Charles Shaw Art

Stowe Vermont Village Sleigh Ride - Mid Century Winter Figurative Landscape A bright, crisp morning and a sleigh ride through new snow in Stowe, Vermont...

Expressive portrait of an artist working at a desk by an unknown artist (20th Century). An artist with brown hair and a moustache is working at a desk, with various supplies around h...

Giuseppe Migneco (Messina 1903 - Milan 1997) - The Fortune Teller. 49.5 x 39.5 cm (without frame) - 52.5 x 40.5 cm (with frame). Mixed media drawing on paper, in wooden frame. Sig...

John Steuart Curry "Sketching Wisconsin," 1946 oil on canvas 31.13 x 28 inches, canvas 39.75 x 36.75 x 2.5 inches, frame Signed and dated lower right Overall excellent condition Presented in a 24-karat gold leaf hand-carved wood frame John Steuart Curry (1897-1946) was an American regionalist painter active during the Great Depression and into World War II. He was born in Kansas on his family’s farm but went on to study art in Chicago, Paris and New York as young man. In Paris, he was exposed to the work of masters such as Peter Paul Rubens, Eugène Delacroix and Jacques-Louis David. As he matured, his work showed the influence of these masters, especially in his compositional decisions. Like the two other Midwestern regionalist artists that are most often grouped with him, Grant Wood (American, 1891-1942) and Thomas Hart Benton (American, 1889-1975), Curry was interested in representational works containing distinctly American subject matter. This was contrary to the popular art at the time, which was moving closer and closer to abstraction and individual expression. Sketching Wisconsin is an oil painting completed in 1946, the last year of John Steuart Curry’s life, during which time he was the artist-in-residence at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. The painting is significant in Curry’s body of work both as a very revealing self-portrait, and as a landscape that clearly and sensitively depicts the scenery of southern Wisconsin near Madison. It is also a portrait of the artist’s second wife, Kathleen Gould Curry, and is unique in that it contains a ‘picture within a picture,’ a compositional element that many early painting masters used to draw the eye of the viewer. This particular artwork adds a new twist to this theme: Curry’s wife is creating essentially the same painting the viewer is looking at when viewing Sketching Wisconsin. The triangular composition of the figures in the foreground immediately brings focus to a younger Curry, whose head penetrates the horizon line and whose gaze looks out towards the viewer. The eye then moves down to Mrs. Curry, who, seated on a folding stool and with her hand raised to paint the canvas on the easel before her, anchors the triangular composition. The shape is repeated in the legs of the stool and the easel. Behind the two figures, stripes of furrowed fields fall away gently down the hillside to a farmstead and small lake below. Beyond the lake, patches of field and forest rise and fall into the distance, and eventually give way to blue hills. Here, Curry has subverted the traditional artist’s self-portrait by portraying himself as a farmer first and an artist second. He rejects what he sees as an elitist art world of the East Coast and Europe. In this self-portrait he depicts himself without any pretense or the instruments of his profession and with a red tractor standing in the field behind him as if he was taking a break from the field work. Here, Curry’s wife symbolizes John Steuart Curry’s identity as an artist. Compared with a self-portrait of the artist completed a decade earlier, this work shows a marked departure from how the artist previously presented and viewed himself. In the earlier portrait, Curry depicted himself in the studio with brushes in hand, and with some of his more recognizable and successful canvases behind him. But in Sketching Wisconsin, Curry has taken himself out of the studio and into the field, indicating a shift in the artist’s self-conception. Sketching Wisconsin’s rural subject also expresses Curry’s populist ideals, that art could be relevant to anyone. This followed the broad educational objectives of UW’s artist-in-residence program. Curry was appointed to his position at the University of Wisconsin in 1937 and was the first person to hold any such position in the country, the purpose of which was to serve as an educational resource to the people of the state. He embraced his role at the University with zeal and not only opened the doors of his campus studio in the School of Agriculture to the community, but also spent a great deal of time traveling around the state of Wisconsin to visit rural artists who could benefit from his expertise. It was during his ten years in the program that Curry was able to put into practice his belief that art should be meaningful to the rural populace. However, during this time he also struggled with public criticism, as the dominant forces of the art market were moving away from representation. Perhaps it was Curry’s desire for public acceptance during the latter part of his career that caused him to portray himself as an Everyman in Sketching Wisconsin. Beyond its importance as a portrait of the artist, Sketching Wisconsin is also a detailed and sensitive landscape that shows us Curry’s deep personal connection to his environment. The landscape here can be compared to Wisconsin Landscape of 1938-39 (the Metropolitan Museum of Art), which presents a similar tableau of rolling hills with a patchwork of fields. Like Wisconsin Landscape, this is an incredibly detailed and expressive depiction of a place close to the artist’s heart. This expressive landscape is certainly the result of many hours spent sketching people, animals, weather conditions and topography of Wisconsin as Curry traveled around the state. The backdrop of undulating hills and the sweeping horizon, and the emotions evoked by it, are emphatically recognizable as the ‘driftless’ area of south-central Wisconsin. But while the Metropolitan’s Wisconsin Landscape conveys a sense of uncertainty or foreboding with its dramatic spring cloudscape and alternating bands of light and dark, Sketching Wisconsin has a warm and reflective mood. The colors of the foliage indicate that it is late summer and Curry seems to look out at the viewer approvingly, as if satisfied with the fertile ground surrounding him. The landscape in Sketching Wisconsin is also revealing of what became one of Curry’s passions while artist-in-residence at UW’s School of Agriculture – soil conservation. When Curry was a child in Kansas, he saw his father almost lose his farm and its soil to the erosion of The Dust Bowl. Therefore, he was very enthusiastic about ideas from UW’s School of Agriculture on soil conservation methods being used on Wisconsin farms. In Sketching Wisconsin, we see evidence of crop rotation methods in the terraced stripes of fields leading down the hillside away from the Curry’s and in how they alternate between cultivated and fallow fields. Overall, Sketching Wisconsin has a warm, reflective, and comfortably pastoral atmosphere, and the perceived shift in Curry’s self-image that is evident in the portrait is a positive one. After his rise to favor in the art world in the 1930’s, and then rejection from it due to the strong beliefs presented in his art, Curry is satisfied and proud to be farmer in this self-portrait. Curry suffered from high blood...

