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"Double Landscape, " Black & White Two-plate Landscape Etching by Joseph Rozman
By Joseph Rozman
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Double Landscape" is an original two-plate landscape etching by Joseph Rozman. This artwork features two surreal landscape scenes in black and white.
2 1/2" x 3 1/4" art
11 5/8" x...
Category
1960s Surrealist Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
"Seba after Hiroshige" from "Japanese Suite" original lithograph signed pop art
By Michael Knigin
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Seba after Hiroshige" is an original color lithograph from the Japanese Suite by Michael Knigin. The artist signed the piece lower right and titled it...
Category
1970s Pop Art Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Circuit De L'Est" Original Aeronautical Lithograph Poster by Marguerite Montaut
By Marguerite Montaut
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Circuit De L'Est" is an original lithograph poster by Marguerite Montaut (GAMY). This artwork features an early biplane flying over farm fields. It is also passing over a river that...
Category
1910s Modern Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph, Ink
19th century landscape color lithograph seascape buildings cityscape houses
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Chicago in Early Days" is an original color lithograph by Kurz & Allison. This piece features multiple views of the city of Chicago.
16 3/4" x 23 1/4" art
28 1/8" x 33 7/8" frame
...
Category
1890s Academic Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Birthplace of Henry Clay, Hanover County, VA, " Lithograph by Kelloggs & Thayer
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Birthplace of Henry Clay, Hanover County, Virginia" is an original hand-colored lithograph by Kelloggs & Thayer. The piece features a homestead and farm anima...
Category
1870s Victorian Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Venise en Fleurs" from "Je Reve, " Surrealist Lithograph signed by Andre Masson
By André Masson
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Venise en Fleurs" is an original color lithograph by Andre Masson. This piece is from the "Je Reve" (I Dream) portfolio of 1975. The edition number, written lower left, is H.C. XXV/...
Category
1970s Surrealist Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Season's Greetings, " Winter Landscape Lithograph in Blue signed by Mark Mille
By Mark Mille 1
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Season's Greetings" is an original lithograph by Mark Mille. The artist signed the piece lower right and wrote the edition number (25/40) in the lower left. It features a winter river scene...
Category
1980s Post-Modern Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Skiing Near Holy Hill, " Original Silkscreen Landscape by Schomer Lichtner
By Schomer Lichtner
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Skiing Near Holy Hill" is an original silkscreen print by Schomer Lichtner. The artist initials are lower right, and the title is along the lower edge. This print depicts people skiing near Holy Hill, Wisconsin. The artist used a muted blue, a deep and dark purple, and accents of red to create this piece.
4 7/8" x 6 7/8" art
11 7/8" x 13 7/8" frame
Milwaukee artist, Schomer Lichtner passed away on May 9, 2006 at the age of 101. He continued to amaze and create with his whimsical paintings of ballerinas and cows. He and his late wife Ruth Grotenrath, both well-known Wisconsin artists, began their prolific careers as muralists for WPA projects, primarily post offices.
Schomer Lichtner was well known for his whimsical cows and ballerinas, such as his "Ballerina Dancing on Cow" sculpture below. The late James Auer, art critic for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel referred to Lichtner as the artist laureate of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He was the official artist of the Milwaukee Ballet.
Lichtner also painted murals for industry and private clients. Schomer was a printmaker and produced block prints, lithographs, and serigraph prints. His casein (paint made from dairy products) and acrylic paintings are of the rural Wisconsin landscape and farm animals. He became interested in cows when he and Ruth spent summers near Holy Hill in Washington County.
According to David Gordon, director of the Milwaukee Art Museum, Schomer Lichtner had a tremendous joie de vivre, " joy of life," and expressed it in his art.
Schomer Lichtner was nationally known for his whimsical paintings and sculptures of black- and white-patterned Holstein cows and elegant ballerina dancers. Lichtner also painted all sorts of combinations of beautiful women, flowers and country landscapes. James Auer, former Milwaukee Journal Sentinel art critic, said that his art eventually "exploded into expressionistic design elements with bold, flat areas of color and high energy that anticipated Pop Art." Auer went on to describe Lichtner’s work as full of "wit, vigor and virtuosity."
As early as 1930, Lichtner’s work was shown at the prestigious Carnegie International Exhibition in New York and at museums throughout the Midwest. As a student, he was a protégé of another icon of 20th century American art, Gustave Moeller...
