Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 8

Sunol Alvar
From the Barcelona suite

1979

About the Item

Artist: Alvar Title: From Barcelona Suite Year: 1979 Medium: Color lithograph with embossing Edition: Numberd 145/185 in pencil Paper: Arches Image size: 24.35 x 18.15 inches paper size: 30 x 24 inches Signature: Hand signed in pencil by the artist Condition Excellent Frame: Framed in a custom wooden gold frame with gold color bevel and fabric matting Description: Referenced and pictured in the book on Alvar, by Edmund Newman, page #210 and #212 About the artist: Alvar Sunol Munoz-Ramos was born on January 20, 1935 in Montgat, a Catalan fishing village on the outskirts of Barcelona, Spain. Sunol Alvar grew up on the sunny Mediterranean coast with his father Tomas, mother Antonia and his older brother and sister, Jordi and Amadea. Showing a great artistic talent as a youth, he attended the Sant Jordi Art School in Barcelona at age 16. At age 18, he won the "Alhambra de Granada" grant, a summer scholarship that allowed him to travel and paint throughout Spain. This was the birth of Alvar's style and the laying of the technical foundation that would accompany him over the following years. Alvar returned home and entered a painting in competition for the Young Painter's Prize sponsored by the City of Barcelona. He won the Grand Prize and the painting was acquired by the Museum of Modern Art in Barcelona for its permanent collection. In 1957, at age 22, Alvar gave his first one-man show at the Galleries Layetana in Barcelona. The exhibit was a great success and Alvar received many invitations for shows in other Spanish cities. He entered one of his canvasses for the annual painting competition at the French Institute of Barcelona. He again won the Grand Prize, and with it a study trip to Paris. Alvar arrived in Paris to paint in 1959. He met Juan Fuentes, a fellow Spaniard and director of the prestigious Gallery Drouant. Fuentes brought Alvar's first group of Paris oil paintings to the gallery. All of the paintings sold in one week. He was subsequently invited to join the celebrated "School of Paris," a group of the top young artists in Paris, organized by the distinguished Charpentier Gallery. His paintings were exhibited in the United States for the first time at the Monede Gallery, New York city, in 1962. Alvar produced his first original lithographs for a one-man show at Gallery Drouant in 1963. In 1970, Alvar left Paris and returned to Spain. Sunol Alvar has exhibited regularly throughout the world over the years. His lithographs were honored with an exhibition at the Hyacinth Rigand Museum in Perpignan, France. The Utah Museum of Fine Art, Salt Lake City, Utah and the Wichita Art Museum in Wichita, Kansas have held major exhibits of his lithographs, paintings and sculptures.
  • Creator:
    Sunol Alvar (1938, Spanish)
  • Creation Year:
    1979
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 37 in (93.98 cm)Width: 30 in (76.2 cm)Depth: 1.5 in (3.81 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    San Francisco, CA
  • Reference Number:
    Seller: 113031stDibs: LU66632194223
More From This SellerView All
  • Untitled III
    By Sunol Alvar
    Located in San Francisco, CA
    Artist: Alvar Title: Untitled III Year: c.1990 Medium: Color lithograph with embossing Edition: Numbered 148/225 in pencil Paper: Arches Image size: 16.5 x 22.5 inches Framed s...
    Category

    Late 20th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

  • Peaches
    By Pati Bannister
    Located in San Francisco, CA
    This artwork titled "Peaches" 1996 is a color off set lithograph by British/American artist Pati Bannister, 1929-2013. It is hand signed, titled and numbered 548/950 in pencil by the...
    Category

    Late 20th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

  • Show and Tell
    By Pati Bannister
    Located in San Francisco, CA
    This artwork titled "Show and Tell" 1999, is a color off set lithograph by British/American artist Pati Bannister, 1929-2013. It is hand signed, titled and numbered 476/950 in pencil...
    Category

    Late 20th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

  • Bridesmaids
    By Pati Bannister
    Located in San Francisco, CA
    This artwork titled "Bridesmaids" 1995, is a color off set lithograph by British/American artist Pati Bannister, 1929-2013. It is hand signed, titled and numbered 41/950 in pencil by...
    Category

    Late 20th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

  • Apple Orchard
    By Pati Bannister
    Located in San Francisco, CA
    This artwork titled "Apple Orchard" 1998, is a color off set lithograph by British/American artist Pati Bannister, 1929-2013. It is hand signed, titled a...
    Category

    Late 20th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

  • Strawberries
    By Pati Bannister
    Located in San Francisco, CA
    This artwork titled "Strawberies" c.1985, published 1996 is a color off set lithograph by British/American artist Pati Bannister, 1929-2013. It is hand signed, titled and numbered 65...
    Category

