American Realist Art

Limited edition monochrome cyan drypoint etching of a potted plant and door by Barbara Cohn (American, 1923-2019). Numbered ("2/25"), titled ("Still Life with Door"), and hand signed...

Slim Aarons Tennis in the Bahamas, 1958 Chromogenic Lambda print Slim Aarons Estate Edition Complimentary dealer shipping to your framer, worldwide. 1957—Two women stand talking to...

Gorgeous 1930s figure drawing of a seated female nude by student of Lee Fritz Randolph (American, 1880-1956), 1937. Signed "Randolph," "C.S.F.A." for California School of Fine Art and dated "6/28/37" upper right. "C.S.F.A" and "6/28/37" lower right. Unframed. Image size, 25"H x 10"L. We believe a student of Lee Randolph...

In this classic black and white midcentury winter snowscape, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, a young skier prefers to carry his own skis down the slope in New Hampshire...

Wonderful small still life painting by John T. Axton III done circa 1980. Oil on canvas and signed with the artist's monogram lower left. Unframed. Axton was born in Fort Leavenwo...

Artist: Lowell Blair Nesbitt, American (1933 - 1993) Title: White Rose Year: 1981 Medium: Silkscreen, signed and numbered in pencil Edition: 200 Image Size...

Delicate watercolor, pen and ink floral study of a purple iris by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b. 1943). Signed lower center. Attributed to De...

Artist: Harry McCormick, American (1942 - ) Title: McSorley's Old Ale House Medium: Serigraph, signed and numbered in pencil Edition: 250, AP Size: 26 in. x 40 in. (66.04 cm x 101.6...

Boy with Action Figures, 1984 by Tria Giovan From a 35mm negative, scanned in 2020 Archival Pigment Print available in this size of 16" x 20" in an Edition of 12 with 3 Artist Proo...

Business is slow! The Village Vendor, painted by Clyde Singer, captures the boredom and expectation waiting for the next sale. This likely New York City scene shows the bustle of ...

This refined work on paper, entitled "Teddo" was produced by the celebrated American artist Paul Cadmus (1901-1999) in 1985. It features a nude male figure with tightly cropped hair ...

Diner Window, 1989 by Tria Giovan From a 6cm x 9cm negative, scanned in 2020 Archival Pigment Print available in this size of 16" x 20" in an Edition of 12 with 3 Artist Proofs Pr...

Fifty Cents on Delancey Street, 1985 by Tria Giovan From a 35mm negative, scanned in 2020 Archival Pigment Print available in this size of 16" x 20" in an Edition of 12 with 3 Arti...

Crosswalk on Delancey Street, 1988 by Tria Giovan From a 6cm x 4.5cm negative, scanned in 2020 Archival Pigment Print available in this size of 16" x 20" in an Edition of 12 with 3...

This modern still life diptych by Gio Bellagio is inspired by ancient Greek ceramic vessels. The pots are adorned with minimalist patterns reminiscent of Greek geometry, emphasising...

Edition of 10 + 1AP

Wonderful mid-century watercolor landscape of a charming house with porch rendered in crisp detail, and a sprawling verdant green yard with large tree and sheds by Joseph Yeager (ear...

Stanton Street View with Cars, 1987 by Tria Giovan From a 6cm x 4.5cm negative, scanned in 2020 Archival Pigment Print available in this size of 16" x 20" in an Edition of 12 with ...

Arthur M Cook better known as Art was born in 1931. Mostly associated with Minnesota. He is well known for his watercolors of birds, especially geese. He is also an artist for wildli...

Cats on the Sidewalk, 1984 by Tria Giovan From a 35mm negative, scanned in 2020 Archival Pigment Print available in this size of 16" x 20" in an Edition of 12 with 3 Artist Proofs ...

A whimsical pastel featuring a Mother with her Child on her lap that just pulled a goldfish from it's bowl. A charming large work that is exquisitely framed. Peggy Dodds Williams ...

Wonderful color photograph by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b. 1943). Titled" Roller Coaster with Palms 1" and signed by the artist "Deborah Eddy " on verso. Presented in...

George Luks An Actor Signed lower left Oil on canvas 18 x 24 inches Provenance Coe Kerr Gallery, New York, 1985 Manoogian Collection, Michigan Artist George Luks was one of a group...

