Anton Schutz

'Delaware River Bridge' — Mid-Atlantic Regionalism

c. 1927

Anton Schutz, 'Notre Dame, Paris', etching, 2nd state, 1927. Signed, titled, and annotated '2nd State', in pencil. Signed and dated in the plate, lower left. A superb, richly-inked...

Samella Sanders Lewis, 'The House of Shango', lithograph, 1992, edition 60. Signed, dated, titled, and numbered '31/60' in pencil. A superb, richly-inked impression, on Arches cream wove paper; the full sheet with margins (1 1/4 to 3 1/2 inches), in excellent condition. Image size 24 x 18 inches (610 x 457 mm); sheet size 30 inches x 22 1/4 inches (762 x 565 mm). Archivally matted to museum standards, unframed. ABOUT THIS WORK “The title of this piece is an unmistakable harkening to African roots. Shango is a religious practice with origins in Yoruba (Nigerian) belief, deifying a god of thunder by the same name. Shango has been adopted in the Caribbean, most notably in Trinidad and Tobago, a fact that underscores the importance of transnationalism to Samella Lewis’s piece. Her work often grapples with issues of race in the U.S., and The House of Shango is no exception. Through a reliance on the gradual transformation of Shango—one that took place across continents and time—Lewis’s piece forms a powerful link between black Americans and their African and Caribbean counterparts. The figure depicted in the piece appears to emerge, quite literally, from the house of Shango. Given the roots and transformative process of the religion, The House of Shango can draw attention to the historical intersections to which black American culture is indebted.” —Laura Woods, Scripps College, Ruth Chander Williamson Gallery, Collection Highlights, 2018 ABOUT THE ARTIST Samella Lewis’ lifelong career as an artist, art historian, critic, curator, collector, and advocate of African American art has helped empower generations of artists in the United States and worldwide, earning her the designation “the Godmother of African American art.” Born and raised in Jim Crow era New Orleans, Lewis began her art education at Dillard University in 1941, transferring to Hampton University in Virginia, where she earned her B. A. and master's degrees. She completed her master's and a doctorate in art history and cultural anthropology at Ohio State University in 1951, becoming the first female African American to earn a doctorate in fine art and art history. Lewis taught art at Morgan State University while completing her doctorate. She became the first Chair of the Fine Arts Department at Florida A&M University in 1953. That same year Lewis also became the first African American to convene the National Conference of African American artists held at Florida A&M University. She was a professor at the State University of New York, California State University, Long Beach, and at Scripps College in Claremont, California. Lewis co-founded, with Bernie Casey, the Contemporary Crafts Gallery in Los Angeles in 1970. In 1973, she served on the selection committee for the exhibition BLACKS: USA: 1973 held at the New York Cultural Center. Samella Lewis's 1969 catalog 'Black Artists on Art', featured accomplished black artists typically overlooked in mainstream art galleries. She said of the book, "I wanted to make a chronology of African American artists, and artists of African descent, to document our history. The historians weren't doing it. It was really about the movement." From the 1960s through the 1970s, her work, which included lithographs, linocuts, and serigraphs, reflected her concerns with the values of human dignity, democracy, and freedom of expression. Between 1969 and 70, Lewis and E.J. Montgomery were consultants for a groundbreaking exhibition at the Oakland Public L designed to create greater awareness of African American history and art. Lewis was the founder of the International Review of African American Art in 1975. In 1976, she founded the Museum of African-American Art with a group of artistic, academic, business, and community leaders in Los Angeles, California. Lewis, the museum’s senior curator, organized exhibitions and developed new ways of educating the public about African American art. She celebrated African American art as an 'art of experience’ inspired by the artists’ lives. And she espoused the concept of African American art as an 'art of tradition', urging museums to explore the African roots of African American art. In 1984, Lewis produced an extensive monograph on Elizabeth Catlett, her beloved mentor at Dillard University. Lewis has been collecting art since 1942, focusing primarily on the WPA era and work created during the Harlem Renaissance. Pieces from her collection were acquired by the Hampton University Museum in Virginia, the world’s earliest collection of African American fine art...

Peter Milton created this etching and engraving entitled “GARDEN WITH HENRY” in 1993. It is signed, titled, dated, and inscribed “153/250” in pencil under the image. The printed image size is 9.5 x 12 inches and the paper size is 15.5 x 18 inches. The inspiration for this piece came from the Henry James novella “The Aspern Papers” and clearly depicts the Venetian setting. The American-British author Henry James (1843-1916) wrote “The Aspern Papers” first published in 1888. Peter Milton was born in Pennsylvania in 1930. He studied for two years at the Virginia Military Institute...

Artist: Hans Figura (Austrian, 1898-1978) Title: Winter Landscape Year: Circa 1950 Medium: Color etching with aquatint on silk Edition: Unknown Plate mark (Image) size: 17.25 x 13.75 inches Framed size: 23 x 19.5 inches Signature: Hand signed in pencil by the artist Condition: very good Frame: Custom framed in a silver and gold frame About the artist. Hans Figura (Austrian, 1898-1978) was a noted painter and etcher, who was well known for his aquatint etchings on paper or satin of European and American landscape and cityscape scenes, as well as paintings of landscape and cityscape scenes, Tyrolean Alp scenes of villages and chalets, street scenes, harbor and marine scenes. Hans Figura was born January 22, 1898, in the small town of Nagy-Kikinda near the Austro-Hungarian border, to Austrian parents. His father was a railway official and he spent his childhood in various small villages along the railway line between Vienna and Hungary. He graduated from the highschool in Vienna and also studied at the Higher Graphical Federal Education and Research Institute, a vocational school there (Höhere Graphische Bundes-Lehr und Versuchsanstalt) As a young man, he served as an officer in the Austrian Army during WWI from 1916-18 on the Russian and Italian fronts. After the war he attended medical school at the University of Vienna for several years beginning in 1918, and seven semesters later, he passed his first state exam, but eventually decided that he preferred the arts to medicine. He also studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna (Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien) and by 1922 he had devoted himself to painting and etching, while also working in other artistic printing mediums, batik, illustration, bookbinding and working with leather. From 1923-28, Figura made numerous art study trips throughout Europe including; Germany, Italy, France, Belgium, Holland, England, Czechoslovakia and Hungary. His first major success came in 1924, when he won acclaim for his etchings exhibited in Italy and the United States. In 1929, he visited the United States and in 1930, he traveled back to France, Holland and also Switzerland. During this time, Figura maintained studios in both New York City and Vienna, Austria. Throughout the course of his career, he exhibited his paintings and prints in many of the large cities throughout Europe and the United States and many of his etchings and paintings were acquired by museums and galleries, including The Kulturamt, Vienna, Austria; the Landesmuseum of Lower Austria; as well as The Society of Art Lovers, Berlin and Munich. Select Exhibitions: 1924- Exhibitions in Italy and the United States. Circa Mid 1920's-1939- All the exhibitions at the Kunstlerhaus, Vienna, Austria. 1926- "Secession...