    Late 20th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

You May Also Like
  • Hand-colored Lithograph Signed Death Dark Imagery 1800's Historical Old Master
    By Honoré Daumier
    Located in Milwaukee, WI
    "Histoire Ancienne (Plate No. 49), La Mort de Sapho 2nd State (rare) Delteil #973" is a hand-colored lithograph by Honore Daumier. The artist signed the image lower right. It depicts...
    Category

    1840s Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

  • 'Lieutenant Crovers Despatch – Return of Governor Stevens to Fort Benton'
    By John Mix Stanley
    Located in Milwaukee, WI
    In the mid-nineteenth century, the United States government set out to survey and document its newly acquired lands and territories west of the Mississippi. The goals of these surveys were manifold: to produce topographical maps, to document flora and fauna, and to document natural resources to build the emerging US economy. These surveys, and the images from them, also functioned to build the new sense of American identity with the landscape, condensing vistas into the 'picturesque' tradition of European image making. Thus, the entire span of US territory could be seen as a single, cohesive whole. This lithograph comes from one of six surveys commissioned by the Army's Topographic Bureau in 1853, which sought to find the best route to construct a transcontinental railroad. The result was a thirteen-volume report including maps, lithographs, and technical data entitled 'Explorations and Surveys to ascertain the most practicable and economical route for a Railroad from the Mississippi river to the Pacific Ocean.' In particular, the print comes from the northern survey, commanded by Isaac Stevens, which explored the regions between the 47th and 49th parallels. 5.75 x 8.75 inches, image 6.5 x 9.25 inches, stone 17 x 20 inches, frame Artist 'Stanley Del.' lower left Entitled 'Lieutenant Crovers Despatch – Return of Governor Stevens to Fort Benton' lower center margin Publisher 'Sarony, Major & Knapp. Lith.s 449 Broadway N.Y.' lower right Inscribed 'U.S.P.R.R. EXP. & SURVEYS — 47th & 49th PARALLELS' upper left Inscribed 'GENERAL REPORT — PLATE XXXVII' upper right Framed to conservation standards using 100 percent rag matting with French accents; glazed with UV5 Plexiglas to inhibit fading; housed in a gold reverse ogee moulding. Print in overall good condition; some localized foxing and discoloration; minor surface abrasions to frame. John Mix Stanley...
    Category