1957—Two women stand talking to a man on the edge of a tennis court in the Bahamas. Behind the main group stand a second group of people talking. Slim Aarons Tennis in the Bahamas, ...

Nora Othic is considered one of the top regionalist painters in the Midwest. She builds on a legacy from her artistic predecessors such as Grant Wood, Thomas Hart Benton and the WPA ...

Seascape of waves crashing against a large rock by Joseph Yeager (early-mid 20th Century) on heavy bond watercolor paper with ragged edges. Signed "Joe Yeager...

"La Cage Aux Fowls" A tongue in cheek swipe at the artist and his muse, the nude and of course the chicken. An oil on canvas circa 1980, signed G. Lester of Ardsley, New York (Americ...

My Fire Escape View 01 on Stanton Street, 1986 by Tria Giovan From a 35mm negative, scanned in 2020 Archival Pigment Print available in this size of 16" x 20" in an Edition of 12 w...

Vibrant watercolor, pen and ink floral study of Peruvian lilies, with brilliant attention to detail and a signature delicate style, by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b.194...

The Golden Gate Lithograph on wove paper watermarked GC, 1940 Signed in pencil by the artist (see photo) Publisher: Associated American Artists Edition: 189, unnumbered The image depicts The Golden Gate Bridge which connects San Francisco and Marin County, California References And Exhibitions: Illustrated: Adams, The Sensuous Life of Adolf Dehn, Fig. 13.17, page 324 Reference: L & O 325 AAA Index 391 Adolf Dehn, American Watercolorist and Printmaker, 1895-1968 Adolf Dehn was an artist who achieved extraordinary artistic heights, but in a very particular artistic sphere—not so much in oil painting as in watercolor and lithography. Long recognized as a master by serious print collectors, he is gradually gaining recognition as a notable and influential figure in the overall history of American art. In the 19th century, with the invention of the rotary press, which made possible enormous print runs, and the development of the popular, mass-market magazines, newspaper and magazine illustration developed into an artistic realm of its own, often surprisingly divorced from the world of museums and art exhibitions, and today remains surprisingly overlooked by most art historians. Dehn in many regards was an outgrowth of this world, although in an unusual way, since as a young man he produced most of his illustrative work not for popular magazines, such as The Saturday Evening Post, but rather for radical journals, such as The Masses or The Liberator, or artistic “little magazines” such as The Dial. This background established the foundation of his outlook, and led later to his unique and distinctive contribution to American graphic art. If there’s a distinctive quality to his work, it was his skill in introducing unusual tonal and textural effects into his work, particularly in printmaking but also in watercolor. Jackson Pollock seems to have been one of many notable artists who were influenced by his techniques. Early Years, 1895-1922 For an artist largely remembered for scenes of Vienna and Paris, Adolf Dehn’s background was a surprising one. Born in Waterville, Minnesota, on November 22, 1895, Dehn was the descendent of farmers who had emigrated from Germany and homesteaded in the region, initially in a one-room log cabin with a dirt floor. Adolf’s father, Arthur Clark Dehn, was a hunter and trapper who took pride that he had no boss but himself, and who had little use for art. Indeed, during Adolf’s boyhood the walls of his bedroom and the space under his bed were filled with the pelts of mink, muskrats and skunks that his father had killed, skinned and stretched on drying boards. It was Adolf’s mother, Emilie Haas Dehn, a faithful member of the German Lutheran Evangelical Church, who encouraged his interest in art, which became apparent early in childhood. Both parents were ardent socialists, and supporters of Eugene Debs. In many ways Dehn’s later artistic achievement was clearly a reaction against the grinding rural poverty of his childhood. After graduating from high school in 1914 at the age of 19—an age not unusual in farming communities at the time, where school attendance was often irregular—Dehn attended the Minneapolis School of Art from 1914 to 1917, whose character