Category
1940s American Modern Landscape Prints
Materials
Screen
"Emprunt 4% 1918 - Appel, " Original Lithograph Poster by A. Malassinet
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Emprunt 4% 1918 - Appel" is an original lithograph poster by A. Malassinet. This poster advertised a fund for the national defense during World War I. The following are two statemen...
Category
1910s Modern Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"French Air Show with Remarque of Head of Pilot, " Lithograph & Stencil by GAMY
By Marguerite Montaut
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"French Air Show with Remarque of Head of Pilot" is an original lithograph and stencil print by Marguerite Montaut (GAMY). It depicts an early airplane flying above a crowd of specta...
Category
1910s American Realist Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph, Stencil, Ink
"Savoie (Societe National des Chemins de Fer Francais), " by L.J. Fontanarosa
By Lucien Joseph Fontanarosa
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Savoie (Societe National des Chemins de fer Francais)" is a signed offset lithograph of a pastoral landscape created for the Societe Nationale...
Category
1940s Other Art Style Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Early 20th century color lithograph poster mountain field houses trees sky text
By Paul Kelsch
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Dauphine" is an offset lithograph of a pastoral landscape created by Paul Kelsch for the Societe Nationale des Chemis de fer Francais, the French National Railways.
24" x 39" paper
30 1/2" x 21 1/8" image
48" x 33" frame
Small hole in each corner, crease in paper and image upper left, small holes lower left.
The SNCF, the French National Rail system, commissioned multiple posters to advertise and celebrate the connected locations on their routes after the Second World War. "Dauphine", created by Paul Kelsch, showcases a small village at the foot of a mountain bathed in the light of a sunset. Kelsch's technique employed impasto brush strokes and bright colors to capture the beauty of the landscape. This scene is in stark contrast to the destruction that the war had wrought in this area during the 1944 invasion. Because of this, the set of posters...
Category
1940s Other Art Style Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
19th century landscape etching tree field black and white figure pastoral scene
By D. Landers, after Charles Harold Davis
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Homeward Bound" is an original etching by D. Landers after a painting by Charles Harold Davis. The artist signed the piece lower right. It depicts a woman in a field.
13 1/4" x 20...
Category
1880s American Realist Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
Late 19th century color lithograph figures dog rabbit landscape cart haystacks
By Jules Denneulin
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Jamais Bredouille (Never Empty-Handed)" is a color lithograph after Jules Denneulin. It depicts a hunter showing his day's work to a farmer on a path at dusk.
20" x 26" art
40 1/4...
Category
1880s Realist Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Diane Chasseresse, " Original Color Lithograph signed by Gaston De Latenay
By Gaston de Latenay
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Diane Chasseresse" is an original color lithograph signed by the artist Gaston de Latenay. It is edition 36/100, which is written in the lower right...
Category
1890s Art Nouveau Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
20th century color lithograph poster landscape pastoral building hills signed
By Vecoux
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Cote Basque" is an original lithograph of the Basque region of France created by Vecoux for the Societe Nationale des Chemis de fer Francais, the French N...
Category
1940s Post-War Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
'Lieutenant Crovers Despatch – Return of Governor Stevens to Fort Benton'
By John Mix Stanley
Located in Milwaukee, WI
In the mid-nineteenth century, the United States government set out to survey and document its newly acquired lands and territories west of the Mississippi. The goals of these surveys were manifold: to produce topographical maps, to document flora and fauna, and to document natural resources to build the emerging US economy. These surveys, and the images from them, also functioned to build the new sense of American identity with the landscape, condensing vistas into the 'picturesque' tradition of European image making. Thus, the entire span of US territory could be seen as a single, cohesive whole.
This lithograph comes from one of six surveys commissioned by the Army's Topographic Bureau in 1853, which sought to find the best route to construct a transcontinental railroad. The result was a thirteen-volume report including maps, lithographs, and technical data entitled 'Explorations and Surveys to ascertain the most practicable and economical route for a Railroad from the Mississippi river to the Pacific Ocean.' In particular, the print comes from the northern survey, commanded by Isaac Stevens, which explored the regions between the 47th and 49th parallels.
5.75 x 8.75 inches, image
6.5 x 9.25 inches, stone
17 x 20 inches, frame
Artist 'Stanley Del.' lower left
Entitled 'Lieutenant Crovers Despatch – Return of Governor Stevens to Fort Benton' lower center margin
Publisher 'Sarony, Major & Knapp. Lith.s 449 Broadway N.Y.' lower right
Inscribed 'U.S.P.R.R. EXP. & SURVEYS — 47th & 49th PARALLELS' upper left
Inscribed 'GENERAL REPORT — PLATE XXXVII' upper right
Framed to conservation standards using 100 percent rag matting with French accents; glazed with UV5 Plexiglas to inhibit fading; housed in a gold reverse ogee moulding.