    1850s Romantic Landscape Prints

    Materials

    Lithograph

  • 'The Flower Vase' original hand-colored lithograph by Nathaniel Currier
    By Nathaniel Currier
    Located in Milwaukee, WI
    The present hand-colored lithograph is one of several decorative images of flower-filled vases published by Nathaniel Currier. This example contains roses, tulips, forget-me-nots, and others all within a vase with gold eagle head handles and an image of a beautiful young woman the belly. 16 x 11 inches, artwork 22.5 x 18.25 inches, frame Entitled bottom center Signed in the stone, lower left "Lith. and Pub. by N. Currier" Inscribed lower right "152 Nassau St. Cor. of Spruce N.Y." Copyrighted bottom center "Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1848 by N. Currier in the Clerk's office of the Southern District of N.Y." with the number 249 Framed to conservation standards using 100 percent rag matting, housed in a lemon gold moulding. Nathaniel Currier was a tall introspective man with a melancholy nature. He could captivate people with his piercing stare or charm them with his sparkling blue eyes. Nathaniel was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts on March 27th, 1813, the second of four children. His parents, Nathaniel and Hannah Currier, were distant cousins who lived a humble yet spartan life. When Nathaniel was eight years old, tragedy struck. Nathaniel’s father unexpectedly passed away leaving Nathaniel and his eleven-year-old brother Lorenzo to provide for the family. In addition to their mother, Nathaniel and Lorenzo had to care for six-year-old sister Elizabeth and two-year-old brother Charles. Nathaniel worked a series of odd jobs to support the family, and at fifteen, he started what would become a life-long career when he apprenticed in the Boston lithography shop of William and John Pendleton. A Bavarian gentleman named Alois Senefelder invented lithography just 30 years prior to young Nat Currier’s apprenticeship. While under the employ of the brothers Pendleton, Nat was taught the art of lithography by the firm’s chief printer, a French national named Dubois, who brought the lithography trade to America. Lithography involves grinding a piece of limestone flat and smooth then drawing in mirror image on the stone with a special grease pencil. After the image is completed, the stone is etched with a solution of aqua fortis leaving the greased areas in slight relief. Water is then used to wet the stone and greased-ink is rolled onto the raised areas. Since grease and water do not mix, the greased-ink is repelled by the moisture on the stone and clings to the original grease pencil lines. The stone is then placed in a press and used as a printing block to impart black on white images to paper. In 1833, now twenty-years old and an accomplished lithographer, Nat Currier left Boston and moved to Philadelphia to do contract work for M.E.D. Brown, a noted engraver and printer. With the promise of good money, Currier hired on to help Brown prepare lithographic stones of scientific images for the American Journal of Sciences and Arts. When Nat completed the contract work in 1834, he traveled to New York City to work once again for his mentor John Pendleton, who was now operating his own shop located at 137 Broadway. Soon after the reunion, Pendleton expressed an interest in returning to Boston and offered to sell his print shop to Currier. Young Nat did not have the financial resources to buy the shop, but being the resourceful type he found another local printer by the name of Stodart. Together they bought Pendleton’s business. The firm ‘Currier & Stodart’ specialized in "job" printing. They produced many different types of printed items, most notably music manuscripts for local publishers. By 1835, Stodart was frustrated that the business was not making enough money and he ended the partnership, taking his investment with him. With little more than some lithographic stones, and a talent for his trade, twenty-two year old Nat Currier set up shop in a temporary office at 1 Wall Street in New York City. He named his new enterprise ‘N. Currier, Lithographer’ Nathaniel continued as a job printer and duplicated everything from music sheets to architectural plans. He experimented with portraits, disaster scenes and memorial prints, and any thing that he could sell to the public from tables in front of his shop. During 1835 he produced a disaster print Ruins of the Planter's Hotel, New Orleans, which fell at two O’clock on the Morning of the 15th of May 1835, burying 50 persons, 40 of whom Escaped with their Lives. The public had a thirst for newsworthy events, and newspapers of the day did not include pictures. By producing this print, Nat gave the public a new way to “see” the news. The print sold reasonably well, an important fact that was not lost on Currier. Nat met and married Eliza Farnsworth in 1840. He also produced a print that same year titled Awful Conflagration of the Steamboat Lexington in Long Island Sound on Monday Evening, January 18, 1840, by which melancholy occurrence over One Hundred Persons Perished. This print sold out very quickly, and Currier was approached by an enterprising publication who contracted him to print a single sheet addition of their paper, the New York Sun. This single page paper is presumed to be the first illustrated newspaper ever published. The success of the Lexington print launched his career nationally and put him in a position to finally lift his family up. In 1841, Nat and Eliza had their first child, a son they named Edward West Currier. That same year Nat hired his twenty-one year old brother Charles and taught him the lithography trade, he also hired his artistically inclined brother Lorenzo to travel out west and make sketches of the new frontier as material for future prints. Charles worked for the