Charles Coutry Art

This is a framed 18th century Giovanni Battista Piranesi etching entitled: "Veduta interna del Sepocro di Santa Costanza, fabbricat...

William P. Hicks has drawn everything about the circus that will fit in the plate. The main figure is an aerial act with a woman balancing on rope held by a figure on the floor. Ther...

Points of Departure II: Nijinsky Variations Robert E. Townsend, 1996 Resist-ground etching and engraving on BFK-Rives paper, 24 x 38 inches (618 x 965 mm), full margins. Signed, ti...

1917. Etching. Hardie 175. 8 x 15 (sheet 10 1/8 x 16 15/16). Edition 76. Slight mat line; otherwise excellent condition. A rich impression printed on antique laid paper with full m...

"Qui a raison?" Chassidic boy, Yeshiva student with open book. Judaica, Jewish scenes from a ghetto. Saul Yaffie, a.k.a. Paul Jeffay, (1898–1957) was a Scottish Jewish artist. Known for his charming French street scenes as well as his judaica work. This is signed in the plate and dated 1931 in the print. This is done in a style similar to the works of the early Bezalel School artists Hermann Struck and Jakob Steinhardt. This lithograph, by artist Paul Jeffay depicts a Judaic Shtetl interior scene with great charm and sensitivity. Saul Yaffie was born in Blythswood, Glasgow on 29 April 1898. His mother was Kate Yaffie (née Karkonoski), and his father, Bernard Yaffie, was a master tailor. Like many Russian Jews, Kate and Bernard Yaffie fled persecution in Russia during a wave of anti-Jewish pogroms triggered by the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881. Saul's father was naturalised as a British citizen by the time that Saul himself was three; a Bernard Yaffie is recorded as living at Abbotsford Place in the old Gorbals, where the young Saul spent the early years of his childhood. The Yaffies were not unique in their situation: the Gorbals was the centre of Scotland's Jewish community and home to a large proportion of Glasgow's immigrants throughout the early 20th century. Over time, there was a movement to some of the more affluent communities in Glasgow, such as Pollokshields and Garnethill, as many Jewish families gradually improved their social and economic situation. Like these, the Yaffies also experienced a time of good fortune, moving to a more agreeable address on Sinclair Drive, Cathcart as Bernard's tailoring business prospered. Saul attended day classes in drawing and painting, modelling, and life drawing at The Glasgow School of Art from 1912 to 1919. During the First World War, he was required to interrupt his studies to serve in the King's Own Scottish Borderers in 1916/17. Although subject to military conscription, Yaffie reached the rank of corporal during his service. Prior to his conscription Yaffie engaged in munitions work, something that was recorded in the GSA's student registers. The post-war economic depression that affected the country during the 1920s, also affected the Yaffie family directly: Bernard Yaffie's business suffered greatly, and the family eventually emigrated to Canada. Saul did not emigrate with his family, choosing instead to stay in Europe, and relocate to jazz age Paris where he continued his artistic practice. Now married, Saul sought to escape persecution in Europe by returning to the UK before the Second World War with his wife, Estusia. The two settled in Manchester, but returned to France after the war. In his memoires ‘Bronze in My Blood’, German-born sculptor Benno Schotz describes a Saul ‘Yaffe’, one of only three other Jewish students who attended The Glasgow School of Art at the time. (Schotz himself was exempt from joining the forces because he was ‘not yet a British subject’, and was engaged in war work in the drawing office of John Brown’s shipyards). On the outbreak of the war, Schotz writes, Yaffie won a poster competition to be displayed in Glasgow tramcars at the beginning of the 1914-18 war – his winning design depicted a woman with a child in her arms, fleeing from a fire behind her. While on leave from service, the young Saul told Schotz he had briefly been stationed in the same unit as Jewish American sculptor Jacob Epstein. This was most likely the 38th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, also known as ‘the Jewish Legion’, one of five Jewish battalions raised during WW1. ‘He told me how incongruous it was’, remembers Schotz, ‘to See Epstein scrubbing the floor of their hut, with a large diamond ring on his finger’. His work is included in the collection of the Ben Uri Museum in London along with Lucian Freud, David Bomberg, Mark Gertler, Josef Herman, Jankel Adler, Feliks Topolski...

Christmas. 1970. Etching. Garton catalog 9 state ii. 15 1/2 x 10 3/4 (sheet 20 1/8 x 17 1/4). Edition of 50. From the Penn Print Room edition published by McDonald and Nicholson in 1...

Jack Levine, American, 1915–2010 The Feast of Pure Reason, 1970 Etching, mezzotint and aquatint on copper in black ink. 20 w. 25 in., sight overall: 27 x 31.75 in., matted. Depict...

The Letter. 1921. Drypoint. Appleby 107. 7 x 9 3/8 (sheet 10 1/2 x 15 7/16). Edition 100. Illustrated: Fine Prints of the Year, 1925; Salaman, Modern Masters of Etching: Edmund Blamp...

Circle of or a follower of Ferdinand Bol - (1616-1680) (PHILOSOPHER READING) ca 1700 Etching on thin laid paper attached to support sheet at the top sh...

Reif 20.IIc(of e). 10 5/8 x 9 3/4 (sheet 19 X 12 3/4). Slight scattered foxing in the margins, away from the image. A rich, tonal impression printed on sturdy wove paper. Proof aside...

Politics (Tonnere de Brest). 1926. Drypoint. Appleby 108. 7 x 9 (sheet 10 1/2 x 15 1/2). A rich impression printed on cream wove paper with full margins. Illustrated: Salaman, Modern...

For a print that's nearly one hundred years old it feels very contemporary. Signed and titled in pencil. Besides the etching I think there is some false biting that adds tone here.