American Folk Art

Vintage wooden Keep Off sign. Hand painted with red background and white lettering on thin wood board. Great colors and graphics. Great vintage condition. Coo...

A large and impressive sculpture of an American Inuit with a basket on his head by Doug Hyde. This heavy piece is signed Doug Hyde and bears his seal. There is an old repair to the t...

1950s "Prince Buddah" circus sideshow banner.

Still life painting (Violin, Flowers), Oil on canvas, by Agnes Weinrich, Signed and dated "22", Unframed: 20" x 16", Framed 27.5 x 23". Agnes Weinrich (1873-1946) was an early female, American modernist artist at a time when there was little interest in Modern Art in the USA and when few women were artists. She was a ground breaker in modern art. The painting shown is an important example of her mature phase of her work. A biography from Wiki-pedia follows: Agnes Weinrich (1873–1946) was one of the first American artists to make works of art that were modernist, abstract, and influenced by the Cubist style. She was also an energetic and effective proponent of modernist art in America, joining with like-minded others to promote experimentation as an alternative to the generally conservative art of their time. Early years[edit] Agnes Weinrich was born in 1873 on a prosperous farm in south east Iowa. Both her father and mother were German immigrants and German was the language spoken at home. Following her mother's death in 1879 she was raised by her father, Christian Weinrich. In 1894, at the age of 59, he retired from farming and moved his household, including his three youngest children—Christian Jr. (24), Agnes (21), and Lena (17), to nearby Burlington, Iowa, where Agnes attended the Burlington Collegiate Institute from which she graduated in 1897.[1][2][3] Christian took Agnes and Lena with him on a trip to Germany in 1899 to reestablish links with their German relatives. When he returned home later that year, he left the two women in Berlin with some of these relatives, and when, soon after his return, he died, they inherited sufficient wealth to live independently for the rest of their lives. Either before or during their trip to Germany Lena had decided to become a musician and while in Berlin studied piano at the Stern Conservatory. On her part, Agnes had determined to be an artist and began studies toward that end at the same time.[1][4] In 1904 the two returned from Berlin and settled for two years in Springfield, Illinois, where Lena taught piano in public schools and Agnes painted in a rented studio. At this time Lena changed her name to Helen. In 1905 they moved to Chicago where Agnes studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago under John Vanderpoel, Nellie Walker, and others.[1] In 1909 Agnes and Helen returned to Berlin and traveled from there to Munich, where Agnes studied briefly under Julius Exter, and on to Rome, Florence, and Venice before returning to Chicago.[5] They traveled to Europe for the third, and last, time in 1913, spending a year in Paris. There, they made friends with American artists and musicians who had gathered there around the local art scene. Throughout this period, the work Agnes produced was skillful but unoriginal—drawings, etching, and paintings in the dominant academic and impressionist styles.[1] On her return from Europe in 1914, she continued to study art, during the warm months of the year in Provincetown, Massachusetts,[1] where she was a member of the Provincetown Printers art colony in Massachusetts,[6] and during the colder ones in New York City. In Provincetown she attended classes at Charles Hawthorne's Cape Cod School of Art and in New York, the Art Students League.[1] Drawing of an old woman by Agnes Weinrich, graphite on paper, 11.5 x 7.5 inches. Hawthorne and other artists established the Provincetown Art Association in 1914 and held the first of many juried exhibitions the following year. Weinrich contributed nine pictures to this show, all of them representational and somewhat conservative in style.[1] A pencil sketch made about 1915 shows a figure, probably one of the Portuguese women of Provincetown. Weinrich was a metculous draftsperson and this drawing is typical of the work she did in the academic style between 1914 and 1920. She also produced works more akin to the Impressionist favored by Hawthorne and many of his students. When in 1917 Weinrich showed paintings in a New York women's club, the MacDowell Club, the art critic for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle said they showed a "strong note of impressionism."