Continental US - Paintings

19th Century Seascape with Fishing Boats on Beach, British School, circa 1870, an oil on canvas seascape with two luggers high on beach at low ti...

A folk art wall panel hand painted by an itinerant artist in Sweden in 1837 (dated), depicting the nativity, with the three kings on horseback paying homage to Mary seated on a thron...

This delightful oil on board titled "Tired Out" by Howard Helmick depicts a young man sleeping in a pile of hay, with a pastoral country scene just beyond the barn's entryway. Housed...

Oil on wood depicting Amiral Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, Duke of Bronte, born September 29, 1758 at Burnham Thorpe and died October 21, 1805 off Cape Trafalgar, is a British...

Beautiful midcentury still life with fruit and wine bottle signed Tonar 1959. It is on canvas panel and in wonderful vintage condition overall. H...

Japanese Two Panel Screen: Trees in Floral Landscape, Edo period painting (mid 19th century) of pine and other trees amongst flowers, with bamboo shoots on the right panel, and white...

Copy of a painting by Arthur Wardle showing 3 leopards in tall grass with red poppies around a woman in classical garb

Madonna oil painting on cardboard . Wonderful patina.

Oil on canvas depicting a Cernay France forest landscape with lush vegetation, trees, rocks and flowers. Presented in a gilt frame with beaded motif. Signed lower right T. W. Shields...

Charming framed and matted antique Chinese painting of birds. Painted on pith paper with gouache in bold colors in a scholastic style...

Set of 5 colored Lithographs by Swedish artist Harald Lyth ( born 1937). Signed and numbered by pencil. Size with out frame 16" x11' each. Framed. One fr...

Oil painting on burlap with a striking composition of a Chinese porcelain bowl. Executed in an ancient fresco style, combining modern simplicity with age old rustic texture and techn...

A large palatial Flemish baroque historical tapestry depicting a battle scene, with soldiers to the foreground on land, the opposing army arriving by sea, with a city under siege to ...

Spectacular and large oil painting on canvas, mid 20th century. A winter scene from the northeast region on the united states, signed by the artist Ken McIndoe from Hopewell, NJ. Born in London in 1938, McIndoe moved permanently to this country in 1957, and studied at the Art Students League around a two-year hitch in the U.S. Army. Besides teaching at the ASL, he has conducted landscape workshops in Ireland, Alaska, and closer to home, as well as teaching at Triangle Art...

Hand-picked by buyers at Ann-Morris Inc.

Oil on canvas horizontal painting by painter Lewis John Shonborn (1852-1931) depicting horses clearing the hurdle. This captivating horizontal oil painting on canvas, created by arti...

An antique American School Folk Art oil painting on canvas depicting an African American fisherman boy in a river landscape, 1913. Signed by the artist, J. Feindell and dated, lower ...