followed strongly reflected that of its director, Munich-trained Robert Kohler, an artistic conservative but a social radical. There Dehn joined a group of students who went on to nationally significant careers, including Wanda Gag (later author of best-selling children’s books); John Flanagan (a sculptor notable for his use of direct carving) Harry Gottlieb (a notable social realist and member of the Woodstock Art Colony), Elizabeth Olds (a printmaker and administrator for the WPA), Arnold Blanch (landscape, still-life and figure painter, and member of the Woodstock group), Lucille Lunquist, later Lucille Blanch (also a gifted painter and founder of the Woodstock art colony), and Johan Egilrud (who stayed in Minneapolis and became a journalist and poet). Adolf became particularly close to Wanda Gag (1893-1946), with whom he established an intense but platonic relationship. Two years older than he, Gag was the daughter of a Bohemian artist and decorator, Anton Gag, who had died in 1908. After her husband died, Wanda’s mother, Lizzi Gag, became a helpless invalid, so Wanda was entrusted with the task of raising and financially supporting her six younger siblings. This endowed her with toughness and an independent streak, but nonetheless, when she met Dehn, Wanda was Victorian and conventional in her artistic taste and social values. Dehn was more socially radical, and introduced her to radical ideas about politics and free love, as well as to socialist publications such as The Masses and The Appeal to Reason. Never very interested in oil painting, in Minneapolis Dehn focused on caricature and illustration--often of a humorous or politically radical character. In 1917 both Dehn and Wanda won scholarships to attend the Art Students League, and consequently, in the fall of that year both moved to New York. Dehn’s art education, however, ended in the summer of 1918, shortly after the United States entered World War I, when he was drafted to serve in the U. S. Army. Unwilling to fight, he applied for status as a conscientious objector, but was first imprisoned, then segregated in semi-imprisonment with other Pacifists, until the war ended. The abuse he suffered at this time may well explain his later withdrawal from taking political stands or making art of an overtly political nature. After his release from the army, Dehn returned to New York where he fell under the spell of the radical cartoonist Boardman Robinson and produced his first lithographs. He also finally consummated his sexual relationship with Wanda Gag. The Years in Europe: 1922-1929 In September of 1921, however, he abruptly departed for Europe, arriving in Paris and then moving on to Vienna. There in the winter of 1922 he fell in love with a Russian dancer, Mura Zipperovitch, ending his seven-year relationship with Wanda Gag. He and Mura were married in 1926. It was also in Vienna that he produced his first notable artistic work. Influenced by European artists such as Jules Pascin and Georg Grosz, Dehn began producing drawings of people in cafes, streets, and parks, which while mostly executed in his studio, were based on spontaneous life studies and have an expressive, sometimes almost childishly wandering quality of line. The mixture of sophistication and naiveté in these drawings was new to American audiences, as was the raciness of their subject matter, which often featured pleasure-seekers, prostitutes or scenes of sexual dalliance, presented with a strong element of caricature. Some of these drawings contain an element of social criticism, reminiscent of that found in the work of George Grosz, although Dehn’s work tended to focus on humorous commentary rather than savagely attacking his subjects or making a partisan political statement. Many Americans, including some who had originally been supporters of Dehn such as Boardman Robinson, were shocked by these European drawings, although George Grocz (who became a friend of the artist in this period) admired them, and recognized that Dehn could also bring a new vision to America subject matter. As he told Dehn: “You will do things in America which haven’t been done, which need to be done, which only you can do—as far at least as I know America.” A key factor in Dehn’s artistic evolution at this time was his association with Scofield Thayer...

