The Lithuanian-American artist Irving Norman was a social Surrealist who painted large-scale and highly detailed critiques of contemporary life with hopes that viewers would consider the consequences of their actions and change their behavior.
Influenced by the dire conditions of the Great Depression, Norman’s massive canvases feature armies of clone-like figures behaving in the clockwork manner in which they have been programmed. He moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1934 before helping to defend the Spanish Republic from the fascist Franco dictatorship.
Norman survived the Spanish Civil War and in 1939 settled on Catalina Island off the Southern California coast, where he began drawing and painting from the atrocities he had witnessed. In 1940, he moved to San Francisco and had a solo exhibition at the San Francisco Museum of Art two years later. Norman then traveled to Mexico City and saw the murals of Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco and David Alfaro Siqueiros before moving to New York City to study at the Art Students League from 1946 to 1947. He returned to San Francisco in the late 1940s. In 1988, fire destroyed Norman’s home, studio, artwork and personal papers.
Find original Irving Norman paintings and prints on 1stDibs.
(Biography provided by Heather James Fine Art)
American Street Scene
By Irving Norman
Located in Palm Desert, CA
A painting by Irving Norman. "American Street Scene" is a macabre social surrealism city scape, oil on canvas in a bold palette of reds, blues, and yellows by artist Irving Norman. T...
Canvas, Oil
$200,000
How Come
By Irving Norman
Located in Palm Desert, CA
"How Come" is a Modern surrealist oil on canvas painting by Irving Norman in 1968. The artwork is 90 x 60 inches and 91 1/4 x 61 1/2 x 1 5/8 inches with the fram, weighing less than ...
Oil
$125,000
Bacchanal
By Irving Norman
Located in Palm Desert, CA
A painting by Irving Norman. "Bacchanal" is a macabre social surrealism painting, oil on canvas in a dark palette of reds, blues, and blacks by artist Irving Norman. The artwork is u...
Canvas, Oil
$150,000
Snapshots
By Irving Norman
Located in Palm Desert, CA
"Snapshots" is a modern surrealist oil on canvas painting by Irving Norman in 1986. The artwork is 40 x 90 inches and 41 3/8 x 91 1/4 x 1 5/8 inches with the frame, weighing less than 50 lbs. It is signed and dated lower right, "I.N. '68". Norman's surrealist paintings transport viewers into dystopian realms where human figures meld with machinery, creating haunting landscapes of industrialized chaos and existential reflection. This painting uses a series of vignettes or "snapshots" of human couples in various states of health and vigor. The grotesque nature of some of the bodies is juxtaposed in the bright swimsuits as children play under an ominous sky...
Oil
$100,000
Man and Time
By Irving Norman
Located in Palm Desert, CA
"Man and Time" is an American surrealist oil on canvas painting by Irving Norman in 1986. The artwork is 58 x 30 inches and 59 1/8 x 31 1/8 x 1 1/2 inches with the frame, weighing le...
Oil
The Human Condition - Monumental Scale Oil on Canvas Painting
By Irving Norman
Located in Palm Desert, CA
Irving Norman conceived and created "The Human Condition” at a time when he must have reflected deeply on the totality of his life. Given its grand scale and cinematic treatment, it ...
Canvas, Oil
$3,500
H 33 in W 28 in D 3 in
Stowe Vermont Village Sleigh Ride, Mid Century Winter Figurative Landscape
By Walter Thomas Sacks
Located in Soquel, CA
Stowe Vermont Village Sleigh Ride - Mid Century Winter Figurative Landscape A bright, crisp morning and a sleigh ride through new snow in Stowe, Vermont...
Canvas, Oil
"Untitled"
By Jean Calogero
Located in Southampton, NY
Oil on canvas painting by Jean Calogero. Circa 1950. Signed lower right. Condition: Good. Overall in museum quality gold leaf frame 17.5 by 15.75 inches. Provenance: Manhattan Co...
Canvas, Oil
$3,105Sale Price|35% Off
H 26 in W 36 in D 3 in
Original Post-War Painting of Mournes from Duldrum Ireland by Modern Artist
By Denis Thornton
Located in Preston, GB
Original Post-War Oil Painting of Mournes from Dundrum Ireland by 20th Century Modern Artist, Denis Thornton (1937-1999) Art measures 30 x 20 inches Frame measures 36 x 26 inches (...
Canvas, Cotton, Oil
Beach landscape on Atlantic French coast
Located in BELEYMAS, FR
Jean-Georges PASQUET (Périgueux 1851 - 1936) Pointe de Suzac at Saint Georges de Didonne Oil on canvas H. 59 cm; W. 85 cm Signed and dated 1885 lower left Provenance: Private collec...
Oil, Canvas
$4,500
H 29 in W 35 in D 2 in
“Impressionist Landscape, c. 1915-1920” California Forest American Impressionist
By Francis Stillwell Dixon
Located in Yardley, PA
“Impressionist Landscape, c. 1915-1920” by Francis Stillwell Dixon (American, 1879-1967). One of Dixon’s finest canvases, depicting a tranquil forest scene bathed in soft, dappled l...
