salinas hung out a shingle and began to paint professionally, augmenting the sales of his easel paintings with what little business he could garner by painting signs for local concerns. It was a struggle for the young artist to make a living, as the effects of the Great Depression were settling in. His early works are very similar to those of Robert Wood's, both in subject matter and treatment. Salinas did small paintings of Bluebonnets for the tourists who visited San Antonio to see the famous Alamo as well as paintings of the Texas missions...

Milton Avery Fish, 1952 Signed and dated twice lower left Crayon on paper 3 1/2 x 10 inches Milton Clark Avery was born in 1885 in Altmar, New York. Largely self-taught, Avery is t...

In 1930, Maxfield Parrish turned his attention to painting landscapes exclusively. Cascades is a fine example of the style that defined his late career. The composition features a fa...

Medium: original lithograph. Printed in 1956 for the rare Documenti d'Arte d'Oggi, published in Milan by Groupe Espace. Size: 12 3/4 x 8 3/4 inches (320 x 222 mm). Signed in the plat...

A beautiful large 1950's French expressionist oil on canvas depicting locals taking an afternoon stroll, by Paris painter André Beaucé. Excellent quality ...

MASSIMO CAMPIGLI 1895-1971 Florenz 1895-1971 St. Tropez (Italian) Title: L'Ecuyere, 1954 Technique: Original Hand Signed and Dated Lithograph in Colours on BFK Rives Wove Paper Th...

Medium: original lithograph. Printed in Paris in 1957 at the Mourlot Freres atelier. Size: 9 x 5 3/4 inches (225 x 145 mm). Jean Cocteau executed this original lithograph to depict a...

Medium: original lithograph. Printed in Paris in 1957 at the Mourlot Freres atelier. Size: 8 3/4 x 6 inches (225 x 150 mm). Jean Cocteau executed this original lithograph to depict a...

Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph was printed in 1956 for the "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 19...

Partially glazed terre-de-faïence convex wall plaque painted in black and white, 1956. Edition of 450. With the Madoura Plein Feu and Empreinte Originale de Picasso stamps, verso. ...

An original oil on linen mounted to board by American modern female artist Harriet Holden Nash. The piece will come with custom framing either black or natural wood based on the buy...

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) - Figure Lithograph from 1957. The edition no. 211/275. With Arches watermark. Dimensions of work: 44.5 x 33.5 cm. Publisher: Fernand Mourlot Éditeur, ...

Original watercolor on archival paper of a Rocky Mountain Meadow by the well known American artist, Werner Drewes. Signed lower right. Titled and dated 1956 on verso of sheet. Con...

Artist: (after) Josef Albers (German-American, 1888-1976) Title: "Staatliche Werkkunstschule Kassel (Prefatio)" Year: 1957 Medium: Original Relief Print (Letterpress), Exhibition Poster on light wove paper Limited edition: Unknown Printer: Staatliche Werkkunstschule Kassel, Kassel, Germany Publisher: Staatliche Werkkunstschule Kassel, Kassel, Germany Sheet size: 24.75" x 17.63" Image size: 11.75" x 15.63" Condition: A few faint handling creases. Never framed, has been professionally stored away for decades. In excellent condition Extremely rare Notes: Provenance: private collection - Nuremberg, Germany. Poster produced for a special exhibition of Albers' work "Early Pictures from the Twenties and New Works" at the Staatliche Werkkunstschule Kassel from May 28 - June 8, 1957. The image featured on this poster is Albers' 1942 lithograph edition "Prefatio", (Danilowitz No. 103, page 76), from his 1942 "Graphic Tectonics" series of 9 lithographs, (Danilowitz No. 100-108, page 74-79). Printer's imprint upper right. This is an extremely rare poster being if not the, one of the, earliest documented Josef Albers exhibition...

Watercolor painting of a street scene with two females and a man that appears to be a beggar. The work is signed by the artist. It is framed in a black frame with a yellow matte. Dim...

Seattle Tubing Society, 1953 by Burt Glinn is one of the photographer's iconic 1950s shots - this one is of people relaxing in inner tubes on a pond. The zeitgeist of madcap and fun,...

Georges Braque L'Oiseau multicolore, circa 1950 Signed and numbered "30/200" in pencil Aquatint in colors on BFK Rives wove paper Image 10 1/4 x 19 1/4 inches Sheet 17 5/8 x 24 5/8 i...

• A unique ceramic by Pablo Picasso This work is a unique ceramic by Pablo Picasso, dated on the reverse, reflecting the artist’s direct and personal intervention in the creation of ...

‘The Gate’, a masterpiece from 1955 painted on canvas by the Florentine artist Ottone Rosai (Florence 1895 – Ivrea 1957). Ottone Rosai Archive, curated by Dr Giovanni Faccenda Signed...

