American Modern Figurative Prints

This artwork titled "Left Bank Cafe, Paris" 1987 is an original color serigraph by noted American artist LeRoy Neiman, 1921-2012. It is hand signed and numbered H.C 166/175 in pencil by the artist. The image size is 26 x 38 inches, sheet size is 32.25 x 44 inches. With the blind stamp of the printer Styria Studio at the lower left corner margin. It is in excellent condition, two small pieces of hanging tape remain on the back. About the artist: Mr. Neiman's kinetic, quickly executed paintings and drawings, many of them published in Playboy, offered his fans gaudily colored visual reports on heavyweight boxing matches, Super Bowl games and Olympic contests, as well as social panoramas like the horse races at Deauville, France, and the Cannes Film Festival. Quite consciously, he cast himself in the mold of French Impressionists like Toulouse-Lautrec, Renoir and Degas, chroniclers of public life who found rich social material at racetracks, dance halls and cafes. Mr. Neiman often painted or sketched on live television. With the camera recording his progress at the sketchpad or easel, he interpreted the drama of Olympic Games and Super Bowls for an audience of millions. When Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky faced off in Reykjavik, Iceland, to decide the world chess championship, Mr. Neiman was there, sketching. He was on hand to capture Federico Fellini directing "8 ½" and the Kirov Ballet performing in the Soviet Union. In popularity, Mr. Neiman rivaled American favorites like Norman Rockwell, Grandma Moses and Andrew Wyeth. A prolific one-man industry, he generated hundreds of paintings, drawings, watercolors, limited-edition serigraph prints and coffee-table books yearly, earning gross annual revenue in the tens of millions of dollars. Although he exhibited constantly and his work was included in the collections of dozens of museums around the world, critical respect eluded him. Mainstream art critics either ignored him completely or, if forced to consider his work, dismissed it with contempt as garish and superficial — magazine illustration with pretensions. Mr. Neiman professed not to care. Maybe the critics are right," he told American Artist magazine in 1995. "But what am I supposed to do about it — stop painting, change my work completely? I go back into the studio, and there I am at the easel again. I enjoy what I'm doing and feel good working. Other thoughts are just crowded out." His image suggested an artist well beyond the reach of criticism. A dandy and bon vivant, he cut an arresting figure with his luxuriant ear-to-ear mustache, white suits, flashy hats and Cuban cigars. "He quite intentionally invented himself as a flamboyant artist not unlike Salvador Dalí, in much the same way that I became Mr. Playboy in the late '50s," Hugh Hefner told Cigar Aficionado magazine in 1995. LeRoy Runquist was born on June 8, 1921, in St. Paul. His father, a railroad worker, deserted the family when LeRoy was quite young, and the boy took the surname of his stepfather. He showed a flair for art at an early age. While attending a local Roman Catholic school, he impressed schoolmates by drawing ink tattoos on their arms during recess. As a teenager, he earned money doing illustrations for local grocery stores. "I'd sketch a turkey, a cow, a fish, with the prices," he told Cigar Aficionado. "And then I had the good sense to draw the guy who owned the store. This gave me tremendous power as a kid." After being drafted into the Army in 1942, he served as a cook in the European theater but in his spare time painted risqué murals on the walls of kitchens and mess halls. The Army's Special Services Division, recognizing his talent, put him to work painting stage sets for Red Cross shows when he was stationed in Germany after the war. On leaving the military, he studied briefly at the St. Paul School of Art (now the Minnesota Museum of American Art) before enrolling in the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where, after four years of study, he taught figure drawing and fashion illustration throughout the 1950s. When the janitor of the apartment building next door to his threw out half-empty cans of enamel house paint, Mr. Neiman found his métier. Experimenting with the new medium, he embraced a rapid style of applying paint to canvas imposed by the free-flowing quality of the house paint. While doing freelance fashion illustration for the Carson Pirie Scott department store in Chicago in the early 1950s, he became friendly with Mr. Hefner, a copywriter there who was on the verge of publishing the first issue of a men's magazine. In 1954, after five issues of Playboy had appeared, Mr. Neiman ran into Mr. Hefner and invited him to his apartment to see his paintings of boxers, strip clubs and restaurants. Mr. Hefner, impressed, showed the work to Playboy's art director, Art Paul, who commissioned an illustration for "Black Country," a story by Charles Beaumont about a jazz musician. Thus began a relationship that endured for more than half a century and established Mr. Neiman's reputation. In 1955, when Mr. Hefner decided that the party-jokes page needed visual interest, Mr. Neiman came up with the Femlin, a curvaceous brunette who cavorted across the page in thigh-high stockings, high-heeled shoes, opera gloves and nothing else. She appeared in every issue of the magazine thereafter. Three years later, Mr. Neiman devised a running feature, "Man at His Leisure." For the next 15 years, he went on assignment to glamour spots around the world, sending back visual reports on subjects as varied as the races at Royal Ascot, the dining room of the Tour d'Argent in Paris, the nude beaches of the Dalmatian coast, the running of the bulls at Pamplona and Carnaby Street in swinging London. He later produced more than 100 paintings and 2 murals for 18 of the Playboy clubs that opened around the world. "Playboy made the good life a reality for me and made it the subject matter of my paintings — not affluence and luxury as such, but joie de vivre itself," Mr. Neiman told V.I.P. magazine in 1962. Working in the same copywriting department at Carson Pirie Scott as Mr. Hefner was Janet Byrne, a student at the Art Institute. She and Mr. Neiman married in 1957. She survives him. A prolific artist, he generated dozens of paintings each year that routinely commanded five-figure prices. When Christie's auctioned off the Playboy archives in 2003, his 1969 painting Man at His Leisure: Le Mans sold for $107,550. Sales of the signed, limited-edition print versions of his paintings, published in editions of 250 to 500, became a lucrative business in itself after Knoedler Publishing, a wholesale operation, was created in 1975 to publish and distribute his serigraphs, etchings, books and posters. Mr. Neiman's most famous images came from the world of sports. His long association with the Olympics began with the Winter Games in Squaw Valley in 1960, and he went on to cover the games, on live television, in Munich in 1972, Montreal in 1976, Lake Placid in 1980, and Sarajevo and Los Angeles in 1984, using watercolor, ink or felt-tip marker to produce images with the dispatch of a courtroom sketch artist. At the 1978 and 1979 Super Bowls, he used a computerized electronic pen to portray the action for CBS. Although he was best known for scenes filled with people and incident, he also painted many portraits. Athletes predominated, with Muhammad Ali and Joe Namath among his more famous subjects, but he also painted Leonard Bernstein, the ballet dancer Suzanne Farrell...

