Raffaelli - La Fumee du Bateau

Jean-Francois Raffaelli (1850-1924), La Fumee du Bateau, color etching and drypoint, 1911, signed and numbered in pencil  lower right. Reference: Delteil 98. In very good condition, the full sheet, printed on a firm cream wove simile Japon paper, 7 3/4 x 5 1/2, the sheet 12 1/2 x 9 1/2 inches.
A fine fresh impression, printed in colors (blue, blue-green, yellow, reddish brown, black), with substantial burr from the drypoint work.
Raffaelli used different plates to create this print, using tiny registration holes to align the prints. In From Pissarro to Picasso: Color Etching in France, Cate and Grivel write that Raffaellis works employ such minimal color that one wonders why he went to the trouble of creating a sequence of plates for each image. They are more akin to simple but elegant etchings or drypoint prints, highlighted in color a la poupee or with watercolor applied by hand or by stencil onto the paper.  But he was a kind of purist, who focused on printmaking a bit more than his French colleagues; a print made entirely of successive plates would be more likely to have a consistent look than a colored work with the print supplying the structure and composition. And, as here, the colors derived through the printmaking process tend to be more subtle and integrated in the print than colors derived through other means.

Vico - Trophy with a Breast Plate Leaning Toward the Left

Enea Vico (1523-1567) engraving, Trophy With a Breas Plate Leaning Toward the Left, 1550, Bartsch 444, with the name of the publisher Ant[onio] Lafreri at bottom, first state (of 2) before numbers.  Good condition,  with small margins all around,  archival matting, 10 x 7  inches.

A fine, fresh impression.  A single stack of weird beasts, arms, armor, and shields.

On laid paper with a Ladder in a Circle watermark.

Provenance: Furstich Waldburg Wolfegg’sches Kupferstichkabinett (Lugt 2542).

The fine impressions of Vico’s Trophy series, such as this example, are of astonishing clarity and brilliance. This sort of showmanship was until recently discounted as lacking in original draughtsmanship or inventiveness, but recent work (as exemplified in the British Museum exhibit The Print in Italy, 1550-1620), is reawakening enthusiasm for Italian prints of this period.

In the December 2002 issue of The Print Quarterly Rosemary Mulcahy writes that “Enea Vico da Parma was the outstanding printmaker of his generation.” She goes on to quote Vasari, who devoted a substantial entry to Vico in his Lives: “many others have engaged in copper engraving, but have not attained such perfection.”

Vico made a range of prints, including archaeological excursions and designs such as this one, and also statues, gems, vases, and some portraits.

Enea Vico - Trophies Including a Helmeted Woman

Enea Vico (1523-1567) engraving, Trophies Including a Helmeted Woman, 1550, Bartsch 442, with the name of the publisher Ant[onio] Lafreri at bottom, first state (of 2) before numbers.  Very good condition,  with small margins all around,  archival matting, 10 x 6 7/8  inches.

A fine, fresh impression, the trophies in two parallel piles, the right side featuring ferocious birds, or at least winged creatures, as well as the helmeted woman; the left side has a pile of armor, weird animal and human faces, shields, and a bit of weaponry as well.

Provenance: Furstich Waldburg Wolfegg’sches Kupferstichkabinett (Lugt 2542).

The fine impressions of Vico’s Trophy series, such as this example, are of astonishing clarity and brilliance. This sort of showmanship was until recently discounted as lacking in original draughtsmanship or inventiveness, but recent work (as exemplified in the British Museum exhibit The Print in Italy, 1550-1620), is reawakening enthusiasm for Italian prints of this period.

In the December 2002 issue of The Print Quarterly Rosemary Mulcahy writes that “Enea Vico da Parma was the outstanding printmaker of his generation.” She goes on to quote Vasari, who devoted a substantial entry to Vico in his Lives: “many others have engaged in copper engraving, but have not attained such perfection.”

Vico made a range of prints, including archaeological excursions and designs such as this one, and also statues, gems, vases, and some portraits.

Enea Vico - Two Trophies with a Cuirass Lower Left

Enea Vico (1523-1567) engraving, Two Trophies With a Cuirass Lower Left, 1550, Bartsch 449, with the name of the publisher Ant[onio] Lafreri at bottom, first state (of 2) before numbers.  Good condition, with small margins all around,  archival matting, 9 5/8 x 7 inches.

A fine, fresh impression.

Provenance: Furstich Waldburg Wolfegg’sches Kupferstichkabinett (Lugt 2542).

The fine impressions of Vico’s Trophy series, such as this example, are of astonishing clarity and brilliance. This sort of showmanship was until recently discounted as lacking in original draughtsmanship or inventiveness, but recent work (as exemplified in the British Museum exhibit The Print in Italy, 1550-1620), is reawakening enthusiasm for Italian prints of this period.

