Tunisian Paintings

American intra-war artist and illustrator Porter Woodruff (1894-1959). Arabian Horse scene, oil and gold leaf on board with chalky gouache. Signed Woodruff on lower right of painting. Signature somewhat obscured by frame. His Art Deco-influenced paintings are highly decorative and appealing, the compositions complex and well-thought out. The gold leaf background is decorative and elegant. His are rare Modernist paintings by an artist who found himself at the very heart of design, fashion and celebrity life in the early part of the century. Label at back for Pitt & Scott Ltd London - well known for its expertise in handling antiques, works of art and fragile artefacts. Dimensions: 11.5"h x 15.5"w (sight) 12.5"h x 17.5"w (frame) Porter Woodruff, was an illustrator artist and contributor to Vogue Magazine and Home & Garden (including covers for both). He was one of five artists stationed in Paris in 1923 for Vogue. Woodruff spent considerable time in Tunisia, North Africa, residing with his romantic partner, Romanian socialite George Sebastian. Sebastian owned a lavish, coastal property in then-trendy Hammamet, near Tunis on the Mediterranean. Sebastian fell in love with the simple beauty of the quiet fishing port of Hammamet and was the first of the international set of the times to build his villa there. He started a trend that has never ceased. Frank Lloyd Wright is said to have claimed Dar Sebastian to be ”the most beautiful house I have ever seen”. American and European intelligentsia and upper-crust were attracted to the area between the wars. The artists Cocteau, Elsa Schiaparelli, Paul Klee, Andre Gide, the Sitwells, and Cecil Beaton enjoyed visiting, partying, and undertaking what someone once described as indulging the opportunity to do 'some rather elaborate sinning'. Other visitors included Art Deco designer Jean-Michel Frank, Wallis Simpson, Somerset Maugham, and Greta Garbo, among others. The onset of war disrupted this scene and it never truly regained its former glory. Dar Sebastian was requisitioned by the 'Desert Fox', German General, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel...

This sensitive depiction of St. Sebastian, pierced by a myriad of arrows but not yet expired, was painted by Porter Woodruff in a gorgeous combination of watercolor, gouache and ink. The saint is shown against an Ionic column, with a dark and turbulent sky behind that is punctuated by a row of poplars pointing skyward. Woodruff was best known for his paintings and illustrations for Vogue magazine -- one of five American fashion illustrators who worked for the magazine -- as well as House & Garden. Woodruff was born in Tennessee, but spent much of his creative life in Paris and Tunisia, where he lived with Georges Sébastian, an important Hungarian-born, French orchestra...