Etching on white laid paper with an "England" watermark, 3 x 1 3/4 inches (76 x 45 mm), full margins. Signed, dated and inscribed "II" in pencil, lower margin. One of 13 trial proof ...

Benton Spruance, 'Nero', 2-color lithograph, edition 35, 1944, Fine and Looney 233. Signed, dated, titled and annotated 'Ed 35' in pencil. Initialed 'BS' in the image, lower right. A...

Original Bravissimo Lido (Small format), artist Rene Gruau. Size: 15.5" x 23.5". Archival linen-backed vintage original French cabaret poster, ready to frame. “Bravissimo” was ...

Etching on cream wove paper. 6 5/16 x 3 3/4 inches (159 x 94 mm), full margin. Signed in pencil lower center margin, from the edition of 111. A well inked impression with a minor cre...

Bernard Sanders (1906-1967) was an extremely gifted portrait artist. and a master at showing us the sitter's age. This is clearly not a young woman. She's, well, early middle age? ...

Carl Ashby, Pensive Lady, 1942, ink and watercolor, retains fresh, clear color. A native of New Mexico, Carl Ashby (1914-2004) moved to New York City in 1938 following a stint with ...

Original horizontal “Resilio Scotchspun” vintage fashion poster. Archival linen backed and presents in excellent condition. “A Bonnie Heila...

Sidney Chafetz (1922-2013) is an outstanding American printmaker whose career stretched from the 1940s through the twentieth century. A Rhode Island native, Sidney Chafetz attended ...

Wake on the Ferry. 1949. Etching. Morse catalog 313. state v. 5 x 7 (sheet 8 3/4 x 11 7/8). Edition of 350: 200 for the Art Students League and 150 for the artist. A fine impression ...

Artist: Will Barnet, American (1911 - 2012) Title: The Doorway Year: 1998 Medium: Lithograph on Arches, signed and numbered in pencil Edition: AP Image Size: 33 x 18 inches Size: 39 x 23 inches Printer: TK Fine Art Editions, NY Publisher: Smithsonian, Wash DC Fig 198, pg 78 from Will Barnet: Prints 1931-2005, published by John Szoke...

SAUL STEINBERG (American 1914-1999) Via Air Mail Geometric Design Lithograph. Sheet: 21 1/2 x 28 inches; Frame: 22 1/4 x 29 inches. Plate signed and dated l/r with sticker upper ri...

John DePol, 'Reflections', chiaroscuro wood engraving, 1979, edition 160 in 1983. Signed, dated and titled in pencil. Signed in the block, lower right. A superb impression, on cream ...