In the December 2002 issue of The Print Quarterly Rosemary Mulcahy writes that “Enea Vico da Parma was the outstanding printmaker of his generation.” She goes on to quote Vasari, who allocated Vico a substantial entry in his Lives: “many others have engaged in copper engraving, but have not attained such perfection.”

Vico made a range of prints, including archaeological excursions and designs such as this one, and also statues, gems, vases, and some portraits.

James Goetz (1915-1946) , Rhea, etching and engraving, 1946, signed in pencil lower right, from the Primordials Portfolio, in an edition of only 30. In very good condition, printed on Murillo paper (heavy buff wove paper).  Printed at Atelier 17. The full sheet, 8 7/8 x 4 7/8, the sheet 12 7/8 x 9 3/8 inches.

A very fine, intricately engraved and printed impression.

S.W.Hayter, the famed printmaker and founder of Atelier 17, said of Goetz: “James Goetz was young. He was an artist who became a soldier; I understand a good one… An officer in the 5th Armored Division, he was wounded in action at Alencon. We who worked beside him in the atelier feel that his absence must have been regretted by his men as deeply as it is by us. He returned after convalescence to his preoccupations of before the war. The engraving medium in which, as these prints show, he found an instrument of great power, served him to state the problem of existence…But for the senseless accident which put an end to his work in June 1946 he might perhaps have found a solution in life.”

Goetz wrote of this subject: “Through the ages Kronos and Rhea produce the gods Hera, Aides, Poseidon and Zeus. Kronos, who creates only to destroy, swallows all his children at birth – but Zeus – for whom Rhea substitutes a stone. Zeus forces his father to disgorge the others and he becomes the sire of all gods and men who follow.”

A close reading of this complex abstraction yields some sense of Goetz’s meaning, and leads to a myriad of other thoughts, feelings and observations as well.

Adriaen van de Velde (1636 – Amsterdam – 1672 – Amsterdam), Two Cows and a Sheep, etching, c. 1657-9. Reference: Hollstein 4. In good condition, on old laid paper, a soft horizontal fold, trimmed on the borderline and window mounted, 4 1/4 x 5 1/8 inches.

A very good impression.

Adriaen van de Velde, the son of Willem van de Velde the 1st, was apparently not interested in pursuing marine paintings which were the specialty of his brother and father, and so was sent to Haarlem to learn landscape painting. And he did indeed specialize in landscapes, particularly pastures and cattle.  Although his teacher was Jan Wisjnants, his work reflects the subject matter of Paulus Potter and Karel Dujardin. But his style is his own.

John Marin (1870-1953), Downtown, The El, etching, 1921, signed in pencil lower left (also signed and dated in the plate). Reference: Zigrosser 134, only state.  Published initially by Alfred Stieglitz and then included as part of the Folio of American Etchings by the magazine The New Republic in 1924, in an edition of unknown size but probably above 500.  In very good condition, the full sheet, on Van Gelder wove paper, 6 3/4 x 8 3/4, the sheet 11 x 13 3/4 inches.

Provenance: Hirschl and Adler Galleries, Inc., New York, New York.

A fine bright impression.

Initially the New Republic Set, sometimes known as Six American Etchings, contained Marin’s Brooklyn Bridge No. 6 (Swaying) (Zigrosser 112).  But after a small number of sets were completed, Downtown the El was substituted for Zigrosser 112 (and so the number of  Downtown The Els in the set would have been a bit fewer than the others in the set).  Zigrosser, who apparently had not seen a complete set at the time he created the catalogue raisonne, conjectured that the substitution might have been because the original plate was damaged.   But since the printer, Peter Platt, was the most renowned artist’s printer of his time, and worked alone, it is unlikely that he would have damaged the plate; a more likely possibility is that he switched to a print that was more comparable in size to the others in the set (The Brooklyn Bridge print was much larger), and Downtown The El is about the same size as the others  (the other prints were Peggy Bacon: The Promenade Deck; Ernest Haskell: The Sentinels of North Creek; Edward Hopper: Night Shadows; Hayes Miller: Play; and John Sloan: Bandit’s Cave).

Downtown The El is one of Marin’s early – and influential – modernist prints, made after his style changed from the British Etchers/Whistlerian idiom. It has also been called Park Row, and Downtown New York.  The El is no longer there, but the building in the center, the Woolworth Building, still stands.

Werner Drewes (1899-1983), Farm in the Woods, woodcut, 1933, signed and dated in pencil lower right (also numbered 1-xxx and titled lower left). Reference: Rose 83. In very good condition, on hand made cream colored Japan paper with an upper and lower deckle edge, 9 1/8 x 11 1/2, the sheet 10 3/4 x 13 7/8 inches.

Provenance: Heald Collection

A fine strong impression.

