John Wenger

Wild Flowers Vibrant Colorful Modernist Oil Painting

John Wenger (1887-1976) celebrated easel painter and stage set designer whose career included 25 solo shows in the USA, Canada, and Europe. He created set designs for such plays as "Ile", "Petrushka", "Funny Face", and Rhapsody In Blue". John Wenger's art is included in many museums in and out of the USA. John Wenger was born on June 16, 1887 in Elizabethgrad, Russia. Wenger was born an artist, and at the age of three was painting (playing) with brushes and paint while his father, a local artist who painted scenery for the traveling theater, worked on drop scenes. His mother disapproved of this and tried to keep her son from playing with these "toys." When John Wenger was several years older, he attended Gihnazia, which is equivalent to high school but on a college level. Throughout his education Wenger excelled in visual arts. The staff at the Gihnazia school encouraged him to apply to the Imperial Art Academy of Odessa for a scholarship. At the age of thirteen, John Wenger became a student at the academy. For Wenger, this was his first time away from home and he found it to be difficult for several months. When he came to America in 1903, John earned his living by designing ladies costumes and jewelry at his uncles store in Newark, New Jersey. He then resumed his art studies at Cooper Union and The National Academy of Design. While in New York, Wenger found an interest in how music and theater connected to art. He rebelled against the heavy sets and hard lines of stage scenery...

Hand signed Lower left Joseph Raskin painted still lifes throughout his career, often using them for formal and technical experimentation. Here, the artist renders a bouquet of a wide variety of flowers in a white vase, in the background the artist places a mirror where the floral arrangement is reflected in it. The artist's choice of colors is vibrant, creating contrast between the subject, and the background in the composition. Joseph Raskin was a painter, etcher, teacher, and writer and co-author with his wife, Edith, of 10 books for young adults. Mr. Raskin studied at the National Academy of Design, which awarded him several fellowships for his work. He was a member of the American Artist's Congress; Woodstock Artists Association; Audubon Artists; Artists Equity Association, NYC. He exhibited at the Salons of American Artists, 1925; Society of Independent Artists, 1930; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts Annual, 1930, 1936, 1938, 1939; Association American Artists, 1945 (WPA era); Corcoran Gallery biennials, 1935, 1937; and in many galleries during those years including the Schervee Gallery, Boston in 1927, Tricker Gallery in 1939, the Schneider-Gabriel Gallery in 1941, Steinway Hall in 1942, and the American Artists Association in 1945. His awards include a European scholarship, National Academy of Design, 1921; Fellowship, Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation, 1921. His paintings and etchings have been exhibited in galleries and institutions here and in Israel, including the New-York Historical Society, the New York Public Library, the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, and the Corcoran Gallery of Art and National Academy of Design, both in Washington, D.C. the Department of Labor Building, Washington DC, the Smithsonian Museum and several universities. Four of his ''West Point'' etchings were acquired by Eleanor Roosevelt for the Roosevelts' home at Hyde Park, N.Y. Fifty of his oil paintings are on display in Safed...