firm on and off over the years, and invented a new type of lithographic crayon which he patented and named the Crayola. Lorenzo continued selling sketches to Nat for the next few years. In 1843, Nat and Eliza had a daughter, Eliza West Currier, but tragedy struck in early 1847 when their young daughter died from a prolonged illness. Nat and Eliza were grief stricken, and Eliza, driven by despair, gave up on life and passed away just four months after her daughter’s death. The subject of Nat Currier’s artwork changed following the death of his wife and daughter, and he produced many memorial prints and sentimental prints during the late 1840s. The memorial prints generally depicted grief stricken families posed by gravestones (the stones were left blank so the purchasers could fill in the names of the dearly departed). The sentimental prints usually depicted idealized portraits of women and children, titled with popular Christian names of the day. Late in 1847, Nat Currier married Lura Ormsbee, a friend of the family. Lura was a self-sufficient woman, and she immediately set out to help Nat raise six-year-old Edward and get their house in order. In 1849, Lura delivered a son, Walter Black Currier, but fate dealt them a blow when young Walter died one year later. While Nat and Lura were grieving the loss of their new son, word came from San Francisco that Nat’s brother Lorenzo had also passed away from a brief illness. Nat sank deeper into his natural quiet melancholy. Friends stopped by to console the couple, and Lura began to set an extra place at their table for these unexpected guests. She continued this tradition throughout their lives. In 1852, Charles introduced a friend, James Merritt Ives, to Nat and suggested he hire him as a bookkeeper. Jim Ives was a native New Yorker born in 1824 and raised on the grounds of Bellevue Hospital where his father was employed as superintendent. Jim was a self-trained artist and professional bookkeeper. He was also a plump and jovial man, presenting the exact opposite image of his new boss. Jim Ives met Charles Currier through Caroline Clark, the object of Jim’s affection. Caroline’s sister Elizabeth was married to Charles, and Caroline was a close friend of the Currier family. Jim eventually proposed marriage to Caroline and solicited an introduction to Nat Currier, through Charles, in hopes of securing a more stable income to support his future wife. Ives quickly set out to improve and modernize his new employer’s bookkeeping methods. He reorganized the firm’s sizable inventory, and used his artistic skills to streamline the firm’s production methods. By 1857, Nathaniel had become so dependent on Jims’ skills and initiative that he offered him a full partnership in the firm and appointed him general manager. The two men chose the name ‘Currier & Ives’ for the new partnership, and became close friends. Currier & Ives produced their prints in a building at 33 Spruce Street where they occupied the third, fourth and fifth floors. The third floor was devoted to the hand operated printing presses that were built by Nat's cousin, Cyrus Currier, at his shop Cyrus Currier & Sons in Newark, NJ. The fourth floor found the artists, lithographers and the stone grinders at work. The fifth floor housed the coloring department, and was one of the earliest production lines in the country. The colorists were generally immigrant girls, mostly German, who came to America with some formal artistic training. Each colorist was responsible for adding a single color to a print. As a colorist finished applying their color, the print was passed down the line to the next colorist to add their color. The colorists worked from a master print displayed above their table, which showed where the proper colors were to be placed. At the end of the table was a touch up artist who checked the prints for quality, touching-in areas that may have been missed as it passed down the line. During the Civil War, demand for prints became so great that coloring stencils were developed to speed up production. Although most Currier & Ives prints were colored in house, some were sent out to contract artists. The rate Currier & Ives paid these artists for coloring work was one dollar per one hundred small folios (a penny a print) and one dollar per one dozen large folios. Currier & Ives also offered uncolored prints to dealers, with instructions (included on the price list) on how to 'prepare the prints for coloring.' In addition, schools could order uncolored prints from the firm’s catalogue to use in their painting classes. Nathaniel Currier and James Merritt Ives attracted a wide circle of friends during their years in business. Some of their more famous acquaintances included Horace Greeley, Phineas T. Barnum, and the outspoken abolitionists Rev. Henry Ward, and John Greenleaf Whittier (the latter being a cousin of Mr. Currier). Nat Currier and Jim Ives described their business as "Publishers of Cheap and Popular Pictures" and produced many categories of prints. These included Disaster Scenes, Sentimental Images, Sports, Humor, Hunting Scenes, Politics, Religion, City and Rural Scenes, Trains, Ships, Fire Fighters, Famous Race Horses, Historical Portraits, and just about any other topic that satisfied the general public's taste. In all, the firm produced in excess of 7500 different titles, totaling over one million prints produced from 1835 to 1907. Nat Currier retired in 1880, and signed over his share of the firm to his son Edward. Nat died eight years later at his summer home 'Lion’s Gate' in Amesbury, Massachusetts. Jim Ives remained active in the firm until his death in 1895, when his share of the firm passed to his eldest son, Chauncey. In 1902, faced will failing health from the ravages of Tuberculosis, Edward Currier sold his share of the firm to Chauncey Ives...
    Category