[7] Broken Fence by Agnes Weinrich, a white-line woodblock made on or before 1917; at left: the woodblock itself; at right: a print pulled from the woodblook. In 1916 Weinrich joined a group of printmakers which had begun using the white-line technique pioneered by Provincetown artist B.J.O. Nordfelt. She and the others in the group, including Blanche Lazzell, Ethel Mars and Edna Boies Hopkins, worked together, exchanging ideas and solving problems.[1][8] A year later Weinrich showed one of her first white-line prints at an exhibition held by the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia.[9] Broken Fence, in its two states—the print and the woodblock from which she made it—show Weinrich to be moving away from realistic presentation, towards a style, which, while neither abstract, nor Cubist, brings the viewer's attention to the flat surface plane of the work with its juxtaposed shapes and blocks of contrasting colors. Cows Grazing in the Dunes near Provincetown by Agnes Weinrich, white-line woodcut, 10 x 10 1/2 inches When in 1920 the informal white-line printmakers' group organized its own exhibition, Weinrich showed a dozen works, including one called Cows Grazing in the Dunes near Provincetown. This print shows greater tendency to abstraction than eitherBroken Fence or the prints made by other Provincetown artists of the time. The cows and dunes are recognizable but not presented realistically. The white lines serve to emphasize the blocks of muted colors which are the print's main pictorial elements. Weinrich uses the texture of the wood surface to call attention to the two-dimensional plane—the paper on which she made the print—in contrast with the implicit depth of foreground and background of cows, dunes, and sky. While the work is not Cubist, it has a proto-Cubist feel in a way that is similar to some of the more abstract paintings of Paul Cézanne.[10] By 1919 or 1920, while still spending winters in Manhattan and summers on Cape Cod, the sisters came to consider Provincetown their formal place of residence.[1][11][12][13] By that time they had also met the painter, Karl Knaths. Like themselves a Midwesterner of German origin who had grown up in a household where German was spoken, he settled in Provincetown in 1919. Agnes and Knaths shared artistic leanings and mutually influenced each other's increasing use of abstraction in their work.[1][14] The sisters and Knaths became close companions. In 1922 Knaths married Helen and moved into the house which the sisters had rented. He was then 31, Helen 46, and Agnes 49 years old. When, two years later, the three decided to become year-round residents of Provincetown, Agnes and Helen used a part of their inheritance to buy land and materials for constructing a house and outbuildings for the three of them to share. Knaths himself acquired disused structures nearby as sources of lumber and, having once been employed as a set building for a theater company, he was able to build their new home.[15] Weinrich was somewhat in advance of Knaths in adopting a modernist style. She had seen avant-garde art while in Paris and met American artists who had begun to appreciate it. On her return to the United States she continued to discuss new theories and techniques with artists in New York and Provincetown, some of whom she had met in Paris. This loosely-knit group influenced one another as their individual styles evolved. In addition to Blance Lazzell, already mentioned, the group included Maude Squires, William Zorach, Oliver Chaffee, and Ambrose Webster. Some of them, including Lazzell and Flora Schofield had studied with influential modernists in Paris and most had read and discussed the influential Cubist and Futurist writings of Albert Gleizes and Gino Severini.[16][17] Mature style[edit] Woman with Flowers by Agnes Weinrich, circa 1920, oil on canvas, 34 x 30 1/4 inches, exhibited at the Provincetown Art Association exhibition of 1920, made available courtesy of the Association. Two of Weinrich's paintings, both produced about 1920, mark the emergence of her mature style. The first, Woman With Flowers, is similar to one by the French artist, Jean Metzinger called Le goûter (Tea Time) (1911).[18] Red Houses by Agnes Weinrich, circa 1921, oil on canvas on board, 24.25 x 25.5 inches; exhibited "Red Houses" at Fifth Annual Exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists. Like much of Metzinger's work, Le goûter was discussed in books and journals of the time—including one called Cubism co-authored by Metzinger himself.