Daniel Maffia Portrait Paintings

Striking Fauvist portrait with a vibrant, high voltage color palette, featuring a green woman with red hair by Sydney Helfman (American, 1926-2010). Aut...

Simka Simkhovitch (Russian/American 1893 - 1949) This came with a small grouping from the artist's family, some were hand signed some were not. These were studies for larger paintings. Simka Simkhovitch (Симха Файбусович Симхович) (aka Simka Faibusovich Simkhovich) (Novozybkov, Russia May 21, 1885 O.S./June 2, 1885 N.S.—Greenwich, Connecticut February 25, 1949) was a Ukrainian-Russian Jewish artist and immigrant to the United States. He painted theater scenery in his early career and then had several showings in galleries in New York City. Winning Works Progress Administration (WPA) commissions in the 1930s, he completed murals for the post offices in Jackson, Mississippi and Beaufort, North Carolina. His works are in the permanent collections of the Dallas Museum of Art, the National Museum of American Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Born outside Kyiv (Petrograd Ukraine) into a Jewish family who owned a small department store. During a severe case of measles when he was seven, Simcha Simchovitch sketched the views outside his window and decided to become an artist, over his father's objections. Beginning in 1905, he studied at the Grekov Odessa Art School and upon completion of his studies in 1911 received a recommendation to be admitted to the Imperial Academy of Arts. Though he enrolled to begin classes in architecture, painting, and sculpture at the Imperial Academy, he was dropped from the school roster in December because of the quota on the number of Jewish students and drafted into the army. Simchovitch served as a private in the 175th Infantry Regiment Baturyn [ru] until his demobilization in 1912. Re-enrolling in the Imperial Academy, he audited classes. Simka Simkhovitch exhibited paintings and sculptures in 1918 as part of an exhibition of Jewish artists and in 1919 placed 1st in the competition "The Great Russian Revolution" with a painting called "Russian Revolution" which was hung in the State Museum of Revolution. In 1922, Simkha Simkhovitch exhibited at the International Book Fair in Florence (Italian: Fiera Internazionale del Libro di Firenze). In 1924, Simkhovitch came to the United States to make illustrations for Soviet textbooks and decided to immigrate instead. Initially he supported himself by doing commercial art and a few portrait commissions. In 1927, he was hired to paint a screen for a scene in the play "The Command to Love" by Fritz Gottwald and Rudolph Lothar which was playing at the Longacre Theatre on Broadway. Art dealers began clamoring for the screen and Simkhovitch began a career as a screen painter for the theater. Catching the attention of the screenwriter, Ernest Pascal, he worked as an illustrator for Pascal, who then introduced him to gallery owner, Marie Sterner. Simkhovitch's works appeared at the Marie Sterner Gallery beginning with a 1927 exhibit and were repeated the following year. Simkhovitch had an exhibit in 1929 at Sterner's on circus paintings. In 1931, he held a showing of works at the Helen Hackett Gallery, in New York City and later that same year he was one of the featured artists of a special exhibit in San Francisco at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park. The exhibit was coordinated by Marie Sterner and included four watercolors, including one titled "Nudes". He is of the generation of Russian Soviet artists such as Isaac Pailes, Serge Charchoune, Marc Chagall, Chana Orloff, Isaac Ilyich Levitan, and Ossip Zadkine. In 1936, Simkhovitch was selected to complete the mural for the WPA Post office project in Jackson, Mississippi. The mural was hung in the post office and courthouse in 1938 depicted a plantation theme. Painted on the wall behind the judge’s bench, “Pursuits of Life in Mississippi”, a depiction of black workers engaged in manual labor amid scenes of white professionals and socialites, was eventually covered over in later years during renovations due to its stereotypical African American imagery. The following year, his painting "Holiday" won praise at an exhibition in Lincoln, Nebraska. In 1940, Simkhovitch's second WPA post office project was completed when four murals, "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat", "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright", "Sand Ponies" and "Canada Geese" were installed in Beaufort, North Carolina. The works were commissioned in 1938 and did not generate the controversy that the Jackson mural had. The main mural is "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright" and depicts a shipwreck which had occurred in Beaufort in 1866. "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat" depicted the lighthouse built in 1859 and the mail boat that was running mail during the time which Simkhovitch was there. The boat ran mail for the area until 1957. "Sand Ponies" shows the wild horses common to the North Carolina barrier islands and "Canada Geese" showed the importance of hunting and fishing in the area. All four murals were restored in the 1990s by Elisabeth Speight, daughter of two other WPA muralists, Francis Speight...