Black & Moorhead 145. The title, Le Beche, is The Shovel in English. Signed and dated in pencil under image at right.

This artwork titled "Maple Leaves and Vines" 1978-79, is an original etching on Wove paper by noted American artist Richard Claude Ziemann, b.1932. It is hand signed, titled, dated a...

An early 20th century view of Times Square. The Society of Iconophiles, 1904. Lithograph in black ink on tissue-thin, laid Japon paper with an anchor and numeral 48 watermark, 8 3/...

A native of New Mexico, Carl Ashby (1914-2004) moved to New York City in 1938 following a stint with the Civilian Conservation Corps. He attended the Art Students League and Atelier ...

Invitation to a party on the occasion of John and Dolly Sloan's twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. Sante Fe: Printed by Peter J. Platt, 1926. 100. Etching on cr...

Original XXII Gran Premio de Espana vintage poster; artist Michael Turner, size: 26.5" x 38". Year 1975. Archival linen backed original Spanish racing poster. 17th Gran Prix...

Fritz Eichenberg, 'The Pimp', wood engraving, 1980, artist's proof before the edition. Signed in pencil. Signed in the block, lower right. A fine, richly-inked impression, on cream wove paper, with full margins (2 3/16 to 3 1/2 inches), in excellent condition. Archivally sleeved, unmatted. Image size 12 x 9 3/4 inches (305 x 248 mm); sheet size 18 x 14 inches (457 x 356 mm). ABOUT THE ARTIST Fritz Eichenberg (1901–1990) was a German-American illustrator and arts educator who worked primarily in wood engraving. His best-known works were concerned with religion, social justice, and nonviolence. Eichenberg was born to a Jewish family in Cologne, Germany, where the destruction of World War I helped to shape his anti-war sentiments. He worked as a printer's apprentice and studied at the Municipal School of Applied Arts in Cologne and the Academy of Graphic Arts in Leipzig, where he studied under Hugo Steiner-Prag. In 1923 he moved to Berlin to begin his career as an artist, producing illustrations for books and newspapers. In his newspaper and magazine work, Eichenberg was politically outspoken and sometimes wrote and illustrated his reporting. In 1933, the rise of Adolf Hitler drove Eichenberg, who was a public critic of the Nazis, to emigrate with his wife and children to the United States. He settled in New York City, where he lived most of his life. He worked in the WPA Federal Arts Project and was a member of the Society of American Graphic Artists. In his prolific career as a book illustrator, Eichenberg portrayed many forms of literature but specialized in works with elements of extreme spiritual and emotional conflict, fantasy, or social satire. Over his long career, Eichenberg was commissioned to illustrate more than 100 classics by publishers in the United States and abroad, including works by renowned authors Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Charlotte and Emily Brontë, Poe, Swift, and Grimmelshausen. He also wrote and illustrated books of folklore and children's stories. Eichenberg was a long-time contributor to the progressive magazine The Nation, his illustrations appearing between 1930 and 1980. Eichenberg’s work has been featured by such esteemed publishers as The Heritage Club, Random House, Book of the Month Club, The Limited Editions Club, Kingsport Press, Aquarius Press, and Doubleday. Raised in a non-religious family, Eichenberg had been attracted to Taoism as a child. Following his wife's unexpected death in 1937, he turned briefly to Zen Buddhist meditation, then joined the Religious Society of Friends in 1940. Though he remained a Quaker until his death, Eichenberg was also associated with Catholic charity work through his friendship with Dorothy Day...

"Second Course Fish" The Perfect Meal - Menu - Intaglio - Style of Chagall The artwork "Second Course Fish" by Michael Parker, created one of a group show at San Francisco State Uni...

Foire de Paris; original lithograph; artist: Albert Solon. Year: 1954. Acid free archival linen backed Size 10.5" x 16 5/8". Excellent condition. Ready to frame The top of this antique poster features the image of the first poster from 1904 in the art nouveau style; and the bottom of the 1954 Foire de Paris where the sails cover part of the earliest poster image. The bottom portion of this design is reflected in its art deco style with the wording of the name of the Foire de Paris reflecting in the water. Original. Linen-backed. The annual Paris Fair was a large international industrial exhibition that attracted not only manufacturers from around the world, but also posterists who vied for the honor of having their design selected as the official poster of the event. For 1954, this poster artist is nostalgic for the turn of the century. He is reminding us that it is the 50th anniversary of the Paris Fair. The vintage poster...

Bernard Brussel-Smith, 'City Scene I', wood engraving, 1949, edition 100. Signed, titled, and numbered '93/100' in pencil. A superb, richly-inked impression, on white wove paper, wi...