Print in overall good condition; some localized foxing and discoloration; minor surface abrasions to frame.
John Mix Stanley...
Category
1850s Romantic Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Forest Glen, " Etching Landscape initialed in Plate by John Thomas Smith
By John Thomas Smith
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Forest Glen" is an original etching by John Thomas Smith. The piece was initialed in plate. It depicts a small inlet to a lush forest.
3 5/8" x 3 1/2" art
12 7/8" x 12 3/4" frame
...
Category
1790s Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
"Arroyo, " Original Woodcut and Monotype signed by Carol Summers
By Carol Summers
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Arroyo" is an original woodcut and monotype by Carol Summers. The artist signed the piece. It is from an edition of 120 and depicts an abstract landscape in blues and greens.
14 1...
Category
1980s Abstract Expressionist Landscape Prints
Materials
Monotype, Woodcut
"Traveling on the Liverpool & Manchester Railroad, 1831, " Raphael Tuck & Son
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Traveling on the Liverpool & Manchester Railroad, 1831" is a color lithograph by Raphael Tuck & Sons. It depicts two trains carrying various cargo.
8" x 24 1/2" art
17 1/2" x 33 3...
Category
1890s Other Art Style Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Late 19th century color cityscape Milwaukee trees figures lake churches
By Theodore R. Davis
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"View of the City of Milwaukee" from "Harper's Weekly" is an original hand-colored wood engraving by Theodore R. Davis. It depicts an aerial view of the Wisconsin lakeside city in 1882.
9" x 13 3/8" art
17 5/8" x 21 3/4" frame
Theodore R. Davis (1840–1894) was a 19th-century American artist, who made numerous drawings of significant military and political events during the American Civil War and its aftermath. As a child, Theodore R. Davis was taken to Washington D.C. where he graduated from Rittenhouse Academy. When he was fifteen, he moved to New York where studied art under Henry W. Herrick and James Walker.
The Training Theodore Davis received under James Walker was informal. Davis typified certain artists as "special artists" was hired by popular magazines and newspapers. He was hired by them to illustrate the Civil War. He was hired by Harpers Weekly in 1861.[
During the Civil War, he served as a captain in the 15th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry. After the war, he became a companion of the New York Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States.
Some of these drawings include the Battle of Champion Hill, and the most significant sketch of General Joseph E. Johnston and General William T. Sherman meeting at the Bennett Farm near Durham Station to discuss the surrender terms of the remaining Confederate armies in the Southeast.
After the war when the Cyclorama in Atlanta was being painted, Davis was asked for his ideas having traveled with Sherman's army. He was later added to the painting.
Theodore Davis was a staff artist at Harper's Weekly.
Many of his drawings were published as wood engravings in Harper's Weekly.
Theodore R. Davis was chosen to create the Haye's China with a chance meeting. Mr. Davis suggested using flora and fauna of the American decor...
Category
1880s Other Art Style Landscape Prints
Materials
Engraving
20th century lithograph black and white landscape print trees lake signed
By Adolf Dehn
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Peaceful Cove - New England" is an original lithograph by Adolf Dehn. The artist signed the piece lower right. It depicts an aerial view of New England.
9 1/2" x 13" image
11" x 15" paper
17" x 20 5/8" frame
Adolf Dehn was born in Minnesota, November 22, 1895 and he died in New York City, May 19 1968.
He was one of the most notable lithographers of the 20th century. Throughout his artistic career, Dehn participated in and helped define some important movements in American art, including Regionalism, Social Realism, and caricature. He was known for both his technical skills and his high-spirited, droll depictions of human foibles.
Biography
Dehn was born in 1895 in Waterville, Minnesota. Dehn began creating artwork at the age of six and by the time of his death had created nearly 650 images.
After high school he went to the Minneapolis School of Art, known today as the (Minneapolis College of Art and Design) where he met Wanda Gág...
Category
1940s Realist Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Beaver Lake Hybrids, " Original Watercolor signed by David Barnett
By David Barnett
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Beaver Lake Hybrids" is an original watercolor by David Barnett. The artist signed the piece lower right. It depicts a bed of brightly-colored flowers.
10" x 8" art
17" x 15" fram...