Striking and colorful mid century Fauvist portrait of a man by Sydney Helfman (American, 1926-2010). The expressive and vibrant color palette, a signatu...

Crying Clown Portrait in Oil on Canvas Portrait of a sad clown by San Francisco artist John Peers (American, 1922-2009). This portrait is closely fra...

This captivating 1945 oil painting by American artist Hayes Lyon portrays Bessy Lyon, the artist’s wife, in a warm and intimate portrait. The piece features soft yet vivid tones and ...

Subtle and moody portrait of a Pensive man by Joan Tidwell (American, 1930-2002). The sitter in the portrait is a middle-aged man looking slightly downwards, wearing a collared shirt. This piece is completed in a tan and green palette, creating a somber feeling. Of particular note are the confident, thick brushstrokes - each one is well-placed in the modernist style. Similar in some ways to Picasso's portraits. Signed "Joan Tidwell" on verso Unframed. Canvas size: 30"H x 22"W oan Gay Tidwell (American, 1930-2002) was born and raised in Hollywood, CA, where she had some success as a child actor. Later, she graduated Magna Cum Laude from the University of Washington with a Master's Degree in English Literature and Drama. Tidwell moved to the Bay...

From the estate of Jerry Opper & Ruth Friedman Opper Black Floor c. 1940-1950's Gouache on Paper 15" x 18" Unframed *Custom framing available for additional charge. Please expect framing time between 3-5 weeks. From the estate of Ruth Friedmann Opper & Jerry Opper. Ruth was the daughter of Bauhaus artist, Gustav Friedmann. San Francisco Abstract Expression A free-spirited wave of creative energy swept through the San Francisco art community after World War II. Challenging accepted modes of painting, Abstract Expressionists produced highly experimental works that jolted the public out of its postwar complacency. Abstract Expressionism resulted from a broad collective impulse rather than the inspiration of a small band of New York artists. Documenting the interchanges between the East and West Coasts, she cites areas of mutual influence and shows the impact of San Francisco on the New York School, including artists such as Mark Rothko and Ad Reinhardt. San Francisco's Beat poets...

Boldly colored portrait of a the artist sketching by California artist Richard "Don" Klopfer (1920-2009). The seated figure is juxtaposed to a fun and vibrant two-toned background of...

A fantastic modern portrait of a young boy. This work is signed what appears to be Paul Sellers and dated 1937, but we have not found information on the artist. The work dated 1936...

From the estate of Jerry Opper & Ruth Friedmann Opper Slit c. 1940-1950's Gouache on Paper 15" x 18", Unframed *Custom framing available for additional charge. Please expect framing...

