Original Art from the Grand Age of American Illustration
This jazz age artwork from the late fall of 1924 smartly blends Halloween season & boxing as a metaphor for the presidential election of that November. In this vibrant gouache, used as a cover for “The Brooklyn Eagle Sunday Magazine,” an Uncle Sam-inspired ring girl attempts to keep the peace between the two parties. This is a spirited roaring 20s time capsule.
Artist: Charles Verschuuren
In Willy Pogany’s dazzling oil on board artwork, an Art Nouveau maiden finds herself in the summer foliage conversing with a little bird. This whimsical scene was created for and used as the front cover of Metropolitan Magazine, July 1916. This artwork marks the best period in Pogany’s prolific and well remembered long and successful career. A stylized belle-epoque, tightly rendered work that features a vibrant color palette and intricate use of the free-flowing forms that came to define the Art Nouveau aesthetic.
Artist: Willy Pogany
A dazzling and erotic oil on canvas by Earl Moran of the platinum bombshell Marilyn Monroe in the nude. Dated 1960 on verso stretcher bar, and marked “Aaron Brothers #646″on back of canvas. During the 1940’s a radiant Norma Jean was Earl Moran’s favorite pin-up model and a number of Brown & Bigelow Calendar works were commissioned featuring the then unknown red headed pin-up model. Earl Moran left the hectic schedule and deadlines of a calendar illustrator in the late 1950’s and moved to California and started working exclusively in oils and created a series of boudoir posed erotically charged nude works that sold to patrons of the arts through an arrangement with The Aaron Brothers Galleries.
Artist: Earl Moran
A large and expertly rendered pastel on illustration board by Hungarian artist Pal Fried. Fried, who commonly worked in oils, was equally adept with pastels and this is a fine offering revisiting one of his favorite themes; a young ballerina in anticipation of her performance. Work is nicely matted and framed and in an excellent state of preservation.
Artist: Pal Fried
An extraordinary and experimental early work by Hannes Bok, featuring a bizarre surreal landscape with a young boy riding a prehistoric creature. Hannes Bok was the pseudonym of Wayne Woodard, a self taught artist who was fascinated by the luminous quality of Maxfield Parrish’s oil paintings.
Upon a visit from the impoverished teenage Bok, and impressed by the examples of Bok’s work, Parrish gave Bok an expensive set of oil paints and brushes to help the teenager build on his obvious gifts.
Artist: Hannes Bok
An inventive mixed medium early work by Edwin Georgi used as the cover for an early 1930s issue of “The Woman’s Home Companion.” A linear and modernist rendering of women’s disembodied heads that contrasts the art deco era ideal of make-up enhanced feminine beauty with classic Greek porcelain statuary. A clever and stylized early work by one of our favorite American Illustrators, Edwin Georgi.
Artist: Edwin Georgi
A sassy and colorful glamour girl pastel rendering by Earl Moran, created for the Brown & Bigelow Calendar Company in the early 1950s. Caption reads “Whenever I dance with you alone, before I know it The evening’s flown.” Work is beautifully matted and framed and in a fine state of preservation, a 1954 Brown & Bigelow Calendar of image is included in sale.
Artist: Earl Moran
A wonderfully conceived and deftly executed art deco original risque artwork from Rolf Armstrong’s short tenure in Hollywood. This large pastel dates to 1932 and is a rare nude by the Father of American pin up. This transcendent work was unearthed in the late 1990s in the estate of a one of Armstrong’s former models. This important piece was exhibited at a solo show of the artist’s work in 1999 at the Bruce R. Lewin Gallery in New York City. A program from the exhibition featuring “The Blue Nude” is included with sale.
Artist: Rolf Armstrong
A strongly rendered, machine age/industrial revolution inspired modernist 1935 oil painting by Thomas Tyrone Comfort, used as the cover for The Los Angeles Herald & Express; Oct.19, 1936. Comfort worked as an art deco-era muralist and illustrator. His work evokes the spirit of the WPA movement, his brilliant career was cut short in 1939 when the artist passed away at the young age of 30.
Artist: Tyrone Comfort
A charming pastel by Jules Erbit, the versatile prolific American illustrator who worked for all of the major calendar companies during his long career. Exclusively a pastel artist, Erbit created a few nudes for the Thomas D. Murphy Calendar Company but his signature genre featured the Erbit girl, a generally wholesome, gregarious and approachable beauty. This artwork is a wonderful example of his Good Girl Art style. A published tear sheet of calendar is included in sale.
Artist: Jules Erbit