[19] Because the group with which Weinrich associated read about and discussed avant-garde art in general and Cubism in particular, it is reasonably likely that Weinrich was familiar with Metzinger's work before she began her own. The second painting, Red Houses, bears general similarity to landscapes by Cézanne and Braque. Both paintings are Cubist in style. However, with them Weinrich did not announce an abrupt conversion to Cubism, but rather marked a turning toward greater experimentation. In her later work she would not adopt a single style or stylistic tendency, but would produce both representative pictures and ones that were entirely abstract, always showing a strong sense of the two-dimensional plane of the picture's surface. After she made these two paintings neither her subject matter nor the media she used would dramatically change. She continued to employ subjects available to her in her Provincetown studio and the surrounding area to produce still lifes, village and pastoral scenes, portraits, and abstractions in oil on canvas and board; watercolor, pastel, crayon and graphite on paper; and woodblock prints.[20] Possessing an outgoing and engaging personality and an active, vigorous approach to life, Weinrich promoted her own work while also helping Karl Knaths to develop relationships with potential patrons, gallery owners, and people responsible for organizing exhibitions. With him, she put herself in the forefront of an informal movement toward experimentation in American art. Since, because of her independent means, she was not constrained to make her living by selling art, she was free to use exhibitions and her many contacts with artists and collectors to advance appreciation and understanding of works which did not conform to the still-conservative norm of the 1920s and 1930s.[1][21][22] Early in the 1920s, critics began to take notice of her work, recognizing her departure from the realism then prevailing in galleries and exhibitions. Paintings that she showed in 1922 drew the somewhat dry characterization of "individualistic.",[23] and in 1923 her work drew praise from a critic as "abstract, but at the same time not without emotion."[24] In 1925 Weinrich became a founding member of the New York Society of Women Artists. Other Provincetown members included Blanche Lazzell, Ellen Ravenscroft, Lucy L'Engle, and Marguerite Zorach. The membership was limited to 30 painters and sculptors all of whom could participate in the group's exhibitions, each getting the same space.[23][25][26] The group provided a platform for their members to distinguish themselves from the genteel and traditionalist art that women artists were at that time expected to show[27] and, by the account of a few critics, it appears their exhibitions achieved this goal.[1][28][29][30] In 1926 Weinrich joined with Knaths and other local artists in a rebellion against the "traditional" group that had dominated the Provincetown Art Association. For the next decade, 1927 through 1937, the association would mount two separate annual exhibitions, the one conservative in orientation and the other experimental, or, as it was said, radical.[31][32] Both Weinrich and Knaths participated on the jury that selected works for the first modernist exhibition.[11] Still Life by Agnes Weinrich, circa 1926, oil on canvas, 17 x 22 inches. Permission to use granted by Christine M. McCarthy, Executive Director, Provincetown Art Association and Museum. The painting was the gift of Warren Cresswell. Weinrich's painting, Still Life, made about 1926, may have been shown in the 1927 show. Representative of some aspects of her mature style, it is modernist but does not show Cubist influence. The objects pictured are entirely recognizable, but treated abstractly. Although fore- and background are distinguishable, the objects, as colored forms, make an interesting and visually satisfying surface design. In 1930 Weinrich put together a group show for modernists at the GRD Gallery in New York. The occasion was the first time a group of Provincetown artists exhibited together in New York. For it she selected works by Knaths, Charles Demuth, Oliver Chaffee, Margarite and William Zorach, Jack Tworkov, Janice Biala, Niles Spencer, E. Ambrose Webster, and others.[1][23] Later years[edit] Weinrich turned 60 on July 16, 1933. Although she had led a full and productive life devoted to development of her own art and to the advancement of modernism in art, she did not cease to work toward both objectives. She continued to work in oil on canvas and board, pastel and crayon on paper, and woodblock printing. Her output continued to vary in subject matter and treatment. For example, Still Life with Leaves, circa 1930 (oil on canvas, 18 x 24 inches) contains panels of contrasting colors with outlining similar to Knaths's style. Movement in C Minor, circa 1932 (oil on board, 9 x 12 inches) is entirely abstract. It too relates to Knaths's work, both in treatment (again, outlined panels of contrasting colors) and in its apparent relationship to music, something in which Knaths was also interested. Fish Shacks...