Category
Early 2000s Contemporary Landscape Prints
Materials
Watercolor
"Pine Tree, " Offset Black & White Lithograph by Ruth Grotenrath
By Ruth Grotenrath
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Pine Tree" is an offset lithograph by Ruth Grotenrath, created for the Riveredge Nature Center, Inc. for their Artists for Conservation series. It depicts an elaborate drawing of a pine tree with branches growing in multiple directions and overlapping one another.
5" x 6 5/8" art
13 5/8" x 15 1/4" frame
"The paintings of Ruth...
Category
1960s Expressionist Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Harvest Home - Henry Alford Poem, " Color Lithograph Poster of Pumpkins & Hay
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Harvest Home" is an original color lithograph poster by an unknown artist. It features a scene of a field with a few pumpkins and wheat. Below the image is an excerpt from a Henry A...
Category
1920s Other Art Style Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"The Fence, Private Keep Out, " Original Linocut on Yellow Paper
By David Barnett
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"The Fence, Private Keep Out" is an original linocut print on yellow paper by David Barnett. The artist signed the piece lower right, wrote the title lower center, and wrote the edit...
Category
1960s Contemporary Landscape Prints
Materials
Linocut
20th century etching figurative landscape city street black and white signed
By Edgar Chahine
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Venise" is an original etching and chine colle by Edgar Chahine. This is an artist's proof, the third state of the etching, and the artist signed the piece in pencil lower right. Th...
Category
1920s Modern Figurative Prints
Materials
Etching
"Combloux (Golfing), " Original Lithograph Poster signed by Pierre Commarmond
By Pierre Commarmond
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Combloux (Golfing)" is an original lithograph poster by Pierre Commarmond. Combloux is a resort in France where people can surround themselves with nature, leisure, and sport. The artist signed the lithograph stone...
Category
1920s Other Art Style Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
17th century etching black and white figurative landscape obelisk buildings
By Jan Frans van Bloemen (Orizzonte)
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Figures at the Obelisk" is an original etching by Jan Frans van Bloemen. It depicts two people conversing in front of a monument. Behind them, an expansive landscape sprawls.
9 1/4" x 6 3/4" art
21 3/4" x 19 3/8" frame
Jan Frans van Bloemen (baptized 12 May 1662 - buried 13 June 1749) was a Flemish landscape painter mainly active in Rome. Here he was able to establish himself as the leading painter of views (vedute) of the Roman countryside depicted in the aesthetic of the classical landscape tradition.
Van Bloemen predominantly painted classical landscapes, taking his inspiration from the Roman Campagna. His landscapes, with their recession through a series of planes, soft, warm lightning and classical and religious subject matter, drew on the examples of artists such as Claude Lorrain and Gaspard Dughet. His paintings are exquisitely imbued with that "difficult-to-define pastoral ambience" which helped to make him such a great painter in the eyes of his contemporaries. The technique and subjects of the work of Jan Frans van Bloemen are also related to painters such as Jan Asselijn, Thomas Wyck...
Category
18th Century Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
17th century etching black and white figurative landscape cityscape buildings
By Jan Frans van Bloemen (Orizzonte)
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Figures Outside the Monastery" is an original etching by Jan Frans van Bloemen. It depicts people on the path to a church.
7" x 10 1/4" art
19 1/4" x 22 5/8" frame
Jan Frans van Bloemen (baptized 12 May 1662 - buried 13 June 1749) was a Flemish landscape painter mainly active in Rome. Here he was able to establish himself as the leading painter of views (vedute) of the Roman countryside depicted in the aesthetic of the classical landscape tradition.
Van Bloemen predominantly painted classical landscapes, taking his inspiration from the Roman Campagna. His landscapes, with their recession through a series of planes, soft, warm lightning and classical and religious subject matter, drew on the examples of artists such as Claude Lorrain and Gaspard Dughet. His paintings are exquisitely imbued with that "difficult-to-define pastoral ambience" which helped to make him such a great painter in the eyes of his contemporaries. The technique and subjects of the work of Jan Frans van Bloemen are also related to painters such as Jan Asselijn, Thomas Wyck...
Category
18th Century Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
19th century color lithograph birds landscape nature grass sky water figure
By Currier & Ives
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Shooting on the Prairie" is an original hand-colored lithograph by Currier & Ives. It depicts a hunter shooting at fowl in an open field.
