Kirk Tatom Art

A great oil on board by Adam Grant. This work is titled “Circus Couple” and shows two acrobatic performers. Artist signed in lower right hand corner. Original artist tag on the back ...

William King (1925-2015). Reclining figure, ca. 1965. Cast and welded bronze, 7 x 9.5 x 5 inches. Unsigned. William King, a sculptor in a variety of materials whose human figures traced social attitudes through the last half of the 20th century, often poking sly and poignant fun at human follies and foibles, died on March 4 at his home in East Hampton, N.Y. He was 90. His death was confirmed by Scott Chaskey, who is married to Mr. King's stepdaughter, Megan Chaskey. Mr. King worked in clay, wood, bronze, vinyl, burlap and aluminum. He worked both big and small, from busts and toylike figures to large public art pieces depicting familiar human poses -- a seated, cross-legged man reading; a Western couple (he in a cowboy hat, she in a long dress) holding hands; a tall man reaching down to tug along a recalcitrant little boy; a crowd of robotic-looking men walking in lock step. But for all its variation, what unified his work was a wry observer's arched eyebrow, the pointed humor and witty rue of a fatalist. His figurative sculptures, often with long, spidery legs and an outlandishly skewed ratio of torso to appendages, use gestures and posture to suggest attitude and illustrate his own amusement with the unwieldiness of human physical equipment. His subjects included tennis players and gymnasts, dancers and musicians, and he managed to show appreciation of their physical gifts and comic delight at their contortions and costumery. His suit-wearing businessmen often appeared haughty or pompous; his other men could seem timid or perplexed or awkward. Oddly, or perhaps tellingly, he tended to depict women more reverentially, though in his portrayals of couples the fragility and tender comedy inherent in couplehood settled equally on both partners. Mr. King's work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, among other places, and he had dozens of solo gallery shows in New York and elsewhere. But the comic element of his work probably caused his reputation to suffer. Reviews of his exhibitions frequently began with the caveat that even though the work was funny, it was also serious, displaying superior technical skills, imaginative vision and the bolstering weight of a range of influences, from the ancient Etruscans to American folk art to 20th-century artists including Giacometti, Calder. and Elie Nadelman. The critic Hilton Kramer, one of Mr. King's most ardent advocates, wrote in a 1970 essay accompanying a New York gallery exhibit that he was, "among other things, an amusing artist, and nowadays this can, at times, be almost as much a liability as an asset." A "preoccupation with gesture is the focus of King's sculptural imagination," Mr. Kramer wrote. "Everything that one admires in his work - the virtuoso carving, the deft handling of a wide variety of materials, the shrewd observation and resourceful invention - all this is secondary to the concentration on gesture. The physical stance of the human animal as it negotiates the social arena, the unconscious gait that the body assumes in making its way in the social medium, the emotion traced by the course of a limb, a torso, a head, the features of a face, a coiffure or a costume - from a keen observation of these materials King has garnered a large stock of sculptural images notable for their wit, empathy, simplicity and psychological precision." William Dickey King...

Swedish artist, oil on canvas. Abstract composition. Colouristic palette. In excellent condition with minimal wear. Indistinctly signed and dated '55. Visible dimensions: 67.5 cm x 5...

Bill Zuro, acrylic on panel, titled Cat Tails, Canadian artist, original label verso, with information and details. The panel measures 8" inches x 10" i...

Moody pastel on paper by Edwin C. Siegfried, one of the top Pastelists of this period. This piece is titled “Moonlit Marsh”. Framed in a walnut stained wood with parcel gilt details....

Bronze sculpture by Latin American sculptor Raúl Valdivieso (Chilean, 1931-1993). Valdivieso is known for his reinterpretation of the classic organic forms and human figures. Raúl Valdiveso was born September 9, 1931 in Santiago, Chile. In 1952 he began his studies at the School of Fine Arts at the University of Chile. There he took to sculpture and studied under professors like Marta Colvin...