Original Abstract Portrait in Mixed Media on Paper I (1987) Example of 1980s vintage Latin American School abstract expressionist art of a minimalist portrait by California-based La...

Ink and wash on paper Signed ‘Harry’ and dated (lower right) 58cm × 38cm (74cm × 54cm framed) Henry Robertson Craig studied at the Dundee College of Art, where he met his lifelong p...

This oil on canvas by Menachem Gueffen, painted circa 1960, reflects the influence of the School of Paris and Post-War European Modernism. The composition presents a stylized female...

Christopher Clark's (US based) "Looking for Breakfast" is an original, handmade oil painting that depicts a bird perched in a flooded grassy field. Bio/artist statement: Christopher has been an artist since early childhood, when he would watch Bob Ross on PBS and mimic the famed oil painter’s art with crayons. He considers himself a self-educated artist, with his studies ranging from personal training with contemporary masters, to classical academic art technique, with much inspiration from 19th Century art and the Impressionist Movement. Christopher lived in Italy for a time, immersing himself in Italian culture and art, which continues to influence his painting. His fan base has grown considerably since his return to the US, gaining the attention of Lucasfilm and Marvel Fine Art, which both signed him as an officially licensed artist in 2016. Other clients include George Lucas, Major League Baseball, Louisville Slugger...

Latin American School Abstract Portrait in Mixed Media on Paper II (1987) Robert Azensky Fine Art Gallery is proud to present this gorgeous ex...

Bold and expressive large scale figurative abstract painting of two people conversing in a theater, with a silhouette of a third figure in the foreground, by Jane Voitle Mellin (Amer...

Artist: Raphael Soyer (1899-1987) Title: Girl with Braided Hair Year: Circa 1947 Medium: Oil on canvas Size: 12 x 9 inches; framed size, 19 x 16 inches Condition: Excellent Inscripti...

Ken Valastro (1954-2014) created dynamic oil paintings characterized by bold color contrasts and vigorous brushwork that captured the energy of urban scenes. His signature style feat...