Canvas, Oil
$5,500
H 19 in W 25 in
Children Playing on a Boat, likely New York/Brooklyn/Flatbush Area, c. 1895
Located in Philadelphia, PA
Charles Lewis Fussell (American, 1840–1909) Children Playing on a Boat Oil on canvas, 11 x 16 3/4 inches Framed: 19 x 25 inches (approx.) Signed at lower left: “C.L. Fussell” Charle...
Canvas, Oil
$4,500
H 31.5 in W 39 in D 2.5 in
“Quebec City, 1853” Panoramic Landscape View, Cityscape, Canada Signed Oil
By Edmund C. Coates
Located in Yardley, PA
“Quebec City, 1853” by Edmund C. Coates (American, 1816-1871). A luminous 19th-century view of Quebec City by the American painter Edmund C. Coates, known for his detailed Hudson Ri...
Canvas, Oil
"Untitled"
By Jean Calogero
Located in Southampton, NY
Oil on canvas painting by the Italian artist, Jean Calogero. Circa 1950. Signed lower left Overall in museum quality gold leaf frame 17.5 by 15.75 inches. Condition: Good. Provenan...
Canvas, Oil
$2,600Sale Price|35% Off
H 28.625 in W 40.625 in D 1.375 in
John Haymson "Brooklyn Bridge" Oil Painting of New York Skyline, circa 1955
By John Haymson
Located in Miami, FL
JOHN HAYMSON – "BROOKLYN BRIDGE" ⚜ Oil on Canvas ⚜ Hand Signed ⚜ Conservation Frame NEW YORK ICON IN VIVID DETAIL This atmospheric oil painting by John Haymson captures the enduring...
Canvas, Oil
$2,750
H 26 in W 48 in D 1 in
“Kennebec” Ship Portrait Sidewheeler Steamboat Paddle Steamer Oil on Canvas
Located in Yardley, PA
A striking and historically attentive portrait of the sidewheel steamer Kennebec, built in 1842. Rendered in crisp profile against a soft, painterly sky and calm Atlantic swells, Cameron’s portrait captures the stately elegance of early American steam navigation. The Kennebec, identified in bold red lettering on her paddle box, is shown under partial sail with twin smokestacks active - suggesting both the hybrid nature of early steam propulsion and the vessel’s readiness for sea. Flying period flags, including a U.S. ensign and company pennants, she presents as a proud representative of the Sanford Steamship Line, for whom she plied the route between Boston, Bangor, and the summer resorts of Maine. Her design, with a wood hull, 230-foot length, and distinctive “hogging truss,” speaks to mid-19th century innovation tailored to coastwise packets. Cameron’s style is reminiscent of 19th-century ship portraiture yet refined with contemporary technical precision. This is an excellent example of his work. This work is oil on canvas and is signed in the lower right. It is housed in its original black frame and retains the artist’s description of the ship on the reverse. Size: 22 inches tall by 44 inches wide (painting) 26 inches tall by 48 inches wide by 1 inch deep (frame) Provenance: Private collection; Acquired from the above About the artist: A Delaware artist, Scott Cameron paints the simple elegance of the America’s Cup races, serene coastal marsh scenes, timeless landscape vistas and historic steamboats in a style reminiscent of the era in which they reigned. An admirer of Andrew Wyeth and the Brandywine School of painters, Scott has combined the detail and quiet stillness of that School in his landscapes with the Luminist School’s sense of light glowing from within. A soft gentle atmosphere seems to fall over each scene adding to the peacefulness of the setting, and a sense of a time gone by. His America’s Cup scenes capture the action at a moment in time, allowing the beauty of the wind-filled sails to become the central design element of each painting. Scott Cameron has exhibited his oil paintings in numerous national and regional shows from the Mystic Seaport Museum to solo and group shows in some of the foremost galleries throughout the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states. Favorite painting locations are the waterways and coastal inlets of Martha’s Vineyard and Maryland’s Eastern Shore and the gentle rolling landscapes of rural Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland. Meticulous research is behind every historic steamboat and America’s Cup painting...
Canvas, Oil
Contact
By Airom
Located in Santa Monica, CA
Painting depicts contact, ambiguous as to whether it could be adverse contact or intimate contact between the focal characters.
India Ink, Oil
Figures in the Mist
Located in Soquel, CA
Abstract figurative work by Bruce Killiam (American, 20th Century). Figures are emerging from the mist, creating an ethereal, moody composition made up of subtle tones of tan, grey, ...
Canvas, Oil
NEW SYNTHESIS
By Irving Norman
Located in Los Angeles, CA
"NEW SYNTHESIS" GRAPHITE AND COLORED PENICL ON PAPER SIGNED, DATED 1947 ILLUSTRATED IN THE BOOK ON THE ARTIST "DARK METROPOLIS" 39.5 X 29.5 INCHES Irving Norman 1906-1889 Born Irving Noachowitz in 1906 in Vilna, which at the time was under Russia's control, Irving Norman emigrated to the United States in 1923, settling first in New York's Lower East, where he trained as a barber, and then in Los Angeles, where he opened his own barber shop in 1934. In 1938, Norman joined the Abraham Lincoln battalion of the International Brigade...
Color Pencil, Graphite