A fine Italian 19th century oil painting on canvas "La Madonna della Seggiola" after Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino 1483-1520) The circular canvas depicting a seated Madonna holding an infant Jesus Christ next to a child Saint John the Baptist, all within a massive carved gilt wood and gesso frame (all high quality gilt is original) which is identical to the frame on Raphael's original artwork. This painting is a 19th Century copy of Raphael's Madonna della Seggiola painted in 1514 and currently exhibited and part of the permanent collection at the Palazzo Pitti, Galleria Palatina, Florence, Italy. The bodies of the Virgin, Christ, and the boy Baptist fill the whole picture. The tender, natural looking embrace of the Mother and Child, and the harmonious grouping of the figures in the round, have made this one of Raphael's most popular Madonnas. The isolated chair leg is reminiscent of papal furniture, which has led to the assumption that Leo X himself commissioned the painting, circa 1890-1900. Subject: Religious painting Measures: Canvas height: 29 1/4 inches (74.3 cm) Canvas width: 29 1/4 inches (74.3 cm) Painting diameter: 28 1/4 inches (71.8 cm) Frame height: 57 7/8 inches (147 cm) Frame width: 45 1/2 inches (115.6 cm) Frame depth: 5 1/8 inches (13 cm).   Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (Italian, March 28 or April 6, 1483 - April 6, 1520), known as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of composition, and visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he forms the traditional trinity of great masters of that period. Raphael was enormously productive, running an unusually large workshop and, despite his death at 37, leaving a large body of work. Many of his works are found in the Vatican Palace, where the frescoed Raphael Rooms were the central, and the largest, work of his career. The best known work is The School of Athens in the Vatican Stanza della Segnatura. After his early years in Rome much of his work was executed by his workshop from his drawings, with considerable loss of quality. He was extremely influential in his lifetime, though outside Rome his work was mostly known from his collaborative printmaking. After his death, the influence of his great rival Michelangelo was more widespread until the 18th and 19th centuries, when Raphael's more serene and harmonious qualities were again regarded as the highest models. His career falls naturally into three phases and three styles, first described by Giorgio Vasari: his early years in Umbria, then a period of about four years (1504–1508) absorbing the artistic traditions of Florence, followed by his last hectic and triumphant twelve years in Rome, working for two Popes and their close associates. Raphael was born in the small but artistically significant central Italian city of Urbino in the Marche region, where his father Giovanni Santi was court painter to the Duke. The reputation of the court had been established by Federico III da Montefeltro, a highly successful condottiere who had been created Duke of Urbino by the Pope - Urbino formed part of the Papal States - and who died the year before Raphael was born. The emphasis of Federico's court was rather more literary than artistic, but Giovanni Santi was a poet of sorts as well as a painter, and had written a rhymed chronicle of the life of Federico, and both wrote the texts and produced the decor for masque-like court entertainments. His poem to Federico shows him as keen to show awareness of the most advanced North Italian painters, and Early Netherlandish artists as well. In the very small court of Urbino he was probably more integrated into the central circle of the ruling family than most court painters. Federico was succeeded by his son Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, who married Elisabetta Gonzaga, daughter of the ruler of Mantua, the most brilliant of the smaller Italian courts for both music and the visual arts. Under them, the court continued as a centre for literary culture. Growing up in the circle of this small court gave Raphael the excellent manners and social skills stressed by Vasari. Court life in Urbino at just after this period was to become set as the model of the virtues of the Italian humanist court through Baldassare Castiglione's depiction of it in his classic work The Book of the Courtier, published in 1528. Castiglione moved to Urbino in 1504, when Raphael was no longer based there but frequently visited, and they became good friends. He became close to other regular visitors to the court: Pietro Bibbiena and Pietro Bembo, both later cardinals, were already becoming well known as writers, and would be in Rome during Raphael's period there. Raphael mixed easily in the highest circles throughout his life, one of the factors that tended to give a misleading impression of effortlessness to his career. He did not receive a full humanistic education however; it is unclear how easily he read Latin. Early Life and Works His mother Màgia died in 1491 when Raphael was eight, followed on August 1, 1494 by his father, who had already remarried. Raphael was thus orphaned at eleven; his formal guardian became his only paternal uncle Bartolomeo, a priest, who subsequently engaged in litigation with his stepmother. He probably continued to live with his stepmother when not staying as an apprentice with a master. He had already shown talent, according to Vasari, who says that Raphael had been "a great help to his father". A self-portrait drawing from his teenage years shows his precocity. His father's workshop continued and, probably together with his stepmother, Raphael evidently played a part in managing it from a very early age. In Urbino, he came into contact with the works of Paolo Uccello, previously the court painter (d. 1475), and Luca Signorelli, who until 1498 was based in nearby Città di Castello. According to Vasari, his father placed him in the workshop of the Umbrian master Pietro Perugino as an apprentice "despite the tears of his mother". The evidence of an apprenticeship comes only from Vasari and another source, and has been disputed—eight was very early for an apprenticeship to begin. An alternative theory is that he received at least some training from Timoteo Viti, who acted as court painter in Urbino from 1495.Most modern historians agree that Raphael at least worked as an assistant to Perugino from around 1500; the influence of Perugino on Raphael's early work is very clear: "probably no other pupil of genius has ever absorbed so much of his master's teaching as Raphael did", according to Wölfflin. Vasari wrote that it was impossible to distinguish between their hands at this period, but many modern art historians claim to do better and detect his hand in specific areas of works by Perugino or his workshop. Apart from stylistic closeness, their techniques are very similar as well, for example having paint applied thickly, using an oil varnish medium, in shadows and darker garments, but very thinly on flesh areas. An excess of resin in the varnish often causes cracking of areas of paint in the works of both masters. The Perugino workshop was active in both Perugia and Florence, perhaps maintaining two permanent branches. Raphael is described as a "master", that is to say fully trained, in December 1500. His first documented work was the Baronci altarpiece for the church of Saint Nicholas of Tolentino in Città di Castello, a town halfway between Perugia and Urbino. Evangelista da Pian di Meleto, who had worked for his father, was also named in the commission. It was commissioned in 1500 and finished in 1501; now only some cut sections and a preparatory drawing remain. In the following years he painted works for other churches there, including the Mond Crucifixion (about 1503) and the Brera Wedding of the Virgin (1504), and for Perugia, such as the Oddi Altarpiece. He very probably also visited Florence in this period. These are large works, some in fresco, where Raphael confidently marshals his compositions in the somewhat static style of Perugino. He also painted many small and exquisite cabinet paintings in these years, probably mostly for the connoisseurs in the Urbino court, like the Three Graces and St. Michael, and he began to paint Madonnas and portraits. In 1502 he went to Siena at the invitation of another pupil of Perugino, Pinturicchio, "being a friend of Raphael and knowing him to be a draughtsman of the highest quality" to help with the cartoons, and very likely the designs, for a fresco series in the Piccolomini Library in Siena Cathedral. He was evidently already much in demand even at this early stage in his career. Influence of Florence Raphael led a "nomadic" life, working in various centres in Northern Italy, but spent a good deal of time in Florence, perhaps from about 1504. Although there is traditional reference to a "Florentine period...