Nora Othic is considered one of the top regionalist painters in the Midwest. She builds on a legacy from her artistic predecessors such as Grant Wood, Thomas Hart Benton and the WPA ...

Nora Othic is considered one of the top regionalist painters in the Midwest. She builds on a legacy from her artistic predecessors such as Grant Wood, Thomas Hart Benton and the WPA ...

Nora Othic is considered one of the top regionalist painters in the Midwest. She builds on a legacy from her artistic predecessors such as Grant Wood, Thomas Hart Benton and the WPA ...

Nora Othic is considered one of the top regionalist painters in the Midwest. She builds on a legacy from her artistic predecessors such as Grant Wood, Thomas Hart Benton and the WPA ...

This midcentury landscape photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features Las Brisas Residencias, home of Eustaquio Escandon in Acapulco, where Henry Kissinger spe...

This late 1950s portrait photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features Sicilian-born American gangster Charles 'Lucky' Luciano (1897 - 1962) walking with friends...

This late 1950s portrait photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features Sicilian-born American gangster Charles 'Lucky' Luciano (1897 - 1962) walking with friends...

This midcentury landscape photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features Las Brisas Residencias, home of Eustaquio Escandon in Acapulco, where Henry Kissinger spe...

Watercolor of a pink rose with a stem on laid paper by Barbara Gibson (20th Century). Presented in a double mat in a modern silver frame. Signed "Barbara Gibson" and dated "1989" in ...

Fabulous American landscape photography of a rural landscape scene. from small hand signed edition of 20 Large Chromogenic print on Kodak Professional Paper The sheets are approxima...

Acrylic painting of white, red, and pink "Swingtime" varietal of fuchsia flowers, hanging from a vine on grey art board by Barbara Gibson (20th Century). Signed by the artist in the ...

Seated Woman, Left Hand to Chin Graphite on laid paper, 1984 Signed and dated in pencil (see photo) Provenance: Donald Morris Gallery, Inc. Birmingham, MI Chern...

Wonderful color photograph of the roller coaster at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b. 1943). Titled "Blue R...

"Parade" Social Realism Mid 20th Century Modern American Scene WPA Regionalism Gerrit Van Sinclair (1890 – 1955) Parade 20 x 15 inches Oil on board, c. 1940s Signed lower right Fram...

Vibrant watercolor, pen and ink floral study of red gladiolas, with brilliant attention to detail and a signature delicate style, by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b.1943)...

"Golden Reflections" with glowing water reflections of a wooden boat tied up to the beach is a quintessential example of Tom Swimm's enhanced realism. This co...

"Perkins Cove" with glowing water reflections of wooden boats tied up to the dock is a quintessential example of Tom Swimm's enhanced realism. This colorful o...

Vibrant watercolor, pen and ink floral study of lilacs, with brilliant attention to detail and a signature delicate style, by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b.1943). Signe...

Boys and Crib one of a series of photographs done during the 1990-1996 period photographing teenage mothers in Texas. Acid free mat and new plexiglass. Image, 14"W x 17.5"L. Black wood frame.Jocelyn Lee was born in Naples Italy, and received her BA in philosophy and visual arts from Yale University, and her MFA in photography from Hunter College. In 2001 she received a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 1996 her work, The Youngest Parents, was published by DoubleTake Books and The Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University in collaboration with Robert Coles and John Moses. She has exhibited nationally, most recently in an exhibition entitled “Feature Photography” at The National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, 2008; The Pace MacGill Gallery in NY, 2007 (Solo)/2005; The DeCordova Museum in Waltham, Mass 2007; The Center for Maine Contemporary Art 2007 (Solo); The University of Maine Museum of Art, 2006 (Solo); Stone Hill...

This late 1960s figurative photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features a young blonde woman preparing to go paragliding in Acapulco. This is an estate stampe...

This late 1960s figurative photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features Jim Kimberly and his wife, with his white sports car and white boats moored on Lake Wort...

Guy Lipscomb:1917-2009. Listed American artist from South Carolina. He is best known for doing these watercolors of the beach dunes. This wonderful watercolor measures 20 inches wide...

"French Air Show with Remarque of Head of Pilot" is an original lithograph and stencil print by Marguerite Montaut (GAMY). It depicts an early airplane flying above a crowd of specta...

This stunning study of George Washington's hands is a unique and remarkable drawing pair. Mora was noted as an exceptional draftsman and actually traveled america giving lectures ab...

Alo Manas by Lawrence Fodor (American, b. 1951). A lithograph of Hopi Medicine Men. Shortly after Summer Solstice each year the Hopi ceremony called the Niman Kachina, also known as “The Going Home of the Kachina.” Presented in a wooden frame. Signed "Larry Fodor...

"Good Health Week" WPA American Scene Mid 20th Century Modern Social Realism Jo Cain (1904 – 2003) Good Health Week 10 ½ x 15 1/2 inches Oil on pape...

Beautiful black and white photograph of cypress trees with light radiating through by Jeffrey Conley (American, b. 1969), c.2006. A first tier, silver gelatin test print (one of one...