    1840s Romantic Still-life Prints

    Materials

    Watercolor, Lithograph

  • 'In Memory of William W. Peabody' original hand-colored lithograph by N. Currier
    By Nathaniel Currier
    Located in Milwaukee, WI
    The present hand-colored lithograph was produced as part of the funeral and mourning culture in the United States during the 19th century. Images like this were popular as ways of remembering loved ones, an alternative to portraiture of the deceased. This lithograph shows a man, woman and child in morning clothes next to an urn-topped stone monument. Behind are additional putto-topped headstones beneath weeping willows, with a steepled church beyond. The monument contains a space where a family could inscribe the name and death dates of a deceased loved one. In this case, it has been inscribed to a young Civil War soldier: William W. Peabody Died at Fairfax Seminary, VA December 18th, 1864 Aged 18 years The young Mr. Peabody probably died in service for the Union during the American Civil War. Farifax Seminary was a Union hospital and military headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia. The hospital served nearly two thousand soldiers during the war time. Five hundred were also buried on the Seminary's grounds. 13.75 x 9.5 inches, artwork 23 x 19 inches, frame Published before 1864 Inscribed bottom center "Lith. & Pub. by N. Currier. 2 Spruce St. N.Y." Framed to conservation standards using 100 percent rag matting and TruVue Conservation Clear glass, housed in a gold gilded moulding. Nathaniel Currier was a tall introspective man with a melancholy nature. He could captivate people with his piercing stare or charm them with his sparkling blue eyes. Nathaniel was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts on March 27th, 1813, the second of four children. His parents, Nathaniel and Hannah Currier, were distant cousins who lived a humble yet spartan life. When Nathaniel was eight years old, tragedy struck. Nathaniel’s father unexpectedly passed away leaving Nathaniel and his eleven-year-old brother Lorenzo to provide for the family. In addition to their mother, Nathaniel and Lorenzo had to care for six-year-old sister Elizabeth and two-year-old brother Charles. Nathaniel worked a series of odd jobs to support the family, and at fifteen, he started what would become a life-long career when he apprenticed in the Boston lithography shop of William and John Pendleton. A Bavarian gentleman named Alois Senefelder invented lithography just 30 years prior to young Nat Currier’s apprenticeship. While under the employ of the brothers Pendleton, Nat was taught the art of lithography by the firm’s chief printer, a French national named Dubois, who brought the lithography trade to America. Lithography involves grinding a piece of limestone flat and smooth then drawing in mirror image on the stone with a special grease pencil. After the image is completed, the stone is etched with a solution of aqua fortis leaving the greased areas in slight relief. Water is then used to wet the stone and greased-ink is rolled onto the raised areas. Since grease and water do not mix, the greased-ink is repelled by the moisture on the stone and clings to the original grease pencil lines. The stone is then placed in a press and used as a printing block to impart black on white images to paper. In 1833, now twenty-years old and an accomplished lithographer, Nat Currier left Boston and moved to Philadelphia to do contract work for M.E.D. Brown, a noted engraver and printer. With the promise of good money, Currier hired on to help Brown prepare lithographic stones of scientific images for the American Journal of Sciences and Arts. When Nat completed the contract work in 1834, he traveled to New York City to work once again for his mentor John Pendleton, who was now operating his own shop located at 137 Broadway. Soon after the reunion, Pendleton expressed an interest in returning to Boston and offered to sell his print shop to Currier. Young Nat did not have the financial resources to buy the shop, but being the resourceful type he found another local printer by the name of Stodart. Together they bought Pendleton’s business. The firm ‘Currier & Stodart’ specialized in "job" printing. They produced many different types of printed items, most notably music manuscripts for local publishers. By 1835, Stodart was frustrated that the business was not making enough money and he ended the partnership, taking his investment with him. With little more than some lithographic stones, and a talent for his trade, twenty-two year old Nat Currier set up shop in a temporary office at 1 Wall Street in New York City. He named his new enterprise ‘N. Currier, Lithographer’ Nathaniel continued as a job printer and duplicated everything from music sheets to architectural plans. He experimented with portraits, disaster scenes and memorial prints, and any thing that he could sell to the public from tables in front of his shop. During 1835 he produced a disaster print Ruins of the Planter's Hotel, New Orleans, which fell at two O’clock on the Morning of the 15th of May 1835, burying 50 persons, 40 of whom Escaped with their Lives. The public had a thirst for newsworthy events, and newspapers of the day did not include pictures. By producing this print, Nat gave the public a new way to “see” the news. The print sold reasonably well, an important fact that was not lost on Currier. Nat met and married Eliza Farnsworth in 1840. He also produced a print that same year titled Awful Conflagration of the Steamboat Lexington in Long Island Sound on Monday Evening, January 18, 1840, by which melancholy occurrence over One Hundred Persons Perished. This print sold out very quickly, and Currier was approached by an enterprising publication who contracted him to print a single sheet addition of their paper, the New York Sun. This single page paper is presumed to be the first illustrated newspaper ever published. The success of the Lexington print launched his career nationally and put him in a position to finally lift his family up. In 1841, Nat and Eliza had their first child, a son they named