Wayne Thiebaud

"Gold Dredgers" Sacramento, Watercolor by Wayne Thiebaud

circa 1956

Artist: Unknown Title: University Floral Design Medium: Watercolor on paper, signed lower right Image Size: 17.5 x 25 inches Frame Size: 28 x 35 inches ...

Emile Rampelberg, French (1911 - 2001) - Seaside Town, Year: circa 1970, Medium: Watercolor on Paper, signed lower right, Size: 19.5 x 26.75 in. (4...

Lionel S. Reiss (1894 - 1988) New York City Skyline View from the East River Watercolor on paper 13 x 19 inches Signed lower left In describing his own style, Lionel Reiss wrote, “By nature, inclination, and training, I have long since recognized the fact that...I belong to the category of those who can only gladly affirm the reality of the world I live in.” Reiss’s subject matter was wide-ranging, including gritty New York scenes, landscapes of bucolic Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and seascapes around Gloucester, Massachusetts. However, it was as a painter of Jewish life—both in Israel and in Europe before World War II—that Reiss excelled. I.B. Singer, the Nobel Prize winner for Literature, noted that Reiss was “essentially an artist of the nineteenth century, and because of this he had the power and the courage to tell visually the story of a people.” Although Reiss was born in Jaroslaw, Poland, his family immigrated to the United States in 1898 when he was four years old. Reiss's family settled on New York City’s Lower East Side and he lived in the city for most of his life. Reiss attended the Art Students League and then worked as a commercial artist for newspapers and publishers. As art director for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he supposedly created the studio’s famous lion logo. After World War I, Reiss became fascinated with Jewish life in the ‘Old World.’ In 1921 he left his advertising work and spent the next ten years traveling in Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. Like noted Jewish photographers Alter Kacyzne and Roman Vishniac, Reiss depicted Jewish life in Poland prior to World War II. He later wrote, “My trip encompassed three main objectives: to make ethnic studies of Jewish types wherever I traveled; to paint and draw Jewish life, as I saw it and felt it, in all aspects; and to round out my work in Israel.” In Europe, Reiss recorded quotidian scenes in a variety of media and different settings such as Paris, Amsterdam, the Venice ghetto, the Jewish cemetery in Prague, and an array of shops, synagogues, streets, and marketplaces in the Jewish quarters of Warsaw, Lodz, Krakow, Lublin, Vilna, Ternopil, and Kovno. He paid great attention to details of dress, hair, and facial features, and his work became noted for its descriptive quality. A selection of Reiss’s portraits appeared in 1938 in his book My Models Were Jews. In this book, published on the eve of the Holocaust, Reiss argued that there was “no such thing as a ‘Jewish race’.” Instead, he claimed that the Jewish people were a cultural group with a great deal of diversity within and between Jewish communities around the world. Franz Boas...

Asian City By Dong Kingman (American, 1911-2000) Unframed: 22" x 15" Framed: 31" x 24" Signed Lower Left Born in Oakland, CA on March 31, 1911. When Kingman was five, his family moved to Hong Kong where he grew up and attended Lingnan Grammar School. The headmaster of the school, Szetu Wei, had studied painting in Paris and recognized his budding artistic talent. For several years he trained young Kingman in both oriental and occidental approaches to painting. Returning to San Francisco in 1929, Kingman became active in the local art scene and began painting scenes of the city. His first solo show at the San Francisco Art Center in 1936 brought immediate recognition. During the 1930s he spent five years working on commissions for the Federal Public Works of Art Project. During WWII he created maps and charts for the O.S.S. After the war Kingman settled in NYC and taught at Columbia University. His paintings were used as backdrops for the movie "Flower Drum Song...