Medium: original lithograph. This lithograph is from the rare 1953 "Improvisations" portfolio, published by the Artists Equity Association of New York on the occasion of the 1953 Spr...

“Art Shay’s photography shakes you up, sets you down gently, pats you on the head and then kicks you in the ass.” Roger Ebert “[Shay’s work] ranks with some of the greats of the 20...

This evocative poster titled “Bezoekt Damme” (“Visit Damme”) was created around circa 1950 by Belgian artist Toon Devaere and promotes the small historic town of Damme, near Bruges, ...

Georges Braque (1882-1963) - Pichet et oiseau Etching from 1955. The edition of 74/300. Dimensions of work: 41.5 x 51 cm. Hand signed. Reference: Vallier 1005. The work is in G...

Guests at a fancy dress party held at the Romanoff Restaurant in Hollywood, Los Angeles in 1950. Slim Aarons Safari Party at Romanoff's, 1950 Chromogenic Lambda print Estate stampe...

Signed lower left, dimensions listed include the frame. Joseph Wolins was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey in 1915. He studied at the National Academy of Design from 1935 to 1941 un...

Legendary photographer Slim Aarons relaxes in a self portrait shot in Athens, near the Acropolis. Slim Aarons said, "I love a solo holiday. It tends to refresh the part of oneself that is most depleted by modern life — patience. "Let me dispel a few myths. You will be lonely. No: you won’t. My solo travels in Paris have brought many perfect hours of being alone but not a moment of loneliness. People who depend on other people are often in hiding from themselves. Two and a quarter million people live in the City of Light: you will see many of them and you will pass them in the street, but when you see Notre Dame after dark and walk home and perhaps stop to have a drink in the Marais, you can feel that the only thing that is missing from your experience is the common dependency on someone to distract your attention. "I’ve had solo pints of Guinness in the pubs of County Kerry and County Cork. I’ve walked across the sage- and juniper-scented maquis of Corsica on a spring day, where you can still find the world of Napoleon’s childhood. More than once I went to the Isle of Iona in the Scottish Hebrides...

Original Marilyn Monroe Photograph Original photograph of Marilyn Monroe posing in her dressing room on the film of "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" by photographer Milton Gold (American,...

Nicely painted mid century abstract oil painting by Ken Munowitz. Oil on canvas. Framed.

Autumn Gift - Seasonal Harvest Still Life with Flowers by Albin Kern. This still life by Austrian-American painter Albin Kern (b. 1884, d. 1975) depicts a seasonal spread of gourds...

Original poster: BOMBAY (American President Lines) Small format without text along the bottom. This is the smaller format for the poster. Archival linen-backed in very fine cond...

Medium: lithograph (after the original lithograph poster executed for Maison de la Pensee of Paris). During the late 1940's and throughout the 1950's, Henri Matisse created a series ...

The 1957 original advertising poster for Ricard presents an iconic image of leisure and conviviality associated with the popular French pastis brand. This poster likely aimed to capt...

Wonderful Surreal Latin American painting. Painting is oil on masonite board with original frame. Appears to be unsigned. Condition is excelle...

Antique American modernist abstract oil painting. Oil on canvas. Framed.

Image dimensions: 34.5 x 2 x 21.5 cm. African Butterfly Woman is an original collage realized in France in the middle of the XX Century. Original ...

This piece is an A.R. turned pitcher created by Pablo Picasso in 1955. It is made with white earthenware clay, decoration in engobes in red and black with glaze inside. It bears the ...

Artist: Bernat Sanjuan i Tarré (Barcelona, 1915 – Deià, Mallorca, 1979) Title: Mediterranean Village of Mallorca Medium: Oil on canvas Dimensions: 65 × 92 cm (25.6 × 36.2 in) Framed:...

Monte Carlo A man and a woman on jet skis off the coast of Monte Carlo, Monaco, 1956 20 × 16 inches - paper size Estate Stamped Collection Edition to 150 Photo by Slim Aarons ...

JOHN HAYMSON – "BROOKLYN BRIDGE" ⚜ Oil on Canvas ⚜ Hand Signed ⚜ Conservation Frame NEW YORK ICON IN VIVID DETAIL This atmospheric oil painting by John Haymson captures the enduring...

Artist: Henri Matisse (after) Title: Nus Bleus VI Portfolio: The Last Works of Henri Matisse Medium: Lithograph Year: 1958 Edition: 2000 Framed Size: 22" x 18" Sheet Size: 14" x 10 1...

Medium: lithograph. This lithograph (after the Vlaminck painting) was printed in Paris in 1958 by the Mourlot atelier and published in an edition of 2000. The image size is 7 3/4 x 1...

