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Terrell James Abstract Drawings and Watercolors

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Artist: Terrell James
Field Study #749
By Terrell James
Located in Houston, TX
Terrell James Field Study #749, 2020 Oil on vellum 20 x 16 in (50.8 x 40.6 cm)
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Terrell James Abstract Drawings and Watercolors

Materials

Oil, Vellum

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"Colorful Geometric Abstraction, " Simon Samsonian, Armenian Artist
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Simon Samsonian (1912 - 2003) Colorful Geometric Abstraction, 1981 Oil on paper 16 x 22 inches Signed and dated lower right Provenance: Estate of the artist This survivor of the Armenian genocide wound up in a Cairo orphanage in 1927. He rose to fame as one of Egypt’s great modernists, but after moving to Long Island late in life he withdrew into anonymity. Now his compelling story is being told. Art historians are finally beginning to realize that the power of abstraction in its early years was a zeitgeist not limited to the major European centers of the avant-garde — Paris, Munich, and Moscow — but one that quickly rippled to major cities throughout the world. Within a few decades that original shock of a new vision had inspired thousands of artists from different cultures — particularly those the Middle East — whose translations were not slavish imitations of works by seminal figures like Picasso, Braque, Malevich, and Kandinsky but creative variants colored by their respective cultures. This essay focuses on an extraordinary Armenian artist, his harrowing survival of the genocide, his rise to fame in Cairo, and his creation of a unique style of abstraction. Art historians have typically formed a chorus that teaches the history of abstraction like this: Just before and during the World War I era, several avant-garde artists emerged to create shockingly different new forms by which artists could express themselves. In Paris, Picasso and Braque broke out with cubism, quickly followed by Mondrian. In Moscow, Malevich created Suprematism, the ultimate hard-edge geometric abstraction. 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But a lens that focuses myopically on the war between the avant-garde of Paris and New York misses the wider narrative of multiple aesthetic modernities that developed in the several decades following World War I. For Armenian artists the matter is even more complex owing to the genocide of 1915 where more than 1.5 million people — seventy-five percent of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire — were massacred. Those not shot on the spot were sent on death marches through the Mesopotamian desert without food or water. Frequently, the marchers were stripped and forced to walk naked under the scorching sun until they dropped dead. As a child Samsonian witnessed the murder of his parents and most of the members of his family. Soon thereafter, his older sister, Anahid, quickly shepherded him into a line of children being rescued by Greek nuns. But they became separated and he lost her, too. He was sent to a Greek orphanage in Smyrna (now Izmir), on Turkey’s west coast. 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Terrell James abstract drawings and watercolors for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Terrell James abstract drawings and watercolors available for sale on 1stDibs. You can also browse by medium to find art by Terrell James in oil paint, paint, paper and more. Much of the original work by this artist or collective was created during the 21st century and contemporary and is mostly associated with the abstract style. Not every interior allows for large Terrell James abstract drawings and watercolors, so small editions measuring 16 inches across are available. Customers who are interested in this artist might also find the work of Bruce Murphy, Dana Piazza, and Caroline Bullock. Terrell James abstract drawings and watercolors prices can differ depending upon medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $3,100 and tops out at $3,100, while the average work can sell for $3,100.

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