A wooden architectural model in original paint of a garage or barn structure, likely used as a child's play object, with a single door and ...

Native American Pueblo painted drum. Classic and colorful cottonwood drum with rawhide skin sides painted red, white and blue. Period: Mid 20th century Origin: Southwest, Cochiti ...

Overscale vintage carved wood Folk Art Toy train set Offered for sale is an overscale vintage carved wood folk art toy train set. The set includes 3 s...

Presented is a John F. Kennedy inscribed and autographed United States Senate Restaurant menu. Kennedy signed the menu on April 10, 1957, when he was a Senator representing the state of Massachusetts...

Cast iron rose sculpture. Dimensions 9" width x 4.75" depth x 2" height. Condition Good vintage condition.

Yokut figurative basket, very fine and tight with much Native use. Period: 19th century Origin: Yokut Size: 15 1/2" x 7". Family Owned & Operated Cisco’s Gallery deals in the rar...

Deep blue ceramic dish with matching lid. This beauty features a pretty white ceramic Magnolia flower with green leaves at the top of the lid. Measures: 4.25" tall 8" diameter 1...

O'Henry Tent and Awning sideshow banner with original shipping tag. Unusual subject matter and fantastic story from the Salem witch trails to Spider Girl. ...

Wonderful 1940s Geo Fitchett Dairy Products Trade sign, this wooden trade sign is in wonderful original condition. It has hooks on the top for hanging, it is double sided as you can ...

19th C Spongeware slop bucket with lid.

Oglala Sioux Style War Headdress: 30"H with Drops 26"W. Typically, war headdresses like this one were composed of awarded coup feathers given to a warrior as an acknowledgement of ba...

These 19th century sponge ware pottery butter crocks measures 6 x 4 and are all in good condition. Each one is slightly different from the next. So nice to see a grouping on a kitche...

This original pattern Mennonite quilt most closely resembles the Philadelphia Pavement pattern. The use of entirely solid colors changes the look consi...

A charming handmade storage piece in the form of a house with two chimneys. Executed in the American Folk Art style, this is a charming piece that is both decorative and practical. T...

Pennsylvania German (Amish or Mennonite) paint-decorated blanket chest of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania origin. Extensive smoke decoration on a ch...

Pair of Mid-Century Modern cabinets, chests, nightstands, karl springer Style Pair of Nightstands or Chests in the Manner of Karl Springer, having a black lacquer and rattan finish. The base giving a floating chest...

American cast iron Mayflower arched doorstop with sailing vessel on rough seas. Signed on lower base, mayflower, 1620. Late 19th Century.

Midcentury, Folk Art, double sided, painted wood "Doll Furniture" sign with jagged edges.

A hand-carved sewing box stand.

Early Chesapeake Bay Scaup Drake Sink Box Wing Decoy, circa 1940, a very shallow flat bodied decoy in original condition, original black and white paint on head and body, and painted...

Monumental and heavy painted steel advertising sign in the shape of a cowboy boot. Boot was most likely hung outside a boot shop. Great original patina. C...

Torcida by Elena Rakochy , Glazed Stoneware Composed of Rounded, Flat and Hexagonal shaped elements juxtaposed with some twisted portions for a dynamic contrast. Artist Bio and State...

19th century painted plains bow with original string and ten matching arrows. Original steel points 2 1/2" - 4". Ex. Fruitland Museum. Ex. Peter Hawkin. Pe...