New York: The Society of Iconophiles, 1908. The complete portfolio containing 12 photogravures after monotypes printed on O.W. handmade paper. Each image measuring approximately 8 1/4 x 6 inches (208 x 151 mm), with full margins. Each with the Society of Iconophiles blind stamp in the lower left margin. In very good condition with no visible defects. Printed by John Andrew & Son, Boston. Presented in the original greenish-gray paper wrapper with the contents page. Edition of 100. Subjects are: 1. Van Cortland Manor House 2. Oyster Market on West Street 3. St. John's Chapel, Varick Street 4. Fraunces Tavern 5. Houses at Battery Park...

Sidney Chafetz (1922-2013) is an outstanding American printmaker whose career stretched from the 1940s through the twentieth century. A Rhode Island native, Sidney Chafetz attended ...

Original Anno Santo 1983 Italian travel poster map. Linen-backed in Grade A condition, ready to frame. A large yellow sun invites you into this image as it shines down on the entire ...

A signed impression from the artist's own collection. Kansas City: Miniature Print Society, 1946. Etching on antique cream laid paper, 3 5/15 x 1 7/8 inches (84 x 49 mm), full margi...

(after) Alexander Calder "Calder's Circus" offset lithograph on wove paper reproduction after drawings by the artist Published by Art in America and Perls gallery in 1964 (from drawi...

Stone and Press Gallery is excited to offer several works in celebration of the LGBTQ community. A nude woman squats on her haunches as she draws an image on a sheet of paper. Jos...

Original G.M.E. Sanitaire vintage French poster. Linen backed in very good condition and ready to frame. GME Sanitaire c'est la Cuisine is a French vintage poster that has been linen backed for preservation. The poster advertises the GME tile and cladding company, which specializes in kitchen tiles...

Etching and aquatint on hand made F.J. Head & Co watermarked cream laid paper, full margins. Signed and dated in pencil, lower right margin. From the edition of 160 (from a total of ...

A fine proof impression on antique paper Etching on antique laid paper with a large heraldic watermark. 4 1/4 x 2 3/8 inches (109 x 61mm), full margins. Signed, dated, and inscribed...

Etching on Japon paper, 3 1/2 x 1 3/4 inches (89 x 44 mm), full margins. Signed in pencil and inscribed "III" in the lower margin. Likely an unrecorded trial proof impression from th...

Etching and aquatint on antique laid paper, wide margins. Signed, dated and inscribed "Edition of 100" in pencil, lower margin. Second state (of 2)....

KARL SCHRAG (German - American 1912 - 1995) SELF PORTRAIT IN THE GERMAN MANNER, 1991 Monotype, Signed titled, dated and annotated "Monotype with touches of Oil color, I /I" Plate an...

Etching on antique Emberlin 1846 cream laid paper with a parial watermark of Britannia, or Seated Victory, set in a cartouche, surmounted by the Crown of England, 3 1/4 x 5 1/2 inche...

William Bertrum Sharp (1924-1984) served in the Armed Forces during World War II and is considered among the first artists to attend art school under the GI Bill. He studied (proba...

Pamela Bianco, 'Fruit Piece', lithograph, c. 1925. Signed and titled in pencil. Signed in the stone, lower left. Annotated 'No. 8' in pencil, upper right...

Etching on bluish-grey, antique laid paper, 5 x 3 5/8 inches (127 x 93 mm), signed, dated, and inscribed "III" in pencil, lower margin. A proof impression from the third state (of 3)...

Original Spokane (Washington), The Colorful Capital of the Inland Empire vintage travel fun map. Printed in 1971, this seldom if ever found original map is archival linen backed an...

Kent Hagerman was an amazing draftsman who managed to get fantastic detail into his work while showing the environment and atmosphere. This print captures the moment a 'pod' is bein...

Etching on cream laid paper with a deckle edge and with an unidentified watermark with an "AL" inside an ovoid cartouche with a garter and buckle (likely English 19th century), 9 1/2...

Etching on watermarked antique handmade FJ Head paper, 9 1/2 x 14 3/4 inches (240 x 373 mm); sheet 14 x 18 1/4 inches (355 x 463 mm), full margins. Signed and dated in pencil, lower margin. Edition of 97. A magnificent, silvery impression with extremely minor (almost invisible) mat tone. [Fletcher 177] [Illustrated: Page 160, Arms, Dorothy Noyes, "Hilltowns and Cities of Northern Italy"]. The Boat Builders Yard in San Trovaso is a historic 17th-century gondola repair and building yard in Venice, Italy. It's one of the few remaining such workshops in Venice, where skilled artisans traditionally craft and maintain the iconic black gondolas used...