Charna Rickey 1923 - 2000 Mexican-American Jewish Woman artist. Signed Bronze House of Books, Architecture Bronze sculpture, signed Charna Rickey and on the front "House of the book." It depicts an open Torah. Original patina. Approx. dimensions: 7 in. H x 9 in. W x 8.5 in. D. Weight: 13.1 lbs. Modernist Judaica Sculpture Born Charna Barsky (Charna Ysabel or Isabel Rickey Barsky) in Chihuahua, Mexico, the future artist lived in Hermosillo and immigrated to Los Angeles when she was 11. She was educated at UCLA and Cal State L.A., she married furniture retailer David Rickey and explored art while raising their three daughters. Moving through phases in terra cotta, bronze, marble and aluminum, she found success later in life. Rickey became one of the original art teachers at Everywoman's Village, a pioneering learning center for women established by three housewives in Van Nuys in 1963. She also taught sculpture at the University of Judaism from 1965 to 1981. As Rickey became more successful, her sculptures were exhibited in such venues as Artspace Gallery in Woodland Hills and the Courtyard of Century Plaza Towers as part of a 1989 Sculpture Walk produced by the Los Angeles Arts Council. Her sculptures have also found their way into the private collections of such celebrities as Sharon Stone. Another of Rickey's international creations originally stood at Santa Monica College. In 1985, her 12-foot-high musical sculpture shaped like the Hebrew letter "shin" was moved to the Rubin Academy of Music and Dance at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. The free standing architectural Judaic aluminum work has strings that vibrate in the wind to produce sounds. Rickey also created art pieces for the city of Brea. They commissioned some amazing art pieces by Laddie John Dill, Walter Dusenbery, Woods Davy, Rod Kagan, Pol Bury, Niki de Saint Phalle, Magdalena Abakanowicz, Larry Bell, John Okulick...

This squirrel is made by Dutch Artist Frans van Straaten. Van Straaten should be called an artist of balance always searching for harmony between force and movement in combination with space. Because of the wide range in his art-education he has mastered the art of drawing, painting and sculpting technology. However, the classical plastic art of sculpture and modelling opens up the possibility for him to create his own language of sculpture in answer to his urge for art. Due to this style of sculpting, the preference for bronze is natural. After his study of sculpture at the Academy of Art in Rotterdam (1988), Frans van Straaten creates bronze sculptures in which he unites force and movement. Feeling and Emotion converted into Matter Sculpture is an experience of space combined with the challenge of the three-dimensional. The tension of space and movement are the themes, which Frans expresses in his sculptures. Summary it can be said that the power of life and being, the feeling and emotion by force and movement will be converted into matter. The experience of space is being expressed in the shapes and characters in each of Frans’ sculptures. His sculptures of bulls express explosive power while the horses find their strength in being elegant. Each sculpture recalls this way their own association and serves as a metaphor for a certain emotion. Feelings, which has inspired the artist for each sculpture. Powerful and Elegant Looking at the works of this artist, it becomes very clear that one of his most important sources is his background in art history. The Renaissance period as well as several Italian artists served as inspiration to Frans as a sculpture. For instance the expressions in Leonardo da Vinci’s artworks, and also Giovanni Bologna...

Harold A. Laynor abstract oil on canvas with impasto relief in original painted wood two part frame. Work is titled "Stapho”. Predominent colors are light marsala, green, white, and black. Painting without frame measures 54" x 36" From the Invaluable webpage: "Dr. Harold A. Laynor (1922-1991) was a prolific and innovative artist. A graduate of Parson's School of Design, Bachelors and Master of Art Degrees from New York University, he earned his doctorate from the State University of New York at Albany." "A member of the famed Ghost Army of World War II, Harold A. Laynor went on to create a legacy of Art spanning five decades, winning many awards including the Guggenheim Fellowship, the Huntington Hartford...

Framed Oil "Wild Roses" on Masonite Panel, by John Heliker, American (1909-2000). Retains Gallery Label from Kraushaar Galleries, New York. Kraushaar Galleries was founded in 1885 and is still in business. Determined to become an artist, Heliker dropped out of high school to copy paintings...

Oil on panel a horse in front of a stable or a farm

Scandinavian artist. Oil on board, abstract composition. 1955. In perfect condition. Signed illegible. Dimensions: W 39.5 cm x H 35.2 cm. Total: W 42.5 cm x H 38.5 cm.