'Sylvan Maze' — Mid-century American Surrealism
By Robert Vale Faro
Located in Myrtle Beach, SC
Robert Vale Faro, 'Sylvan Maze', color lithograph, 1946, edition 20. Signed, dated, titled and
Lithograph
Robert Vale Faro was a modernist architect and artist associated with the Chicago Bauhaus. He received his degree in architecture and design from the Armour Institute in Chicago and worked at L'Ecole Des Beaux-arts, Paris, from 1924–27, where he was influenced by Harry Kurt Bieg and Le Corbusier. Upon his return to Chicago, Faro worked with the important modernist Chicago architects George and William Keck under Louis Sullivan. Faro founded the avant-garde printmaking group Vanguard in 1945. The group counted Atelier 17 artists Stanley William Hayter, Sue Fuller and Anne Ryan as New York members and Francine Felsenthal in Chicago. The Brooklyn Museum mounted a show of Vanguard artists' work in 1946, which subsequently toured several other institutions in the United States. Faro's visionary graphics from the 1940s are a sophisticated blend of Abstract Expressionism, Surrealism, and Indian Space Painting, with a humorous, often satiric bent, perhaps serving the artist as an emotional counterpoint to Bauhaus Formalism. His work is in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the National Gallery of Art and the Seattle Art Museum.
Explore a vast range of abstract prints on 1stDibs to find a piece to enhance your existing collection or transform a space.
Unlike figurative paintings and other figurative art, which focuses on realism and representational perspectives, abstract art concentrates on visual interpretation. An artist may use a single color or simple geometric forms to create a world of depth. Printmaking has a rich history of abstraction. Through materials like stone, metal, wood and wax, an image can be transferred from one surface to another.
During the 19th century, iconic artists, including Edvard Munch, Paul Cézanne, Georgiana Houghton and others, began exploring works based on shapes and colors. This was a departure from the academic conventions of European painting and would influence the rise of 20th-century abstraction and its pioneers, like Pablo Picasso and Piet Mondrian.
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