Art

Modern painting by Margaret Balzer Cantieni (1914-2002). Tempera on wood board. Signed in lower right corner "Balzer '46". Painting measures 1 1" x 14" with frame 16 1/2" x 19 1/2". Margaret Balzer studied at the Art Institute of Chicago with Lyonel Feininger, Josef Albers and William Stanley Hayter...

An screen print poster by Josef Albers that advertises his 1972 Exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The print features a minimalist, op art design made up...

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), terracotta fish pitcher. Madoura pottery 1952. This original terracotta fish pitcher was created by Picasso in 1952 and was ...

Salvador Dalí "Triomphale" Original pâte de verre Salvador Dalí plate Daum Editeur, Nancy, France Inscribed Dalí on lower right, and numbered 1199...

Provenance: with “Mr. Scheer,” Vienna, by July 1918; where acquired by: Jindřich Waldes, Prague, 1918–1941; thence by descent to: Private Collection, New York Literature: Rudolf Kuchynka, “České obrazy tabulové ve Waldesově obrazárně,” Památky archeologické, vol. 31 (1919), pp. 62-64, fig. 5. Jaroslav Pešina, “K datování deskových obrazů ve Waldesově obrazárně,” Ročenka Kruhu pro Pěstování Dějin Umění: za rok (1934), pp. 131-137. Jaroslav Pešina, Pozdně gotické deskové malířství v Čechách, Prague, 1940, pp. 150-151, 220. Patrik Šimon, Jindřich Waldes: sběratel umění, Prague, 2001, pp. 166, 168, footnote 190. Ivo Hlobil, “Tři gotické obrazy ze sbírky Jindřicha Waldese,” Umění, vol. 52, no. 4 (2004), p. 369. Executed sometime in the 1380s or 1390s by a close associate of the Master of the Třeboň Altarpiece, this impressive panel is a rare work created at the royal court in Prague and a significant re-discovery for the corpus of early Bohemian painting. It has emerged from an American collection, descendants of the celebrated Czech industrialist and collector Jindřich Waldes, who died in Havana fleeing Nazi-occupied Europe. The distinctive visual tradition of the Bohemian school first began to take shape in the middle of the fourteenth century after Charles IV—King of Bohemia and later Holy Roman Emperor—established Prague as a major artistic center. The influx of foreign artists and the importation of significant works of art from across Europe had a profound influence on the development of a local pictorial style. Early Italian paintings, especially those by Sienese painters and Tommaso da Modena (who worked at Charles IV’s court), had a considerable impact on the first generation of Bohemian painters. Although this influence is still felt in the brilliant gold ground and the delicate tooling of the present work, the author of this painting appears to be responding more to the paintings of his predecessors in Prague than to foreign influences. This Resurrection of Christ employs a compositional format that was popular throughout the late medieval period but was particularly pervasive in Bohemian painting. Christ is shown sitting atop a pink marble sarcophagus, stepping down onto the ground with one bare foot. He blesses the viewer with his right hand, while in his left he holds a triumphal cross with a fluttering banner, symbolizing his victory over death. Several Roman soldiers doze at the base of the tomb, except for one grotesque figure, who, beginning to wake, shields his eyes from the light and looks on with a face of bewilderment as Christ emerges from his tomb. Christ is wrapped in a striking red robe with a blue interior lining, the colors of which vary subtly in the changing light. He stands out prominently against the gold backdrop, which is interrupted only by the abstractly rendered landscape and trees on either side of him. The soldiers’ armor is rendered in exacting detail, the cool gray of the metal contrasting with the earth tones of the outer garments. The sleeping soldier set within a jumble of armor with neither face nor hands exposed, is covered with what appears to be a shield emblazoned with two flies on a white field, somewhat resembling a cartouche (Fig. 1). This may be a heraldic device of the altarpiece’s patron or it may signify evil, referencing either the Roman soldiers or death, over both of which Christ triumphs. This painting formed part of the collection assembled by the Czech industrialist and founder of the Waldes Koh-i-noor Company, Jindřich Waldes, in the early twentieth century. As a collector he is best remembered for establishing the Waldes Museum in Prague to house his collection of buttons (totaling nearly 70,000 items), as well as for being the primary patron of the modernist painter František Kupka. Waldes was also an avid collector of older art, and he approached his collecting activity with the goal of creating an encyclopedic collection of Czech art from the medieval period through to the then-present day. At the conclusion of two decades of collecting, his inventory counted 2331 paintings and drawings, 4764 prints, and 162 sculptures. This collection, which constituted the Waldesova Obrazárna (Waldes Picture Gallery), was first displayed in Waldes’ home in Prague at 44 Americká Street and later at his newly built Villa Marie at 12 Koperníkova Street. This Resurrection of Christ retains its frame from the Waldes Picture Gallery, including its original plaque “173 / Česky malíř z konce 14 stol.” (“Czech painter from the end of the 14th century”) and Waldes’ collection label on the reverse. The Resurrection of Christ was one of the most significant late medieval panel...