Framed 19th Century English Embroidery of a Country Landscape

Copy of a portrait painting titled "Woman Meditating" showing contemplative woman in blue dress under arches

This early 20th-century still life oil painting on board by Carl Fischer captures a warm, impressionistic composition featuring a rustic woven basket of vegetables, bright citrus, an...

Beautifully painted in a quiet palette of blue, gray and warm skin tones, this portrait of a college student with blonde hair and fair complexion was made by Ernst Söderberg in 1920....

18th century continental eglomise painting of St John the Baptist preaching. Eglomise is a method of reverse painting on glass. In a go...

This stylized and richly-colored, almost cinematic, depiction of a nude Toltec male youth by John Garth shows the figure holding a knife and chalice, hinting at human sacrifice, stan...

Barclay Butera "Living in Style" large coffee table book. Publisher: Assouline (2008), (New York). Edition: First Edition. Hardcover Interior designer Barclay Butera makes his publishing debut with this visual compilation of his most iconic work. A young and celebrated star of the design community, Butera creates clean, classical interiors known for their luxury and livability. His work is inspired by a plethora of elements, from the glamour of midcentury Hollywood to the sophistication of Europe and the exoticism of the Far East. Butera s experience in the interior design business began at a young age while working with his mother, who designed the interiors of homes all over the world. At age twenty-five, he started his own company. Barclay Butera explores five themes in the designer s work: Desert, City, Mountain, Beach, and Town & Country. In this stunning edition brimming with exciting design ideas, the author invites readers to explore both the small details and the larger motifs that come together in an enviable interior. About the designer: Since 1994, Barclay Butera has been the creative force behind his prestigious design firm and showroom in Newport Beach, California. His success in Newport prompted Butera to establish showrooms in Park City, Utah, and Corona del Mar, California. Butera is renowned for his approachable elegance and glamorous, coastal-chic interiors. In addition to his thriving interior design business, Butera’s venture into licensing has landed him an unprecedented number of the industry’s most respected partners including: Bradburn Home...

Beautiful nude painting by Barbara Pound, circa 1960. Water colors.

Pulp Fiction Art "Before the Races" by Victor Olson. A beautiful Grace Kelly like female holds a parasol in her hand waiting for the horse races to begin. Elegant sophisticated impas...