Delightful watercolor painting of a beautiful sky rolling over the rooftops of Paris by artist André Lafond, 1955. Original one-of-a-kind artwork on paper displayed on a white mat ...

Octave Denis Victor Guillonnet (1872 - 1967) Les Oliviers, A landscape with olive trees signed "EODV Guillonnet" lower right Oil on wood panel 38 x 46 cm...

"Henry And Eve Miller On Partington Ridge" - 1954 Original Photograph 1954 original black and white silver gelatin photograph of Henry and Eve Miller at their house on Partington Ridge in Big Sur, California by California photographer Jim Healy (American, 20th C.). Eve Miller sits behind a desk while Henry Miller leans against a bookshelf in their home office in Big Sur. Eve holds a cigarette in her hand, with Henry next to her, leaning his elbow against the bookshelf. Titled, stamped and dated on verso. "Henry and Eve Miller on Partington Ridge 1954 photo by Jim Healy" Stamped "Henry Miller Memorial Library, Big Sur California" Presented in a white mat. Mat: 20"H x 16"W Photo: 14"H x 11"W Image: 13 1/8"H x 10 5/8"W Henry Miller was born December 26, 1891 in New York, New York. In 1920 Miller began working for Western Union Telegraph service where his interest in writing began. He soon left for Europe in 1928 where he resided in Paris in 1930. He continued full time with his long and lucrative career as a writer of more than 36 creative and analytical works. Miller's entrance into the writer's circle began with Tropic of Cancer, which still proves to be Miller's most famous work. Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn chronicle Miller's lives and loves as an expatriate in Paris. They were both originally published in France by Jack Kahane at Obelisk Press in the mid-thirties. Soon after the publishing of Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn, Miller's other works to date were published in the United States. During this time it was said that "Miller became a legendary character, a kind of folk hero, the Paul Bunyan of literature, larger than life as exile, bohemian, and rebel, the great champion of freedom of expression and other lost causes...

Striking, sculptural, and unmistakably modern, this original 1956 poster was created for the XIIIème Salon de Mai, held at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris. Featuring a b...

5080 Oil on canvas of sailboats in a French Riviera harbor

Rainy Time Square (1953) Silver Gelatin Fibre Print - Oversized (Photo by H. Armstrong Roberts/Alamy) Two silhouetted women at bus stop under umbrellas in Time Square, Manhattan,...

Medium: pochoir (after the gouache). Printed in Paris in 1957 by Jacomet and issued in an edition of 1000 by the Galerie Berggruen for a rare catalogue. Image size: 5 x 3 3/4 inches ...

Georges Braque, French (1882 - 1963) - La Theogonie d'Hesiode Frontispiece, Year: 1953, Medium: Etching, Image Size: 14.5 x 11.5 inches, Size: 17.5 x 13.5 in. (44.45 x 34.29 cm), Pr...

Signed lower center, 'Olaf Wieghorst' (American, 1899-1988) with dedication, 'To Herb with best wishes. El Cajon, 1959' Born in Denmark, Olaf Wieghorst was the son of a photographe...

Lithograph, 1953 Handsigned by the artist in pencil and numbered 27/100 Printer : Jean Pons (Paris) LCD5352

Medium: lithograph (after the woodcut). Printed in Paris in 1954 by Mourlot and published by Berggruen for a scarce catalogue. Image size: 4 1/2 x 4 inches (117 x 100 mm). There is a...

Color lithograph, circa 1950. With the artist's printed signature as issued, lower center, and numbered 84/200 in pencil, lower right. Printed and published by Mourlot, Paris. The...

Artwork # 1 on 5 sold in limited edition in perfect condition This photo was made in 1955, the negative was digitized during the artist's lifetime and the technical parameters (framing, contrast, light, etc.) was approved by him. This is a very high quality fine art prints on 310 gr/m² Fine Art paper with museum quality pigment inks. “ On Broadway, near Trinity Church”, New York December 1955. A rainy Sunday morning, a solitary pedestrian seems to be falling over on the slippery surface. As is always the case with Fabrizio La Torre’s photographs, quite apart from the artistic merit, this picture invites us to speculate what is the story behind it: why this deserted avenue at 11:10 on that particular morning, what was the man in the rain doing, why is that car defiantly parked right underneath a no parking sign...

Antique American oil painting. Oil on board. Signed. Framed. Measuring: 24 by 30 inches overall, and 18 by 24 painting alone. Excellent condition, ready to hang and enjoy.

Oil still-life of a bouquet of ocher, rose, cobalt, lavender, and ivory wildflowers, informally arranged in a goblet against a background of rust and periwinkle. Signed lower right...