A vintage screen print poster by minimalist, op artist Joseph Albers from 1968. The piece advertises and exhibit of paintings and graphic works at Denise Rene, a Paris Art Gallery. ...

Artist: Victor Vasarely (Hungarian-French, 1906-1997) Title: "E.T. (Fond Argent)" *Signed by Vasarely in pencil lower right Year: 1983 Medium: Original Screenprint on Arches paper Li...

Fleditwerk Serigraph, 1970 Signed, titled, dated and numbered in pencil by the artist. Publisher: Kunstverein Braunschweig blindstamp lower left Edition: 100 (66/100) Condition: Excellent Image: 22 x 22...

Abstract Cubist Construction Collage Mid 20th Century American Modernism Cubism Vaclav Vytacil (1892 - 1984) Abstract Construction #2 Caesin on board collage 11 x 13 1/2 th inches S...

Artist: Salvador Dali (1904-1989) Title: Piano surréaliste Year: 1984 Medium: Bronze Edition: 34/350, plus proofs Size: 26.3 x 15.7 x 12 inches Condition: Excellent Inscription: Inci...

Victor Vasarely born in 1906 was a Hungarian-French artist, who is widely accepted as a "grandfather" and leader of the Op Art movement. Op Art is a form of abstract art that gives the illusion of movement by the precise use of pattern and color, or in which conflicting patterns emerge and overlap. Victor Vasarely and Brigit Riley are its most famous exponents. In its visual balancing act of color and movement from a flat plane to developed continuous flow “Untitled” is a complex arrangement of squares and colors that visually expand and contract. It is one of Vasarely’s most successful Op Art abstract works. The piece is signed on the lower right and number 20/150 on the lower left. The print is behind glass and matted. Vasarely was born in Pecs and grew up in Slovakia and Budapest, where in 1925, he took up medical studies. Abandoning medicine he turned to traditional academic painting at the private Podolini-Volkmann Academy. In 1928/1929, he enrolled at Sandor Bortnyik’s private art school widely recognized as Budapest's centre of Bauhaus studies. His studies concentrated on applied graphic art and typographical design. In 1929, he painted his Blue Study and Green Study. In 1930, he married his fellow student Claire Spinner (1908–1990). Together they had two sons, Andre and Jean-Pierre. Vasarely became a graphic designer and a poster artist during the 1930s combining patterns and organic images with each other. Vasarely utilized geometric shapes and colorful graphics, the artist created compelling illusions of spatial depth, as seen in his work Vega-Nor (1969). Vasarely’s method of painting borrowed from a range of influences, including Bauhaus design principles, Wassily Kandinsky, and Constructivism. In the late 1920s, Vasarely enrolled at the Muhely Academy in Budapest, where the syllabus was largely based on Walter Gropius’s Bauhaus school in Germany. After settling in Paris in 1930, Vasarely worked in advertising agencies to support himself as a graphic artist while creating many works including Zebra (1937), which is considered by some to be one of the earliest examples of Op Art. The artist experimented in a style based in Surrealism and Abstract Expressionism during the 1940s, before arriving at his hallmark checkerboard...

Set of 32 polished and patinated-bronze chess pieces, 1966-70. Height varies from 38 mm; 1 1/2 inches to 85mm; 3 3/8 inches. Each piece signed on t...