8 1/2" x 12 1/2" art
20 1/4" x 23 3/4" frame
Nathaniel Currier was a tall introspective man with a melancholy nature. He could captivate people with his piercing stare or charm them with his sparkling blue eyes. Nathaniel was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts on March 27th, 1813, the second of four children. His parents, Nathaniel and Hannah Currier, were distant cousins who lived a humble yet spartan life. When Nathaniel was eight years old, tragedy struck. Nathaniel’s father unexpectedly passed away leaving Nathaniel and his eleven-year-old brother Lorenzo to provide for the family. In addition to their mother, Nathaniel and Lorenzo had to care for six-year-old sister Elizabeth and two-year-old brother Charles. Nathaniel worked a series of odd jobs to support the family, and at fifteen, he started what would become a life-long career when he apprenticed in the Boston lithography shop of William and John Pendleton.
A Bavarian gentleman named Alois Senefelder invented lithography just 30 years prior to young Nat Currier’s apprenticeship. While under the employ of the brothers Pendleton, Nat was taught the art of lithography by the firm’s chief printer, a French national named Dubois, who brought the lithography trade to America.
Lithography involves grinding a piece of limestone flat and smooth then drawing in mirror image on the stone with a special grease pencil. After the image is completed, the stone is etched with a solution of aqua fortis leaving the greased areas in slight relief. Water is then used to wet the stone and greased-ink is rolled onto the raised areas. Since grease and water do not mix, the greased-ink is repelled by the moisture on the stone and clings to the original grease pencil lines. The stone is then placed in a press and used as a printing block to impart black on white images to paper.
In 1833, now twenty-years old and an accomplished lithographer, Nat Currier left Boston and moved to Philadelphia to do contract work for M.E.D. Brown, a noted engraver and printer. With the promise of good money, Currier hired on to help Brown prepare lithographic stones of scientific images for the American Journal of Sciences and Arts. When Nat completed the contract work in 1834, he traveled to New York City to work once again for his mentor John Pendleton, who was now operating his own shop located at 137 Broadway. Soon after the reunion, Pendleton expressed an interest in returning to Boston and offered to sell his print shop to Currier. Young Nat did not have the financial resources to buy the shop, but being the resourceful type he found another local printer by the name of Stodart. Together they bought Pendleton’s business.
The firm ‘Currier & Stodart’ specialized in "job" printing. They produced many different types of printed items, most notably music manuscripts for local publishers. By 1835, Stodart was frustrated that the business was not making enough money and he ended the partnership, taking his investment with him. With little more than some lithographic stones, and a talent for his trade, twenty-two year old Nat Currier set up shop in a temporary office at 1 Wall Street in New York City. He named his new enterprise ‘N. Currier, Lithographer’
Nathaniel continued as a job printer and duplicated everything from music sheets to architectural plans. He experimented with portraits, disaster scenes and memorial prints, and any thing that he could sell to the public from tables in front of his shop. During 1835 he produced a disaster print Ruins of the Planter's Hotel, New Orleans, which fell at two O’clock on the Morning of the 15th of May 1835, burying 50 persons, 40 of whom Escaped with their Lives. The public had a thirst for newsworthy events, and newspapers of the day did not include pictures. By producing this print, Nat gave the public a new way to “see” the news. The print sold reasonably well, an important fact that was not lost on Currier.
Nat met and married Eliza Farnsworth in 1840. He also produced a print that same year titled Awful Conflagration of the Steamboat Lexington in Long Island Sound on Monday Evening, January 18, 1840, by which melancholy occurrence over One Hundred Persons Perished. This print sold out very quickly, and Currier was approached by an enterprising publication who contracted him to print a single sheet addition of their paper, the New York Sun. This single page paper is presumed to be the first illustrated newspaper ever published.
The success of the Lexington print launched his career nationally and put him in a position to finally lift his family up. In 1841, Nat and Eliza had their first child, a son they named Edward West Currier. That same year Nat hired his twenty-one year old brother Charles and taught him the lithography trade, he also hired his artistically inclined brother Lorenzo to travel out west and make sketches of the new frontier as material for future prints. Charles worked for the firm on and off over the years, and invented a new type of lithographic crayon which he patented and named the Crayola. Lorenzo continued selling sketches to Nat for the next few years.
In 1843, Nat and Eliza had a daughter, Eliza West Currier, but tragedy struck in early 1847 when their young daughter died from a prolonged illness. Nat and Eliza were grief stricken, and Eliza, driven by despair, gave up on life and passed away just four months after her daughter’s death.