Copy of a painting titled "Sleeping" showing nude woman with red hair sleeping

Karl Viktor Mayr (Austrian, 1882-1974) a very fine Austrian oil on canvas "An Exotic Nude Girl" depicting a young semi-nude woman, revealing her breast...

These magnificent lacquered wood panels have been mounted together on a lucite panel. Each panel has its original hanging handle. The panels are hanging on antique railroad...

This oil on canvas embodies the vibrant spirit of English Abstract Expressionism, reminiscent of Hans Hofmann's push and pull technique. It displays an energetic composition of sunse...

Created over 50 years ago, the painting is an artwork of great historical significance. Charles Hinman was a Pioneer of shaped canvases and a leader in abstract art in the 20th centu...

Contemporary New York artist Peter Buchman's 'Note to Self' is created using laser-cut plexiglass, acrylic medium, and enamel on wood. It's part of his Voice-Over series, in which the artist gathers linguistic phrases to immortalize the valuable contributions of other cultures to the American Diaspora. To describe Buchman's word paintings as 'A Figure of Speech' is an understatement of the profound soulfulness they embody. They bear the marks of the artist's hand but also carry the collective spirit of many who came before him. These words derive from familiar phrases, music albums, his unique brand of irony, and the very essence of the human form. For this specific piece, 'Note to Self,' Peter is fascinated by what he said - she said and all of that back-and-forth cross-communication. Phrases like 'word on the street' and 'news at eleven'—we are all familiar with this kind of language, but how does it make us feel to see it stacked on top of each other? Writing lists, scribbling notes, verbatim, talking to ourselves or our partners... where does it all get us? Everywhere? Nowhere? This communication and street slang intrigues him. Whether he hears it or actually sees the words, the language grabs his attention, and he wants to discuss it again... with you, the viewer. Will you engage? Signed and dated en verso. This is a commissioned piece and will ship directly from the artist's studio. American artist Peter Buchman has BFA in Illustration from The Rhode Island School of Design and did a Sculpture Residency at The School of Visual Arts in New York. Peter's artwork has been exhibited throughout the US since 1981 including the Parrish Art Museum (Southampton, NY), Cooperstown Museum (NY), Delaware Museum of Art, Kidder Smith Gallery (MA) and Vered Gallery (East Hampton, NY). His work is included in the portfolios of collectors including Beth Rudin DeWoody, Nicole Miller, David Yurman and Howard Schultz...

Watercolor and ink depicting a very colorful and striking floral bouquet in a blue and white vase over-looking the bay. Two boats with figures on the sandy beach are below, blue tona...

Copy of Impressionist painting by Secessionist artist Carl Moll titled,"Dammerung" showing a stream with a moored boat in a forest at dusk

Inspired by Nature and elements, Rebecca Koury is a vert talented artist creating very unique pieces. This beautiful pair was picked from a series of 9 paintings titled, “Echoes”. Th...

Depicting napoleon and titled on the road from Waterloo to Paris. This museum-quality work is recorded by the royal academy as an exhibition picture by stone, see photos. Has recently been professionally cleaned and restored to excellent condition. Measures: 50 W x 40.75 H overall in frame. 35.75 W x 26.75 H visible area. Stone was a British painter and illustrator best known for his realist depictions of garden parties, literary scenes, and sentimental portraits, as in his hallmark painting In Love (1888). Notably, Stone also produced illustrations for books by Charles Dickens and Anthony Trollope. Born on July 4, 1840 in London, United Kingdom, he was trained from a young age by his father, the renowned painter Frank Stone...

A striking original abstract painting, oil on canvas, signed by artist. Probably late 20th century. Boasting tones of marigold, phthalo green, midnight blue, aubergine, and brick, th...

Oil on Canvas Cocker Spaniel Portrait by Houston artist Martha Goodrum

Late 19th century pastoral oil painting of figures in forest by stream with fallen tree mounted in a gilt frame.

Oil on Canvas Cocker Spaniel Portrait by Houston artist Martha Goodrum

Large Antique English Framed Oil on Canvas Ship Painting, Signed "CKM 1876," Charles Keith Miller (British, 1836-1907). Charles Keith Miller (Briti...