Edward West Currier. That same year Nat hired his twenty-one year old brother Charles and taught him the lithography trade, he also hired his artistically inclined brother Lorenzo to travel out west and make sketches of the new frontier as material for future prints. Charles worked for the firm on and off over the years, and invented a new type of lithographic crayon which he patented and named the Crayola. Lorenzo continued selling sketches to Nat for the next few years. In 1843, Nat and Eliza had a daughter, Eliza West Currier, but tragedy struck in early 1847 when their young daughter died from a prolonged illness. Nat and Eliza were grief stricken, and Eliza, driven by despair, gave up on life and passed away just four months after her daughter’s death. The subject of Nat Currier’s artwork changed following the death of his wife and daughter, and he produced many memorial prints and sentimental prints during the late 1840s. The memorial prints generally depicted grief stricken families posed by gravestones (the stones were left blank so the purchasers could fill in the names of the dearly departed). The sentimental prints usually depicted idealized portraits of women and children, titled with popular Christian names of the day. Late in 1847, Nat Currier married Lura Ormsbee, a friend of the family. Lura was a self-sufficient woman, and she immediately set out to help Nat raise six-year-old Edward and get their house in order. In 1849, Lura delivered a son, Walter Black Currier, but fate dealt them a blow when young Walter died one year later. While Nat and Lura were grieving the loss of their new son, word came from San Francisco that Nat’s brother Lorenzo had also passed away from a brief illness. Nat sank deeper into his natural quiet melancholy. Friends stopped by to console the couple, and Lura began to set an extra place at their table for these unexpected guests. She continued this tradition throughout their lives. In 1852, Charles introduced a friend, James Merritt Ives, to Nat and suggested he hire him as a bookkeeper. Jim Ives was a native New Yorker born in 1824 and raised on the grounds of Bellevue Hospital where his father was employed as superintendent. Jim was a self-trained artist and professional bookkeeper. He was also a plump and jovial man, presenting the exact opposite image of his new boss. Jim Ives met Charles Currier through Caroline Clark, the object of Jim’s affection. Caroline’s sister Elizabeth was married to Charles, and Caroline was a close friend of the Currier family. Jim eventually proposed marriage to Caroline and solicited an introduction to Nat Currier, through Charles, in hopes of securing a more stable income to support his future wife. Ives quickly set out to improve and modernize his new employer’s bookkeeping methods. He reorganized the firm’s sizable inventory, and used his artistic skills to streamline the firm’s production methods. By 1857, Nathaniel had become so dependent on Jims’ skills and initiative that he offered him a full partnership in the firm and appointed him general manager. The two men chose the name ‘Currier & Ives’ for the new partnership, and became close friends. Currier & Ives produced their prints in a building at 33 Spruce Street where they occupied the third, fourth and fifth floors. The third floor was devoted to the hand operated printing presses that were built by Nat's cousin, Cyrus Currier, at his shop Cyrus Currier & Sons in Newark, NJ. The fourth floor found the artists, lithographers and the stone grinders at work. The fifth floor housed the coloring department, and was one of the earliest production lines in the country. The colorists were generally immigrant girls, mostly German, who came to America with some formal artistic training. Each colorist was responsible for adding a single color to a print. As a colorist finished applying their color, the print was passed down the line to the next colorist to add their color. The colorists worked from a master print displayed above their table, which showed where the proper colors were to be placed. At the end of the table was a touch up artist who checked the prints for quality, touching-in areas that may have been missed as it passed down the line. During the Civil War, demand for prints became so great that coloring stencils were developed to speed up production. Although most Currier & Ives prints were colored in house, some were sent out to contract artists. The rate Currier & Ives paid these artists for coloring work was one dollar per one hundred small folios (a penny a print) and one dollar per one dozen large folios. Currier & Ives also offered uncolored prints to dealers, with instructions (included on the price list) on how to 'prepare the prints for coloring.' In addition, schools could order uncolored prints from the firm’s catalogue to use in their painting classes. Nathaniel Currier and James Merritt Ives attracted a wide circle of friends during their years in business. Some of their more famous acquaintances included Horace Greeley, Phineas T. Barnum, and the outspoken abolitionists Rev. Henry Ward, and John Greenleaf Whittier (the latter being a cousin of Mr. Currier). Nat Currier and Jim Ives described their business as "Publishers of Cheap and Popular Pictures" and produced many categories of prints. These included Disaster Scenes, Sentimental Images, Sports, Humor, Hunting Scenes, Politics, Religion, City and Rural Scenes, Trains, Ships, Fire Fighters, Famous Race Horses, Historical Portraits, and just about any other topic that satisfied the general public's taste. In all, the firm produced in excess of 7500 different titles, totaling over one million prints produced from 1835 to 1907. Nat Currier retired in 1880, and signed over his share of the firm to his son Edward. Nat died eight years later at his summer home 'Lion’s Gate' in Amesbury, Massachusetts. Jim Ives remained active in the firm until his death in 1895, when his share of the firm passed to his eldest son, Chauncey. In 1902, faced will failing health from the ravages of Tuberculosis, Edward Currier sold his share of the firm to Chauncey Ives...
    Category