Drewes, who studied at the Bauhaus in Weimar and Dessau during the ’20’s, with Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, and Lyonel Feininger, came to the United States in 1930. His early work reflects the Bauhaus emphasis on abstraction, together with an element of German Expressionism; this was a major departure from the conservative and conventional tendencies of ’30’s artists in the US.  But he became force in American art – he taught at the Brooklyn Museum and Columbia, was named director of the WPA’s New York graphic division, and was a founding member of Abstract American Artists.

Detail

Joseph Hirsch (1910-1981), Lunch Hour, 1942, lithograph, signed in pencil.  Published by Associated American Artists, in good condition (some time staining) with full margins, on a cream wove paper, 9 x 11 3/4, the sheet 11 x 13 7/8 inches.

A very good impression, still in its original Associated American Artists mat (which, surprisingly, does not appear to be acid-free).

Hirsch was a traditionalist, a social realist painter and printmaker, who won numerous prizes and awards over the course of a long career. His work did not tend to break new ground, but if he were producing these paintings and prints today one wonders whether this sort of work would be revered as leading edge post-modernism.  The AAA label, reproduced below, shows the wide ranging acclaim he had achieved by age 32.

The Associated American Artists Label for Hirsch’s Lunch Hour

Rembrandt  Harmensz. van Rijn (1606-1669), The Death of the Virgin, etching and drypoint, 1639 [signed and dated in the plate]. References: Bartsch, Hollstein 99, Hind 161, second state (of 3). In very good condition (a couple of small fox marks, unobtrusive printer’s creases lower right), printed on sturdy ivory/tan laid paper with a Strasbourg Lily watermark (see discussion below),  trimmed just outside of the platemark top and sides,  outside of the borderline bottom, 15 5/8 x 12 1/4 inches.

A fine lifetime impression, with traces of drypoint burr on the figures and clothing of figures at the left; also on the chair bottom right, and in numerous places elsewhere.

In the second state Rembrandt added drypoint work on the chair lower right, in the third state he darkened the foreground bedpost with additional drypoint.

Provenance: Kennedy Galleries, NY (with their inventory number verso); unidentified collector (initial N, not in Lugt).  Also writing verso in pencil (title, catalogue numbers, the annotation “extremely fine.”)

A Strasbourg Lily watermark is common to the first state and second state impressions of Death of the Virgin (cf. Erik Hinterding, Rembrandt as an Etcher, Catalogue of Watermarks, vol. 2, p. 276; also see Ash and Fletcher, Watermarks in Rembrandt Prints, p. 196); the variation closest to our impression is probably Hinterding’s Strasbourg Lily C.b.a. (cf. Hinterding vol. 2, p. 203) which is found in the second state impression at PCS (Private Collection, Switzerland). Other examples of the second state with this watermark or a close variant (cf. Hinterding p. 276) can be found at the Rijkisprentenkabinet, Amsterdam; the British Museum; The Library of Congress; and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Hinterding indicates that Rembrandt used paper with this watermark during the period 1633-1641.

In this very large depiction of the death of the Virgin, a story not recounted in the Bible but widely known since the Middle Ages through an account in the Golden Legend, Rembrandt focuses on the movement and expressions of the mourners surrounding the covered bed. A doctor takes Mary’s pulse, while the bald-headed apostle Peter comforts her; a priest stands at the left and a shorter figure (kneeling?) holds a tall pole (much as a kneeling server in Durer’s woodcut of the same subject holds a crucifix and a priest stands to the left). A man sitting in the foreground reads a huge bible. The figures are dressed in vaguely oriental garb, to locate the scene in the ancient Middle East. Above the bed in the clouds an angel appears, surrounded by putti. Rembrandt uses a vast range of techniques in the print, sketching some figures and the clouds lightly, and drawing some figures and structures in great detail and with substantial shading and cross-hatching.

Detail

Enea Vico (1523-1567 engraving, Two Trophies With a Breast Plate and a Ram’s Head, 1550, Bartsch 447, with the name of the publisher Ant[onio] Lafreri at bottom, before numbers.  Good condition, with small margins all around (slight discoloration upper right and left due to hinging),  archival matting, 9 1/2 x 7 inches.

A fine, fresh impression.

Provenance: Furstich Waldburg Wolfegg’sches Kupferstichkabinett (Lugt 2542).

The fine impressions of Vico’s Trophy series, such as this example, are of astonishing clarity and brilliance. This sort of showmanship was until recently discounted as lacking in original draughtsmanship or inventiveness, but recent work (as exemplified in the British Museum exhibit The Print in Italy, 1550-1620), is reawakening enthusiasm for Italian prints of this period.

In the December 2002 issue of The Print Quarterly Rosemary Mulcahy writes that “Enea Vico da Parma was the outstanding printmaker of his generation.” She goes on to quote Vasari, who allocated Vico a substantial entry in his Lives: “many others have engaged in copper engraving, but have not attained such perfection.”

Vico made a range of prints, including archaeological excursions and designs such as this one, and also statues, gems, vases, and some portraits.