A pair of early 19th Century Continental School Oil on canvas. One portrays Egyptian Figures at a table with Hieroglyphics, and the other one a flute player and a singer. The scenes are from a funerary banquet, from the Tomb of Nenkhef. Both are framed in matching silver gild...

(no image) on lattice frame. Pair available; Sold seperately.

Sascha de Puchala abstract of Roosters. Heavy impasto textural piece of two cocks fighting. Signed lower middle. One small tear. See photos.  

Vibrantly colored oil painting on canvas depicting a Persian in prayer. Jewel tone colors of turquoise, amethyst and aqua marine with earth tone golds reds and browns. Gilt and carv...

Large Vintage Abstract Panting by Gloria Allison Cuban American Artist Offered for sale is a large and colorful figurative abstract painting by Cuban...

Beautifully painted and with an arresting subject, this piece -- with its male nude subject having removed his own fig leaf -- reveals the sly humor of its painter, Leon Dusso...

Copy of a Dutch Flemish still life painting titled "A Table of Desserts" showing wine, fruits and pie in copious amounts Condition: Good; Wear consistent with age and use

Original Modernist Abstract Painting, Acrylic on Board with modern wood frame. Signed, Dated and titled on verso. Artist T. Joyce of Sarasota FL, dated 2005, titled History Repeating...

An exquisite example of this artist's traditional take on still-life realism, and a masterpiece in its own rite. This floral painting represents the artist's awe for botanical and floral scenes as well as his or her adept knowledge of tactile painting. With broad sweeping strokes and high texture, the artist paints a portrait of a small circular Ombre deep blue vase, filled with creamy white ranunculus or buttercups with berry color centers, green eucalyptus and small accents of white hydrangea. Oil on canvas. Framed roughly in a small wood frame, with gilt painted accent inside. How we would display: A botanical painting will forever bring a certain feeling of femininity and softness to a room. This piece would be wonderful displayed in a space with too many harsh lines. Alternatively, we suggest hanging this as part of a grouping of other floral portraits on a large wall to add interest. Another favorite of ours for art is to display pieces on their own in a bedroom. Such as a guestroom or child's room. Hung just above a nightstand (we currently love the idea of using a bombe chest), and just above a table lamp, (perhaps a lamp with a Caprani...

Pullman extra large original art oil on canvas. This painting is in excellent Vintage Condition with minor marks, dents, and wear. We take our...

Thangkas are devotional paintings displayed by Buddhists in monasteries, temples, and even their homes. This 19th-century Tibetan Thangka is rich with historical figures and symbolism arranged around the Viashravana in the painting's center. This lesser deity is the god of wealth...

Exciting painting of jockeys in a race where you can practically feel the wind going by as the horses speed by. Signed Ninetta Butterworth 1922-2010 Listed English artist Custom Fra...

A delightful hand embellished giclee or reproduction on canvas having a whimsical collection of ice cream colored cupcakes and teacups with clever bits of dictionary definitions and ...

Willian A. Slaughter (1923-2003) William A. Slaughter was born in San Antonio, Texas, in 1923 and died in Dallas, Texas, in December 2003. His first call was to the ministry, and aft...

