Russell Harris

"Confections Of Delight" (2025) Oil Still-Life Painting on Panel

2025

Anthony Waichulis' "Acidulcis" is an original, handmade oil still-life painting that depicts a bowl of lemons on a wooden table, with bright sunlight shining in through the partially...

"Celestial Dinner" by Francisco Collado is an original, handmade oil painting on panel that measures 30.5 x 43.5 inches in its decorative frame and is ready to hang. About the Artis...

James Tormey (American, 1938-2017) "Candyland (Mixed Bowl)" on table with white tablecloth cover. Oil Painting on Canvas. Hand signed lower right. Measures approx. - 32" high x 37" wide, total with frame - 37 1/2" high x 42 1/2" wide. James J Tormey, NYC artist, He was born in Brooklyn in 1938. As a young man he moved to Manhattan where he lived and worked for more than 60 years. James Tormey studied at the Pratt Institute, in Brooklyn, and at Columbia University and worked in advertising for several years while he painted part time. In the 1960s he supported himself as a photographer, covering openings and events for the Museum of Modern Art, in New York City. For many years he was represented by the Madison Avenue Gallery, in New York City, where he had numerous one-man shows. He has also exhibited in Japan and Germany. The artist makes his home in Manhattan and is represented by the Uptown Gallery, also in New York City. James Tormey paints still lifes of traditional subject matter: fruit, vegetables, or eggs appear in bowls or on surfaces illuminated by powerful directional light. Tormey builds stronger and more precise meaning into his work by exploring how the backgrounds and settings for his still lifes can convey particular ideas. In his recent work, for instance, he painted a series of images in which fruit—a traditional still-life subject—is placed in architectural settings or frames that we usually associate with religious imagery. In Icon, for instance, the artist painted a red cabbage and placed it inside a Renaissance-style frame that he built and decorated himself. Instead of being presented with a saint or a Madonna within such a context, we are given a fully realized, but quite ordinary, vegetable. Tormey’s painting technique involves great care from the beginning. He works in his apartment in Manhattan’s Upper West Side in a meticulously clean space equipped with a very solid easel and a large glass palette on a painting table. For reference he uses photographs he has taken of still-life setups in conjunction with pictures of architectural or other settings he has collected over the years. “I start with a careful graphite drawing right on the canvas,” he explains. These days he uses lightweight cotton duck, although much of his earlier work was done on smoother surfaces. Once the graphite line is established, the artist makes a thin monochrome version of the image with a dull green. “I don’t add anything to the paint other than turpentine,” he explains. “I don’t use oil or glazing mediums because I don’t like shine. The turpentine dulls the paint, which suits what I’m doing.” Once the green layer has dried, the artist applies a second thin layer in a warm brown using burnt sienna or burnt umber. “In all these stages I’m working from dark to light,” he says, “so that I’m always getting a rendered, three-dimensional image.” Tormey works on two or three paintings at a time to allow for sufficient drying time between layers. “I also like the way one painting seems to talk to another,” he says. “It makes for a richer process.” Once he starts working in full color on the image, he continues slowly, applying many thin layers and gradually achieving subtle tonal and color shifts until his forms burst with three-dimensional life. “I work with a very dry brush,” explains the artist. Many of Tormey’s paintings contain dark backgrounds, some of which are pure black—something that can present its own technical problems. “I don’t want those backgrounds to feel present,” he says. “I want them to simply drop out.” Because he doesn’t want any shine on his work he doesn’t use varnish. It’s not surprising that Tormey’s work, with its heavy contrasts and smooth tonal transitions, is strongly influenced by photography. Tormey worked as a photographer for some years, and when he began doing still lifes he often photographed them against black backgrounds. His work was also published as fine art cards, posters, and fine art Giclee prints. He pioneered the "larger-than-life" still-life with his work combining traditional subject matter with a contemporary interpretation that produces startling images of heroic proportions. Light reflected and transmitted lends the natural objects, which are the subjects, a quality which may evoke in the viewer clarity of vision and a delight in the forms of the natural world around them. His work conveys a powerful positive philosophy and he once said "I believe the only way we can come to terms with the world is if we look at it as it really is." He believed that artists should take responsibility for the meaning their works carry and stated that "there are definite ideas behind my paintings". He studied at Pratt Institute and Columbia University and worked in advertising and as a photographer before turning to full-time painting. His paintings were exhibited in dozens of galleries around the country, in Germany and Japan and are now seen in numerous public and private collections. While he was not officially part of the Photorealism art...

Signed, verso, 'Tom Kraa' and dated 1987 on stretcher; bearing original gallery label verso with artist name, date and title, 'Funny Money'. Previously with: DW Gallery, Dallas, Texas An exceptional trompe-l'œil still life showing illuminated party lights, United States currency and a crossword puzzle against the backdrop of a sheet of pegboard. This little known artist exhibited with the prestigious DW Gallery in Dallas in the year before it closed. Along with several other women, Linda Samuels (formerly Linda Surls) started the DW Gallery (DWG) as a small women's co-op at McKinney and Hall streets in 1975. In the first few years, the gallery was staffed by member artists, each of whom worked three days a month and paid a $33 monthly fee toward overhead costs. Throughout its 13-year history, the gallery developed a reputation for recognizing raw talent and eventually became one of the nation's most respected showcases for contemporary regional artists. DWG was the first to exhibit several "new" artists who are nationally recognized today, including Lee N. Smith, David Bates, and Clyde Connell. The gallery was also successful at promoting up-and-coming Dallas artists such as David McManaway, John Hernandez, and Sam Gummelt. In 1978, the gallery was incorporated after receiving backing from founding member Lou Alpert (formerly Frederickson). By 1980, when director Linda Samuels moved to California, the gallery had expanded twice. In 1981, Diana Block succeeded Samuels as DWG director. Under Block, the gallery continued its successful theme exhibits, including a popular Book/Art exhibition. In 1983, DWG expanded to a new space on Main Street in Deep Ellum and opened a bookstore in a renovated warehouse. In 1986, when the gallery again needed to expand, it moved to new space on Canton and Oakland Streets rented from John Tatum, Dallas developer and major stockholder in DWG. After a dispute over the lease, the gallery closed in September 1988. By this time, its operating budget had increased from $24,000 to $100,000 since 1981, with investors contributing less than 25 percent of the annual budget. The closing exhibition, The Last Show, was guest-curated by founding member Linda Samuel. It featured recent works by each of the 28 artists associated with the gallery over the past year. The gallery received postcard tributes from more than 80 artists who had exhibited there through the years, including Bob Wade, Peter Julian, Gilda Pervin, James Surls, Benito Huerta, Dan Rizzie, Danny Williams, Bill Komodore, and Frank Tolbert.