Original Art from the Grand Age of American Illustration
At the turn of the 20th century, Industrial Revolution inventions brought technological advancements to printmaking that ushered in a Golden Age of American illustration. Publishers and calendar companies developed new techniques for producing multi-color offset lithographs that were fast, affordable, and flat-out glorious to view, blurring the distinction between fine art and "art for commerce." The best examples by the finest commercial illustrators were revered by the public, and today are beloved by collectors.
This stirring oil on canvas presents a traditional Indonesian dance filled with music, movement, and joy. Martha Sawyers, the artist, made a name in the illustration world for her deeply sensitive and captivating portraits of Far Eastern life–she returned to the region time and again, and her appreciation for the variety of cultures and peoples she encountered culminated in the book she co-authored with her husband William Reusswig “India and Southeast Asia.”
Artist: Martha Sawyers
In this inspired and tremendously fun pen and ink illustration, two Brinkley girls are seen in an all out battle to catch a bridal bouquet tossed by an unseen hand. In an ironic turn, they become so engrossed in their conflict that the flowers they are fighting for appear about to fall to the ground. The frenzied scene, with its youthful energy and sexuality suggests the ambivalence of Brinkley’s new woman towards traditional marriage.
Artist: Nell Brinkley
This early 1930s pastel by frequent Golden Age of Hollywood female cover artist Mila Baine, shows a radiant and stylish Norma Shearer looking smart, crisp and alluring. Likely a cover for the title Movie Mirror, for whom Blaine worked often during the period. Handsomely matted and framed behind glass in a fine period frame. Handsomely matted and framed behind glass in a fine period frame.
Artist: Mila Baine
Created to accompany the 13th installment of the serialized novel” Silver Knees” in the April 4th 1931 issue of Liberty Magazine, this oil on canvas painting features a romanticized depiction of love during the Mexican-American war. In this lush scene, Gitana, a gypsy dancer, enjoys an afternoon serenade as her star crossed lover, an American war hero, looks on quietly.
Artist: Norman Price
Offered here is an original piece of camera ready artwork–pen and ink with collage elements–created for billboard advertising usage during World War II.
Artist: Cardwell Higgins
The original gouache cover painting by Lloyd Birmingham used for the December 1964 “Stories of Imagination – Fantastic” pulp magazine published by Ziff-Davis, illustrating the Philip K. Dick short novel “The Unteleported Man”. A fresh to the market cover published pulp painting that had remained for decades in the artists upstate New York estate. Work is handsomely framed in a retro looking limed oak fine gallery frame behind glass, comes with the complete published December 1964 edition of Fantastic Stories of Imagination.
Artist: Lloyd Birmingham
One of two 1930s oil on stretched canvas paintings we have acquired by Robert T. Riley, a New York state fine artist and illustrator who worked in a social realist / WPA bleak stylized Regionalist aesthetic. In this expressive work, Riley evokes the anxieties caused by a football injury as a player is carted off the field, capturing the multitude of pained expressions on the faces of those gathered. This somber, painting was created during the depths of the Great Depression and it offers bleak commentary on the hardships endured by all men.
Artist: Robert Riley
A haunting original watercolor on board verso stamped for use by The Saturday Evening Post by acclaimed American illustrator Henry Soulen. From a pre-air travel era in American popular culture when tastes ran towards the exotic, foreign and mysterious. Nicely framed in a period gesso gold wood frame.
Artist: Henry Soulen
This period 1930s signed oil on stretched canvas painting was created by the New York state fine artist and illustrator Robert T. Riley. With a social realist / WPA styled grittiness, Riley captures the hardscrapple life of deck hands hard at work, while eluding to the anxieties of the Great Depression. The stylized rigging suggests the mechanization of the Industrial revolution, and the sailors pulling up the sails find their muscles strained to the point of breaking in an homage to John Henry.
Artist: Robert Riley
An outstanding large oil painting by the well listed and prolific fine artist and illustrator Frederick Sands Brunner, this oil on canvas features a pretty red haired sunlit nude with an engaging smile and pretty figure with porcelain white skin gathering water at a stream. The verso bears a foil gallery label for Newman Galleries in Philadelphia where the artist exhibited and sold many of his his works in this genre.
Artist: Frederick Sands Brunner