Portrait of a woman with dark hair on paper. Drawn using pastel chalk, the subject of this piece is a woman with a bouffant with short dark brown hair gazing at the artist. She wears a high neck purple top...

NATIVE AMERICAN BEADED WATCH FOB WITH A STYLIZED FEDERAL EAGLE & SHIELD AND CROSSED AMERICAN FLAGS, circa 1915-1920’s Native American beaded pocket w...

Rare 19th century matching set of six sponge ware luncheon plates 8.5" in. diameter all in mint condition. Set of six sponge ware dinner plates 9" diameter all in mint condition. Sol...

Hand-carved wooden Folk Art hunter with a sheet metal hat. Original red, white and black paint surface.

This appliqued table mat may have been made for a child but it can certainly please any adult. Next to each letter is an animal or vignette whose first letter is shown next to it. For instance, next to the letter C is the cow jumping over the moon...

This one-patch quilt made almost entirely of plaid cotton flannels is both simple and sophisticated. It took an artistic eye to put together this large combination of plaids in a pal...

An exceptional 19th-century American Amish quilt featuring a striking "Diamond in a Square Trip Around the World" pattern, hand-stitched with precision and care. Originating from the Amish communities of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, this quilt showcases a bold palette of forest green, burgundy, and baby blue — a unique color combination that enhances the geometric movement of the traditional layout. Each piece of fabric was hand-cut and repurposed from materials available at the time, resulting in a utilitarian object elevated to an expression of cultural identity and visual artistry. A superb example of early American craftsmanship, this quilt is both a collector’s item and a compelling piece of textile art for refined interiors. Dimensions: 73” x 73” Date of Manufacture: 4th Quarter of the 1800s Place of Origin: Pennsylvania, United States Material: Cotton Condition: Good 19th century Amish quilt, antique hand-stitched quilt, Diamond in a Square quilt, Trip Around the World quilt, Lancaster County quilt, forest green and burgundy quilt, baby blue quilt, antique American patchwork, Amish textile art, early American quilt, heirloom Pennsylvania quilt, folk art quilt, Amish repurposed fabric quilt, antique Americana textile, historic Amish hand quilting, Amish Trip Around the World Quilts, Amish American Quilts, Pennsylvania Quilts, Lancaster County Quilts...

Inuit carved stone pipe in the shape of a walrus. H 4-3/4" W 8" D 2-1/8".

Paul Edward Walker (American, b.1949) Checkerboard oil on board signed “Art by Paul Walker”, “Nov. 97, Savannah, GA” 26 by 20 inches; ¾ inches deep Paul Walker is a Savannah, G...

Native American pipe bag. Original catlinite pipe bowl and stem. Comes in a buffalo hide pouch. Pipe bag and attached early Canadian silver trade brooch and elk ivories...

Vintage Hand colored lithograph by artist Swankar Hanumann of a kachina (Katsina) Doll standing on a pedestal holding a rattle and bow. Presen...

“Rainbow” Heechee Probe with black glass spine abstract Sculpture By Thomas Kelly.

Zuni Fetish Bowl 1976 Edna Weahkee Leki ( 1924 - 2003 ) Ceramic pot, pine tar, turquoise, azurite, serpentine, travertine, alabaster, spiny oyster shell, c...

Vintage plastic road sign from Los Angeles. Slippery road ahead. Large in scale. Yellow background with black graphics. Cool piece of wall art.

Portrait landscape chalk sketch of two nude women posing in front of a window with outlines of foliage and chairs and table. The subjects have dark brown or black hair, one tied with...

Surviving pieces of vernacular lighting are extremely rare and it is hard to source convincing re-creations. These are copies of a period sconce from Longfellows Wayside Inn S Sudbur...

Native American style double-strand necklace with coral and turquoise beads. Top of necklace is double stranded and tapered out from the centre. Large double beaded turquoise knot fl...

Lovely Folk Art wooden carved standing owl. It has bone around the eyes. Small chip on the base.