The subject of Nat Currier’s artwork changed following the death of his wife and daughter, and he produced many memorial prints and sentimental prints during the late 1840s. The memorial prints generally depicted grief stricken families posed by gravestones (the stones were left blank so the purchasers could fill in the names of the dearly departed). The sentimental prints usually depicted idealized portraits of women and children, titled with popular Christian names of the day.
Late in 1847, Nat Currier married Lura Ormsbee, a friend of the family. Lura was a self-sufficient woman, and she immediately set out to help Nat raise six-year-old Edward and get their house in order. In 1849, Lura delivered a son, Walter Black Currier, but fate dealt them a blow when young Walter died one year later. While Nat and Lura were grieving the loss of their new son, word came from San Francisco that Nat’s brother Lorenzo had also passed away from a brief illness. Nat sank deeper into his natural quiet melancholy. Friends stopped by to console the couple, and Lura began to set an extra place at their table for these unexpected guests. She continued this tradition throughout their lives.
In 1852, Charles introduced a friend, James Merritt Ives, to Nat and suggested he hire him as a bookkeeper. Jim Ives was a native New Yorker born in 1824 and raised on the grounds of Bellevue Hospital where his father was employed as superintendent. Jim was a self-trained artist and professional bookkeeper. He was also a plump and jovial man, presenting the exact opposite image of his new boss.
Jim Ives met Charles Currier through Caroline Clark, the object of Jim’s affection. Caroline’s sister Elizabeth was married to Charles, and Caroline was a close friend of the Currier family. Jim eventually proposed marriage to Caroline and solicited an introduction to Nat Currier, through Charles, in hopes of securing a more stable income to support his future wife.
Ives quickly set out to improve and modernize his new employer’s bookkeeping methods. He reorganized the firm’s sizable inventory, and used his artistic skills to streamline the firm’s production methods. By 1857, Nathaniel had become so dependent on Jims’ skills and initiative that he offered him a full partnership in the firm and appointed him general manager. The two men chose the name ‘Currier & Ives’ for the new partnership, and became close friends.
Currier & Ives produced their prints in a building at 33 Spruce Street where they occupied the third, fourth and fifth floors. The third floor was devoted to the hand operated printing presses that were built by Nat's cousin, Cyrus Currier, at his shop Cyrus Currier & Sons in Newark, NJ. The fourth floor found the artists, lithographers and the stone grinders at work. The fifth floor housed the coloring department, and was one of the earliest production lines in the country. The colorists were generally immigrant girls, mostly German, who came to America with some formal artistic training. Each colorist was responsible for adding a single color to a print. As a colorist finished applying their color, the print was passed down the line to the next colorist to add their color. The colorists worked from a master print displayed above their table, which showed where the proper colors were to be placed. At the end of the table was a touch up artist who checked the prints for quality, touching-in areas that may have been missed as it passed down the line. During the Civil War, demand for prints became so great that coloring stencils were developed to speed up production.
Although most Currier & Ives prints were colored in house, some were sent out to contract artists. The rate Currier & Ives paid these artists for coloring work was one dollar per one hundred small folios (a penny a print) and one dollar per one dozen large folios. Currier & Ives also offered uncolored prints to dealers, with instructions (included on the price list) on how to 'prepare the prints for coloring.' In addition, schools could order uncolored prints from the firm’s catalogue to use in their painting classes.
Nathaniel Currier and James Merritt Ives attracted a wide circle of friends during their years in business. Some of their more famous acquaintances included Horace Greeley, Phineas T. Barnum, and the outspoken abolitionists Rev. Henry Ward, and John Greenleaf Whittier (the latter being a cousin of Mr. Currier).
Nat Currier and Jim Ives described their business as "Publishers of Cheap and Popular Pictures" and produced many categories of prints. These included Disaster Scenes, Sentimental Images, Sports, Humor, Hunting Scenes, Politics, Religion, City and Rural Scenes, Trains, Ships, Fire Fighters, Famous Race Horses, Historical Portraits, and just about any other topic that satisfied the general public's taste. In all, the firm produced in excess of 7500 different titles, totaling over one million prints produced from 1835 to 1907.
Nat Currier retired in 1880, and signed over his share of the firm to his son Edward. Nat died eight years later at his summer home 'Lion’s Gate' in Amesbury, Massachusetts. Jim Ives remained active in the firm until his death in 1895, when his share of the firm passed to his eldest son, Chauncey.
In 1902, faced will failing health from the ravages of Tuberculosis, Edward Currier sold his share of the firm to Chauncey Ives...