    Mid-19th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Watercolor, Lithograph

  • 'May Morning' from 'American Country Life' lithograph, N. Currier and F. Palmer
    By Nathaniel Currier
    Located in Milwaukee, WI
    The present print is one of several examples produced for Nathaniel Currier by his longtime collaborator Frances F. "Fanny" Palmer. Harry T. Peters wrote of her: "There is no more interesting and appealing character among the group of artists who worked for Currier & Ives than Fanny Palmer. In an age when women, well-bred women in particular, did not generally work for a living Fanny Palmer for years did exacting, full-time work in order to support a large and dependent family ... Her work ... had great charm, homeliness, and a conscientious attention to detail." One of a series of four prints showing American country life in different seasons, the image presents the viewer with a picturesque view of a successful American farm. In the foreground, a gentleman rides a horse with a young boy before a respectable Italianate country house. Two women and a young girl pick flowers in the garden and several farm workers attend to their duties. Beyond are other homes and a city on the coast. 16.63 x 23.75 inches, artwork 28.13 x 33.38 inches, frame Entitled bottom center "American Country Life - May Morning" Signed in the stone, lower left "F.F. Palmer, Del." Signed in the stone, lower right "Lith. by N. Currier" Copyrighted lower center "Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1855 by N. Currier in the Clerk's office of the Southern District of N.Y." Inscribed bottom center "New York, Published by N. Currier 152 Nassau Street" Framed to conservation standards using silk-lined 100 percent rag matting and Museum Glass with a gold gilded liner, all housed in a stained wood moulding. Nathaniel Currier was a tall introspective man with a melancholy nature. He could captivate people with his piercing stare or charm them with his sparkling blue eyes. Nathaniel was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts on March 27th, 1813, the second of four children. His parents, Nathaniel and Hannah Currier, were distant cousins who lived a humble yet spartan life. When Nathaniel was eight years old, tragedy struck. Nathaniel’s father unexpectedly passed away leaving Nathaniel and his eleven-year-old brother Lorenzo to provide for the family. In addition to their mother, Nathaniel and Lorenzo had to care for six-year-old sister Elizabeth and two-year-old brother Charles. Nathaniel worked a series of odd jobs to support the family, and at fifteen, he started what would become a life-long career when he apprenticed in the Boston lithography shop of William and John Pendleton. A Bavarian gentleman named Alois Senefelder invented lithography just 30 years prior to young Nat Currier’s apprenticeship. While under the employ of the brothers Pendleton, Nat was taught the art of lithography by the firm’s chief printer, a French national named Dubois, who brought the lithography trade to America. Lithography involves grinding a piece of limestone flat and smooth then drawing in mirror image on the stone with a special grease pencil. After the image is completed, the stone is etched with a solution of aqua fortis leaving the greased areas in slight relief. Water is then used to wet the stone and greased-ink is rolled onto the raised areas. Since grease and water do not mix, the greased-ink is repelled by the moisture on the stone and clings to the original grease pencil lines. The stone is then placed in a press and used as a printing block to impart black on white images to paper. In 1833, now twenty-years old and an accomplished lithographer, Nat Currier left Boston and moved to Philadelphia to do contract work for M.E.D. Brown, a noted engraver and printer. With the promise of good money, Currier hired on to help Brown prepare lithographic stones of scientific images for the American Journal of Sciences and Arts. When Nat completed the contract work in 1834, he traveled to New York City to work once again for his mentor John Pendleton, who was now operating his own shop located at 137 Broadway. Soon after the reunion, Pendleton expressed an interest in returning to Boston and offered to sell his print shop to Currier. Young Nat did not have the financial resources to buy the shop, but being the resourceful type he found another local printer by the name of Stodart. Together they bought Pendleton’s business. The firm ‘Currier & Stodart’ specialized in "job" printing. They produced many different types of printed items, most notably music manuscripts for local publishers. By 1835, Stodart was frustrated that the business was not making enough money and he ended the partnership, taking his investment with him. With little more than some lithographic stones, and a talent for his trade, twenty-two year old Nat Currier set up shop in a temporary office at 1 Wall Street in New York City. He named his new enterprise ‘N. Currier, Lithographer’ Nathaniel continued as a job printer and duplicated everything from music sheets to architectural plans. He experimented with portraits, disaster scenes and memorial prints, and any thing that he could sell to the public from tables in front of his shop. During 1835 he produced a disaster print Ruins of the Planter's Hotel, New Orleans, which fell at two O’clock on the Morning of the 15th of May 1835, burying 50 persons, 40 of whom Escaped with their Lives. The public had a thirst for newsworthy events, and newspapers of the day did not include pictures. By producing this print, Nat gave the public a new way to “see” the news. The print sold reasonably well, an important fact that was not lost on Currier. Nat met and married Eliza Farnsworth in 1840. He also produced a print that same year titled Awful Conflagration of the Steamboat Lexington in Long Island Sound on Monday Evening, January 18, 1840, by which melancholy occurrence over One Hundred Persons Perished. This print sold out very quickly, and Currier was approached by an enterprising publication who contracted him to print a single sheet addition of their paper, the New York Sun. This single page paper is presumed to be the first illustrated newspaper ever published. The success of the Lexington print launched his career nationally and put him in a position to finally lift his family up. In 1841, Nat and Eliza had their first child, a son they named Edward West Currier. That same year Nat hired his twenty-one year old brother Charles and taught him the lithography trade, he also hired his artistically inclined brother Lorenzo to travel out west and make sketches of the new frontier as material for future prints. Charles worked for the firm on and off over the years, and invented a new type of lithographic crayon which he