Robert Kipniss (American, b. 1931) At Dawn, 1975 Pencil on paper 10 1/2 x 7 1/4 in. Framed: 14 2/3 x 11 1/3 in. Signed upper right: Kipniss '75 Verso bears Hirschl & Adler Galleries Label Robert Kipniss, painter and printmaker, was born in New York City in 1931. He creates essentially monochromatic*, stylized vistas with natural and architectural elements intended to evoke an elegiac, nearly surrealistic mood in haunting, silent landscapes; the melancholy of nostalgia. Trees, in mid and far-distance, form clusters or act as misty individuals containing a haunted, indefinable presence, witnesses to the foreground drama of more specific shape, form and detail, often a close-up tree. Kipniss studied at the Art Students League* in 1947; Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio, 1948-50; and the University of Iowa, receiving a BA degree in English literature in 1952, and an MFA in painting and art history in 1954. The artist employs a meticulous technique combining a multiplicity of specific strokes, whether with brush, pencil or print-maker's needle and burin*, to create the essence of his generalized, non-specific forms. Light and darkness are clearly Kipniss' compositionally constructive elements. They also exist as contestants in the emotional drama at the heart of each work of art. The contrast, and sometimes combat, between these two opposites, symbolically represent with blackness -- ideas of threat, fear, trouble, evil; with whiteness safety, redemption, fulfillment and good. In Kipniss' 1995 mezzotint*, Clear Vase and Landscape, with a foreground image of precisely leafy stalks, the vase holding them, nearly invisible in its transparency, suggests an almost Salvador Dali-like surrealist device. This central image dominates but seems to invite association with, and commentary from, the surrounding clumps and individual round-topped, yet cedar-like trees. His mezzzotint, For Stella," 1997, depicts a gently twisting, curving, pale and smoothly-barked foreground, leafless tree limb or trunk, like a female human body, suggesting weakness, fatigue, an inability to deal with the staccato background screen of textured bush that seems to uncomfortably impinge upon it. This print is arguably a metaphor for a delicate soul struggling to overcome the prickly difficulties of domineering life. The classic mezzotint process, invented in the middle of the 17th Century, is the reverse of most of the other print-making media, since the artist works from a black ground to increasingly lighter areas. The copper plate is first roughened by a "rocker," creating a burr over the entire surface (the more burr left intact, the more ink it holds, the darker the final finished print). The artist, Robert Kipniss, in this instance, gradually burnishes, smoothes down the burr in varying degrees to produce the gradations of lights and darks of the final design. The deepest darks in the final picture are those areas on the plate that have been little touched after the initial roughening. Mezzotint relies on shade and tone rather than outline for its effect, which fits the Kipniss style of atmospheric* masses of value. A recent oil painting by Robert Kipniss, Hillside Silhouettes, 2001, 40 x 29, is somewhat more complex in composition than many, with four cubically-constructed houses each set in their own zones, seemingly unrelated to one another, with receding hills and similarly isolated, increasingly misty trees beyond. In his career, Robert Kipniss has had over 40 one-man shows since the first in New York in 1951, including an important retrospective exhibition at the Associated American Artist Gallery, New York in 1977. Many of these one-man exhibitions have been mounted by over 50 museums in the United States, South America and Europe, including the Chicago Art Institute, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modem Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, Library of Congress and British Museum in London. Robert Kipniss is represented in the permanent collections of the institutions above, among many others, as well as the Philadelphia Museum of Art; New York Public Library; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Detroit Art Institute; Yale University Museum; National Collection of Fine Arts, Smithsonian Institution; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Portland Art Museum; and the New Orleans Museum of Art. He was elected to the National Academy of Design* in 1980, and to the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers, London in 1998 Robert Kipniss can be referenced in numerous publications, including Who's Who in American Art from the 1950s to the present, and multiple reviews in periodicals like Art News, Art in America and Art Forum. There are also three important catalogues raisonne published on his work. Robert Kipniss has received many awards: 1965 - Ohio University National Drawing Show, Purchase Prize 1976 - National Academy of Design, New York City, The Ralph Fabri Prize 1978 - The Print Club of Philadelphia, Charles M Lea Prize 1979 - Charlotte Printmakers Society, Purchase Award 1979 - Society of American Graphic Artists, Printmaking Award 1979 - Wittenberg University, Springfield, OH, Honorary Doctorate 1980 - Elected to the National Academy of Design, New York City 1980 - Audubon Artists, New York City, Silver Medal 1980 - National Academy of Design, New York City, The Leo Meissner...

Vibrant watercolor, pen and ink floral study of deep red roses, with brilliant attention to detail and a signature delicate style, by California artist Deborah Eddy (American, b.1943...

Delicate watercolor, pen and ink floral study of iris and yellow freesia, with brilliant attention to detail and a signature delicate style, by California artist Deborah Eddy (Americ...