Category
1870s Other Art Style Animal Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Red, Yellow, Blue & Green, " Color Woodcut & Monotype signed by Carol Summers
By Carol Summers
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Red, Yellow, Blue & Green" is an original color woodcut by Carol Summers. The artist signed the piece in the lower left. This woodcut depicts four color fields. The edition number i...
Category
2010s Landscape Prints
Materials
Monotype, Woodcut
"Door County, " Original Silkscreen Print by Pamela Bachman
By Pamela Bachman
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Door County" is an original silkscreen by Pamela Bachman. IT depicts an aerial view of different attractions in Door County, Wisconsin. The artist signed ...
Category
1980s Landscape Prints
Materials
Screen
Early 20th century color lithograph poster river building trees text
By Robert Abel
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Chateaux De La Loire" is a signed original lithograph by Robert Abel. It depicts a view of one of the most iconic houses on the Loire River in France.
Left ...
Category
21st Century and Contemporary Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Early 20th century color lithograph poster mountain building trees sky text
By Edouard-Georges Mac-Avoy 1
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Perigord" is an original lithograph of a landscape created for the Societe Nationale des Chemis de fer Francais, the French National Railways. Artist Eduoard Georges Mac'Avoy worked...
Category
1940s Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Font-Romeu, " Original Color Lithograph Poster by Vincent Guerra
By Vincent Guerra
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Font-Romeu (Tennis/Golfing Retreat)" is an original color lithograph poster by the designer Vincent Guerra. He signed the design in the lower left. This poster depicts a woman relaxing under a tree...
Category
1920s Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
18th century landscape etching pastoral house nature scene detailed ink trees
By John Thomas Smith
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Near Mill Hill, Gravesend" is an original etching by John Thomas Smith. It depicts a cottage and farmstead with a few small figures. The piece is titled on ...
Category
1790s Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
"Country Inn by the Pond, " Etching by John Thomas Smith
By John Thomas Smith
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Country Inn by the Pond" is an original etching by John Thomas Smith. It depicts a cozy building surrounded by trees and vegetation and next to a pond.
3" x 5 1/4" art
16" x 18 1/...
Category
1790s Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
17th century etching black and white figurative landscape trees statues scene
By Jan Frans van Bloemen (Orizzonte)
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Mother & Child Near Statues" is an original etching by Jan Frans van Bloemen. It depicts two figures, a mother and child pair, next two two classical statues. There are other figures in this park-like environment.
9 1/4" x 6 3/4" art
21 5/8" x 19 3/8" frame
Jan Frans van Bloemen (baptized 12 May 1662 - buried 13 June 1749) was a Flemish landscape painter mainly active in Rome. Here he was able to establish himself as the leading painter of views (vedute) of the Roman countryside depicted in the aesthetic of the classical landscape tradition.
Van Bloemen predominantly painted classical landscapes, taking his inspiration from the Roman Campagna. His landscapes, with their recession through a series of planes, soft, warm lightning and classical and religious subject matter, drew on the examples of artists such as Claude Lorrain and Gaspard Dughet. His paintings are exquisitely imbued with that "difficult-to-define pastoral ambience" which helped to make him such a great painter in the eyes of his contemporaries. The technique and subjects of the work of Jan Frans van Bloemen are also related to painters such as Jan Asselijn...
Category
18th Century Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
17th century etching black and white figurative landscape trees buildings
By Jan Frans van Bloemen (Orizzonte)
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Conversation Outside Castle" is an original etching by Jan Frans van Bloemen. It depicts a number of figures just outside the majestic walls of a castle. These groups of figures are engaged in their own conversations.
9" x 6 3/4" art
21 5/8" x 19 3/8" frame
Jan Frans van Bloemen (baptized 12 May 1662 - buried 13 June 1749) was a Flemish landscape painter mainly active in Rome. Here he was able to establish himself as the leading painter of views (vedute) of the Roman countryside depicted in the aesthetic of the classical landscape tradition.
Van Bloemen predominantly painted classical landscapes, taking his inspiration from the Roman Campagna. His landscapes, with their recession through a series of planes, soft, warm lightning and classical and religious subject matter, drew on the examples of artists such as Claude Lorrain and Gaspard Dughet. His paintings are exquisitely imbued with that "difficult-to-define pastoral ambience" which helped to make him such a great painter in the eyes of his contemporaries. The technique and subjects of the work of Jan Frans van Bloemen are also related to painters such as Jan Asselijn...