An Upper East Side of Manhattan New York city scene of bald guy reading newspaper on bench with East River and tugboat in background. The 1970s were the “glory days,” Huffaker says, for himself and a stable of talented illustrators whose work routinely found itself on the covers of the nation’s premier newsmagazines and in the pages of The New York Times. For the better part of that decade, Huffaker was among an elite breed of commercial artists—his hero and fellow Southerner Jack Davis, the legendary Mad Magazine illustrator, among them—working during a remarkable period when art directors routinely turned to illustration to give comic relief to the country’s deeply serious and dark problems. From civil rights and the women’s movement to Vietnam and Watergate, the gas crisis and inflation to the rise of Jimmy Carter, Huffaker mined a deep well of material ripe for his brand of visual wit and caustic satire. He sent his portfolio to children's book illustrator Maurice Sendak, the legendary “Where The Wild Things Are” illustrator to gauge his prospects, and when Sendak replied, “C’mon up, you’ll do all right,” SELECT HONORS: 2 Page-One Awards (from the New York Newspaper Guild), for work in Fortune Magazine and Sports Illustrated. Nominated 3 times for Cartoonist-of-the-Year by the National Cartoonists Society (illustration category). Desi Award of Excellence (Graphic Design Magazine). 20 Award of Merit citations from the Society of Illustrators. One-man show, Society of Illustrators. Illustrators 22 - annual national exhibition for the Society of Illustrators. SELECT MAGAZINE COVERS Time Magazine (6), Sports Illustrated (2), Business Week (12), Forbes, Saturday Review, New York Times Sunday Magazine, The New Republic, Family Weekly, Madison Avenue, New York Daily News Sunday Magazine (2), Junior Scholastic, ACLU, The Nation , and more EDUCATION BA, University of Alabama. Attended Pratt Graphic Center and The Art Students League, New York City. BOOKS WRITTEN AND ILLUSTRATED The Dispensible Man (M. Evans and Co.) and The Bald Book (M. Evans and Co.) BOOKS ILLUSTRATED White Is (Grove Press), The Begatting of a President (Ballantine Books), The Biggest Sneeze (Harper-Collins), H. Phillip Birdsong's ESP (Young Scott Books), Kids Letters to President Reagan (M. Evans), The Worlds Greatest Left-Handers (M. Evans), Does My Room Come Alive at Night (HarperCollins), The Man With Big Ears (HarperCollins), Jake Snake's Race (HarperCollins), and more POLITICAL CARTOONING Political cartoonist at The News and Obsever in Raleigh, NC and syndicated during the early 70's. Today, syndicated in 750 publications 3-times a week with Cagle Cartoons. FINE ART SHOWS Allied Artists of America, Salmagundi Club, Phillips Mill Annual (honorable mention), New Hope Shad Festival (grand Prize), Hunter Museum in Chattanooga ( one -man career retrospective), Santa Fe public library (one--man), Rosenfeld Gallery (Philadelphia), Potter...

Modern portrait of young girl named Cathy Gutman by American painter, Patricia Gren Hayes (b. 1932), 1982. Signed and dated lower left corner and on verso Provenance: Purchased as part of larger collection of artist's work from the estate of Larry Miller fine Art Unframed. Canvas size: 18"H x 16"W. Patricia Gren Hayes (American, b. 1932) is a Bay Area Figurative & Feminist Art Movement artist who studied at Winnipeg Public Art School in 1950. She received early recognition in Museum and Gallery competitions and exhibitions and was awarded a Special Education in Art recognition by the Winnipeg Museum of Fine Art, and was awarded a scholarship to the Banff College of Fine Art. Further studies were at The University of Manitoba. She was a Member of Winnipeg Free Press Sketch Club and was a Cartoonist and paste-up for a French-English bi-weekly, in Eastern Canada; She studied outdoor impressionism in New York in 1960; in 1962, attended The California College of Arts and Crafts, and in 1976 B.A., U.C. Berkeley where she studied under Elmer Bischoff, David Simpson, Joan Brown, Felix Ruvolo, Yolanda Lopez and Vincent Perez. She started a freelance commercial art business in 1963; copyrighted a National Cartoon, 1976, and served as Exhibition Director for San Francisco Woman Artists Gallery and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 1976-1978. She was a workshop instructor at the San Francisco Woman Artists Gallery, 1977-1985; and was Manager/Owner Stanton Art Gallery, Alameda, CA, 1976-1982. Solo Exhibitions: Berkeley Marina, 1974; Oakland Center for The Visual Arts, "Images of Women", 1979 Group Exhibitions: Oakland's Dept of Education, 1963, Studio One; Alameda County Fair, 1975, 1976, 1978; San Francisco Art Festival, 1969, 1970, 1976, 1977, 1978; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 1976, 1977, 1978; San Francisco Women Artists Gallery Exhibition, award winner - 1970, 1977, 1978; Hayward Bay Fair Art Festival, award winner - 1971; Capricorn Assunder Gallery, 1973; Oakland Art Festival, 1973, 1974; Alameda Art Association, 1978; El Cerrito...