patented and named the Crayola. Lorenzo continued selling sketches to Nat for the next few years. In 1843, Nat and Eliza had a daughter, Eliza West Currier, but tragedy struck in early 1847 when their young daughter died from a prolonged illness. Nat and Eliza were grief stricken, and Eliza, driven by despair, gave up on life and passed away just four months after her daughter’s death. The subject of Nat Currier’s artwork changed following the death of his wife and daughter, and he produced many memorial prints and sentimental prints during the late 1840s. The memorial prints generally depicted grief stricken families posed by gravestones (the stones were left blank so the purchasers could fill in the names of the dearly departed). The sentimental prints usually depicted idealized portraits of women and children, titled with popular Christian names of the day. Late in 1847, Nat Currier married Lura Ormsbee, a friend of the family. Lura was a self-sufficient woman, and she immediately set out to help Nat raise six-year-old Edward and get their house in order. In 1849, Lura delivered a son, Walter Black Currier, but fate dealt them a blow when young Walter died one year later. While Nat and Lura were grieving the loss of their new son, word came from San Francisco that Nat’s brother Lorenzo had also passed away from a brief illness. Nat sank deeper into his natural quiet melancholy. Friends stopped by to console the couple, and Lura began to set an extra place at their table for these unexpected guests. She continued this tradition throughout their lives. In 1852, Charles introduced a friend, James Merritt Ives, to Nat and suggested he hire him as a bookkeeper. Jim Ives was a native New Yorker born in 1824 and raised on the grounds of Bellevue Hospital where his father was employed as superintendent. Jim was a self-trained artist and professional bookkeeper. He was also a plump and jovial man, presenting the exact opposite image of his new boss. Jim Ives met Charles Currier through Caroline Clark, the object of Jim’s affection. Caroline’s sister Elizabeth was married to Charles, and Caroline was a close friend of the Currier family. Jim eventually proposed marriage to Caroline and solicited an introduction to Nat Currier, through Charles, in hopes of securing a more stable income to support his future wife. Ives quickly set out to improve and modernize his new employer’s bookkeeping methods. He reorganized the firm’s sizable inventory, and used his artistic skills to streamline the firm’s production methods. By 1857, Nathaniel had become so dependent on Jims’ skills and initiative that he offered him a full partnership in the firm and appointed him general manager. The two men chose the name ‘Currier & Ives’ for the new partnership, and became close friends. Currier & Ives produced their prints in a building at 33 Spruce Street where they occupied the third, fourth and fifth floors. The third floor was devoted to the hand operated printing presses that were built by Nat's cousin, Cyrus Currier, at his shop Cyrus Currier & Sons in Newark, NJ. The fourth floor found the artists, lithographers and the stone grinders at work. The fifth floor housed the coloring department, and was one of the earliest production lines in the country. The colorists were generally immigrant girls, mostly German, who came to America with some formal artistic training. Each colorist was responsible for adding a single color to a print. As a colorist finished applying their color, the print was passed down the line to the next colorist to add their color. The colorists worked from a master print displayed above their table, which showed where the proper colors were to be placed. At the end of the table was a touch up artist who checked the prints for quality, touching-in areas that may have been missed as it passed down the line. During the Civil War, demand for prints became so great that coloring stencils were developed to speed up production. Although most Currier & Ives prints were colored in house, some were sent out to contract artists. The rate Currier & Ives paid these artists for coloring work was one dollar per one hundred small folios (a penny a print) and one dollar per one dozen large folios. Currier & Ives also offered uncolored prints to dealers, with instructions (included on the price list) on how to 'prepare the prints for coloring.' In addition, schools could order uncolored prints from the firm’s catalogue to use in their painting classes. Nathaniel Currier and James Merritt Ives attracted a wide circle of friends during their years in business. Some of their more famous acquaintances included Horace Greeley, Phineas T. Barnum, and the outspoken abolitionists Rev. Henry Ward, and John Greenleaf Whittier (the latter being a cousin of Mr. Currier). Nat Currier and Jim Ives described their business as "Publishers of Cheap and Popular Pictures" and produced many categories of prints. These included Disaster Scenes, Sentimental Images, Sports, Humor, Hunting Scenes, Politics, Religion, City and Rural Scenes, Trains, Ships, Fire Fighters, Famous Race Horses, Historical Portraits, and just about any other topic that satisfied the general public's taste. In all, the firm produced in excess of 7500 different titles, totaling over one million prints produced from 1835 to 1907. Nat Currier retired in 1880, and signed over his share of the firm to his son Edward. Nat died eight years later at his summer home 'Lion’s Gate' in Amesbury, Massachusetts. Jim Ives remained active in the firm until his death in 1895, when his share of the firm passed to his eldest son, Chauncey. In 1902, faced will failing health from the ravages of Tuberculosis, Edward Currier sold his share of the firm to Chauncey Ives...
    Category

    Mid-19th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Watercolor, Lithograph

  • 'Partridge Shooting' original hand-colored lithograph by Nathaniel Currier
    By Nathaniel Currier
    Located in Milwaukee, WI
    The present hand-colored lithograph presents the viewer with a hunting scene in a picturesque landscape. In the foreground, a man approaches two partridges as his two pointers prepare to flush them out. Beyond, a white fence draws our eyes to the homestead in the distance. Images like this one show how people in the United States were trying to identify themselves as a new nation in the North American landscape - as separate from their European counterparts but with similar similar and specific wildlife and magesties of nature. It also identifies hunting in this landscape as an American pastime. 9.25 x 12.5 inches, artwork 18.38 x 22 inches, frame Entitled bottom center "Partridge Shooting...
    Category

    Mid-19th Century Romantic Figurative Prints

    Materials

    Watercolor, Lithograph

Recently Viewed

View All