Category
18th Century Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
"San Salvador: Station d'Hiver des Arthritiques" Original Color Lithograph
By Ernest-Louis Lessieux
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"San Salvador (Mediterranean)" is an original color lithograph poster by Ernest Louis Lessieux. It depicts a woman and her son on the picturesque coast of...
Category
Late 19th Century Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph, Color
19th century black and white etching industrial landscape boat riverbank trees
By Charles François Daubigny
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Le Bateau a Conflans/Le Paysagiste au Bateau" or "The Boat at Conflans/Landscape with Boat" is an original etching by Charles Francois Daubigny...
Category
Late 19th Century Barbizon School Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
19th century color lithograph seascape boat ship waves maritime landscape
By Currier & Ives
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Iron Steam Ship Great Britain" is an original hand-colored lithographed published by Currier & Ives. It depicts a large British steam ship on the water. The caption below says "3500 Tons. Engine 1000 Horse power. Weight of Iron used in the Ship and Engine is 1500 Tons. THE LARGEST IN THE WORLD. Length from Figurehead to Tafrail 322 Fe3et. Main breadth 50' 6" ... Depth 32' 6" Lieut. Jaf. Hosken R.N. Commander."
8" x 12 3/4" art
17 1/8" x 21 1/2" frame
Currier & Ives produced their prints in a building at 33 Spruce Street where they occupied the third, fourth and fifth floors. The third floor was devoted to the hand operated printing presses that were built by Nat's cousin, Cyrus Currier, at his shop Cyrus Currier & Sons in Newark, NJ. The fourth floor found the artists, lithographers and the stone...
Category
1850s Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Daphnis et Chloe - The Lovers, " an Original Lithograph by Pierre Bonnard
By Pierre Bonnard
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Daphnis et Chloe - The Lovers" is an original lithograph by Pierre Bonnard. This lithograph is a rare proof for the illustrated edition of Daphnis et Chloe. There were two proofs, o...
Category
Early 1900s Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
17th century etching black and white landscape forest trees satyr goats
By Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Mythological Scene--Satyr & Goat Herder" is an etching by Italian artist Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione. It depicts a satyr lounging on the left and an approaching goat herder on th...
Category
Mid-17th Century Old Masters Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
19th century etching black and white seascape print figure waves rocks signed
By James Fagan
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"The Fisherman's Catch" is a signed (in pencil lower right and in plate lower left) etching by James Fagan. It depicts a fisherman walking on a beach in black and white. It is signed...
Category
1880s American Realist Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
"When Day is Done, " an Original Etching signed by John Edward Costigan
By John Edward Costigan
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"When Day is Done" is an original etching and aquatint signed lower right in pencil by the artist John Edward Costigan. It depicts a man and a woman with their young child at the end...
Category
1930s Post-Impressionist Figurative Prints
Materials
Etching, Aquatint
"Royalty Greeting Townspeople, " a Tempera Diptych from the Late 19th c.
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Royalty Greeting Townspeople" is a Persian tempera diptych from the Late 19th century. It includes multiple figures in red and blue interacting in a f...
Category
Late 19th Century Other Art Style Figurative Prints
Materials
Tempera
19th century black and white etching landscape scene boat riverbank trees signed
By Thomas R. Manley
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Farm at Inlet" is an etching by Thomas R. Manley signed lower right. It depicts a waterfront scene in black and gray.
26 1/2" x 33 1/2" art
26 3/8" x 33 3/8" framed
Thomas Manley...
Category
1880s American Impressionist Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
19th century black and white etching landscape circular print river signed
By Edward Loyal Field
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"The Boat House" is a signed (lower center) etching by Edward Loyal Field. It depicts a scene across a river in the foreground, where a quaint set of houses sits in black and white.1...
Category
1880s Realist Landscape Prints
Materials
Etching
20th century color lithograph boat ocean waves seascape dramatic text signed
By A. Theunissen
Located in Milwaukee, WI
"Engagez-Vous Dans La Marine (Battleship)" is an original color lithograph poster signed and dated in print, A. Theunissen. It depicts a battleship on the ocean with a call for engag...
Category
1930s Modern Landscape Prints
Materials
Lithograph
19th century etching black and white seascape print boats water buildings signed
By Thomas Moran
Located in Milwaukee, WI
This black and white etching by American painter and print maker of the Hudson River School in New York: Thomas Moran, is a rare Klackner #53 of the catalogue raisonné, depicting "The Harbor of Vera...
Category
1880s Hudson River School Landscape Prints
Materials
Parchment Paper, Etching