Hand-carved Folk Art pink and white midcentury car. Fun display piece. Quite a heavy piece.

Nearly six feet tall, this one-of-a-kind sculpture is created from carved wood and vibrant multicolored lacquer. Bright reds, blues, greens, yellow, orange and black. Signed "J.A. Bi...

Antique Amish Bars quilt from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. This quilt is from the 1930s wool and cotton sateen. The condition is very good with min...

Presented is a wonderful inscribed color photo of the inauguration of George H.W. Bush as the 41st President of the United States held on January 20, 1989. The inauguration marked the commencement of the four-year term of George H. W. Bush as President and Dan Quayle as Vice President. The photograph is signed and inscribed to Ron Wade, who once served as a White House page for President Nixon. Inscription reads, "To Ron Wade/ Sincerely /George Bush" Mr. Wade then scripted a note on the verso of the photo, stating "Signed as President, week of 6-1/-89". The inauguration of George H. W. Bush as the 41st president of the United States was held at the West Front of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. This was the 51st inauguration. Chief Justice William Rehnquist administered the presidential oath of office to Bush and Justice Sandra Day O'Connor administered the vice presidential oath of office to Quayle. Bush was the first sitting vice president to be inaugurated as president (not due to his predecessor's death or resignation) since Martin Van Buren...

Early 19th century child's windsor chair.

Distressed vintage embossed School sign. Reads "SCHOOL" in bold black lettering embossed on a bright yellow background with a black border. Great piece of ...

This beautiful terracotta wall plaque is very unusual, salvaged from a brownstone in New York City. Made of terracotta depicting a young Victorian woman...

Vintage American hand hooked rug was handcrafted in the early 1900s in the New England Area of the United States. It has a floral pattern with flowers in brilliant vintage colors including ivory, green, blue, and red. The Antique Hooked Rugs are a combination of Folk Art Creativity and Simplicity. When it comes to true simplicity and artistic creativity Antique Hooked Rugs have some of the best representations. The tradition of Hooked Rug started in New England. “Hooking” is the term used to describe the technique of hand crafting these rugs started as a hobby for the farmers in the long and dark cold winter nights of North East States in the US in the early 1800s. Hooked rugs were made as functional pieces for the home either as a table decoration or a wall art. Antique Hooked Rugs are a combination of Folk Art Creativity and Simplicity. When it comes to true simplicity and artistic creativity Antique Hooked Rugs have some of the best representations. Dimensions: 3’ x 4’ 9” Date of Manufacture: Early 1900s Place of Origin: America Material: Rag wool and cotton pile on a burlap foundation Condition: Wear consistent with age and use American Hooked Rugs, Vintage Hooked Rugs, Early American Hooked Rugs, American Rag Rugs, Antique Rug, Antique Rugs, Antique Carpets, Vintage Carpets, Handwoven Rugs, Vintage Artisan Rugs, Antique Handmade Rugs, Sustainability, Vintage Distressed Rugs, Allover Design Rug, Mid Century Modern Rugs, Vintage Rag Rugs, Vintage Wool Rag Rugs...

Late 19th Century Folk Art "BOOT' Cobbler's Trade Show OR sHOP Sign / Sculpture . aLL Hand made,, Oil cloth, copper top and Wood...Most likely hung outside of an old cobbler , shoe ...

Vintage carnival game made by the Saint Louis Carnival company. We also have the original paper game rules signs with these. Please note that not all crates are painted St. Louis Car...

A rather odd hand painted political black leather Gladstone holdall, believed to be a graduate college bag. American in origins, second quarter of the 20th century in age 3...

Vintage metal street sign illustrating 'Enter Here.' Sign is affixed to a pipe with reflective tape on the front. Meant to be driven into th...

Prominent 1980s reversible LUNCH sign in a unique and bold blue base color with white font and borders. The reverse side features colorful flowers and the w...