Orignal Vienna Metropoli della musica vintage poster. Archival linen backed and ready to frame. Grade A condition without any tears, damage, fading, or aging. Printed by: Piller-Druckl-Wien. Note that this is the rare “English” version for Vienna, however, the lower lettering is actually written in Italian. One of the best orchestras in the world, many even consider it the best: the Wiener Philharmoniker. Ambassadors of Viennese music travel the world: concerts, tours, and reruns such as those of the New Year's Concert and the summer concert. Perhaps no other musical ensemble is more consistently and closely associated with the history and tradition of European classical music than the Vienna Philharmonic. I am excited to offer this vintage poster for sale...

MORTON DIMONDSTEIN (NY 1920 - LA 2000) MARKET IN ERONGARICUARO 1954 Serigraph, silkscreen. Signed titled and dated in pencil. Image 10 ¼ x 25 ½ inches. Large full sheet 17 1/4 x 30...

A life drawing by a well known book illustrator and long-term resident of the Chelsea Hotel in the 1930s. Caswell, Edward Gin giving Doris a hair cut Black crayon on lightweight, br...

Christian Dull, 'Mending Nets', aquatint, c. 1930, edition 50. Signed and numbered '50/-' in pencil. A fine impression, on cream laid paper, the full sheet with margins (1/2 to 1 1/2...

Original, smaller format size, NANTUA SON LAC. Archival linen-backed original lithograph, excellent condition, ready to ship or frame. Grade A. This poster promotes mini-golf, v...

Original vintage poster: "Map of the United States as Californians See It". 1947, artist: Oren Arnold. Size: 16.5" x 20.5", R. H. MOEBUS COMPANY This poster is not linen-backed. This poster is in very good fine condition, ready to frame. A humorous satirical pictorial map from 1947 with the golden sun on the upper left, gives a detailed depiction of California, its relative size to the rest of the United States, showing Florida as "Death Valley", the rest of the United States as "Unexplored" 'Unimportant anyway, not in California". The image has your Mexican singer; bikini-clad bathers and others set in the image. Shows rivers, lakes, harbors, landmarks, parks, recreational activities, and local people. This map shows Los Angeles’ city...

Artist: Peter Max Title: Rama Rama Year: 1971 Medium: Screenprint Edition: Signed in pencil and marked 72/100 Very good unframed condition. Beginning in the 1960s Peter Max has bee...

tching on green-hued antique laid Japon paper, 9 7/16 x 4 1/16 (240 x 104 mm), full margins. Signed, dated and inscribed "Ed. 100 II." One of a total edition on 124 impressions, prin...

Etching on antique cream laid paper with an "England" watermark; 13 7/8 x 8 5/8 inches (353 x 221 mm), full margins. Signed, dated, titled, numbered "III," and inscribed in pencil. O...

Etching on cream wove Japon paper, 7 3/8 x 7 3/4 inches (188 x 197 mm), full margins. Signed and dated in pencil, lower margin. In excellent condition with some minor surface soiling...

'I'll Be What I Choose: Vanity of Ambition', color lithograph, 1949, edition 40, Fine and Looney 281. Signed, titled, and numbered '23/40' in pencil. Initialed in the stone, lower ri...

"Tar Cart #2" by Joseph Solman (American, 1909-2008) Hand signed recto Joseph Solman (January 25, 1909 – April 16, 2008) was a Jewish American painter, a founder of The Ten, a group...

Richard LINDNER Lovers with a Tiger Original lithograph, 1977 Printed signature in the plate On heavy paper 76 x 56 cm (c. 30 x 22 inch) Created for the artist exhibition in Maeght ...

Lindsey Row, Chelsea. 1888. Lithograph. Way 20; Levy 33; Tedeschi, Stratis and Spink 23. 5 x 8. Edition of 56 posthumous impressions printed by Goulding, in addition to the 14 lifet...

New York, circa 1940 Etching with aquatint in colors on cream laid paper with a partial watermark and a deckle edge, 11 3/4 x 8 1/4 inches (297 x 208 mm), full margins. Minor mat to...

Circa 1950. Etching with aquatint on cream wove paper, 6 x 4 3/4 inches (151 x 119 mm), full margins. Signed "Zavel" and numbered 2/55 in pencil, lower margin. In good condition wit...

Artist: LeRoy Neiman (American, 1921-2012) Title: Paris Bourse Year: 1981 Medium: Screenprint, signed and numbered in pencil Edition: PP Image Size: 29.5 x 37 inches Frame Size: 41 ...