A very interesting and unusual Lancaster Bridge Original Oil Painting by artist J. Earle Pfoutz. The painting is produced on artist board and comes complete with what appears to be an original artist decorated/painted frame. The painting is signed on the front by the artist. Overall frame Size approximately 42″ wide x 2″ deep x 30″ high J. Earle Pfoutz had a long and distinguished career as a self trained artist. More can be learned about him from reading this article produced by Gary Hawbaker at askART Earle Pfoutz Born: 1891 – Lancaster, Pennsylvania Died: 1957 Known for: Landscape, figure, still life painting An image of J Earle Pfoutz Biography from the Archives of askART J. Earle Pfoutz (John Earle Pfoutz) – (Oct 23, 1891-Nov 9, 1957) “A seventh generation descendant of a Swiss family which arrived in America early in the 17th Century, J. Earle Pfoutz was born in Lancaster, PA, son of John Bachman and Susan Allison Pfoutz. He painted houses for a living and pictures for a life. A self-taught artist, described as a primitive, he was distinctive for his vivid imagination and bold color application. He painted hundreds of Lancaster County scenes. Pfoutz traveled through the hills near his home and along the Susquehanna River in search of scenes. He began painting with a brush when he was fourteen, but added a palette knife after suffering an eye injury. He completed eighth grade in the Lancaster Public Schools and there his formal education ended. However, the Department of Public Instruction of the State of Pennsylvania thought so highly of his work as an artist that officials certified him as an art instructor and he taught for a year in the York (PA) public schools. He also was an art instructor under the program for disabled veterans, sponsored by the Veterans Administration, when he gave private instruction to veterans in their homes. In 1947, J. Earle Pfoutz finally earned national recognition as an artist. His painting, Opalescent October, was chosen by the Museum of Art of Dayton Ohio, to travel all over the country for a year with its Group Exhibition. Described as a “very colorful, calm scene, iridescent in color, sweeping in design,” the painting started on its journey around the country early in 1948. In an interview with the Sunday News (Lancaster, PA – Nov 2, 1947), Pfoutz stated that he didn’t know whether he was a “primitive” or an “impressionist.” No master taught him, no school channeled his style. “Sometimes I didn’t eat, but I always managed to paint,” he recalled. Many of his hundreds of canvases -most of them not sold, but given away to friends – found their way to other parts of the country. “I never remember the day when I did not love color,” Pfoutz said. “I was about 12 years old when I saw my first palette – a string of different colored paint paddles that graced the stores of that day. As a boy I had two great desires. One was to be able to eat all the strawberry jam I could, and the other to possess a string of those beautiful paint paddles. Well, I’ve got my fill of jelly, but I’ve never yet got my fill of beautiful colors.” In 1950, Pfoutz’s one man show of paintings made front page headlines in the Lancaster Intelligencer Journal: “Most of the twenty oil paintings on exhibition are landscapes, although there are several interesting figure studies. Colors again, as in all Pfoutziana are rich and full-bodied, but for the most part not as startlingly as in some of the earlier work. Most of the paintings were done during the past year, and also reveal the painter’s characteristic heavy impasto technique, in which the rich swirls of paint carry their own message. Among the figures, The Banjo Picker, and The Magician, are the most provocative. Both are character studies; the first being of a tramp musician whose drab clothing is set-off by a luminous aqua blue background. Modern in feeling and treatment is The Magician, a clown-faced wizard whose spinning ball in the air suggests the fourth dimension – space. The use of the primary colors in this picture serves to emphasize the theme effectively. A large colorful landscape, Opalescent October, depicting rolling hills against a late afternoon sky is new to Lancastrians, as it has just returned from Dayton, Ohio, where it hung in the Dayton Art Institute. Another landscape with soft dreamy colors is Fantasie D’Autumne, and one of the loveliest pictures in the show. Pennsylvania Dutch Country is another with eye appeal, and was one of the works which was hung in the Old Customs House in Philadelphia during Pennsylvania Week, and before that in a collection of Pfoutz work in the same place. In deep contrast to the sunny skies and brilliant foliage of many of the pictures, is the somewhat morbid Worry, in which the center of interest is a tremendous rat. This, the painter explains, was symbolic of 1948 in China, which was ‘The Year of The Rat’ in the Chinese calendar. Background material for the picture was furnished to Pfoutz by author Pearl Buck. Other pictures include Autumn Prelude, Miners Village, painted at Cornwall, PA; Humid Day, Saint Peters Kierch, at Middletown, PA; Lady Pfoutz, inspired by the painter’s wife; Sun Flowers, Sentimental Journey, Gyne, Luzon Woman, Old Bridge, The Cow Path. Lemures, based on Roman mythology, and Ethiopian, painted from an ebony wood carving...

Exquisitely accomplished, this lovely male nude by Paul Goadby Stone is the earliest piece we have ever offered by the artist. Although it has the a...

Monumental 53×65" framed. Stunning, colossal 5" thick, finely carved wood gilt frame with black accent. Original oil on canvas. Architectural whim. R Pacari(?) Hanging hardware inclu...

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...