Our November show is a truly special collection in that it highlights beloved Galerie d’Orsay artists while also presenting paintings from the collection of a prominent wealth management company that's asked us to help them place their works. This extraordinary collection features preeminent American Abstract Expressionist artists with star-studded museum credentials. Many of these artists were rubbing shoulders with Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Helen Frankenthaler, and Hans Hofmann. We are delighted to be offering our collectors works by these artists!
Abstract Expressionism developed in New York in the 1940s and was the first specifically American movement to achieve international influence and put NYC in the forefront of the western art world. The varied work produced by the Abstract Expressionists resists definition as a cohesive style though has an overt emphasis on color and medium and their incredible capacity, when wielded deftly, to express strong emotion.
Janice Biala (1903 – 2000)
One of the few women associated with the New York School, Biala was born in Poland, though lived and painted primarily in Paris and the U.S. She was first known as a representational artist though her later work was influenced by many Abstract Expressionist painters. Biala’s sublime assimilation of the School of Paris and the New York School of Abstract Expressionism highlights color abstraction and gestural simplicity in profound and beautiful ways.
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Carnegie Art Museum, Pittsburgh, PA
Musée National d'Arts Moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Stanley Boxer
(1926 – 2000)
Endlessly innovative and with a profound sensitivity to texture, Boxer was a prolific artist across a number of different media. His paintings are abstract compositions notable for their texture and color, in which small gestures are multiplied to form a single entity—almost as if observing cells under a microscope where individual units coalesce into a whole. If there is to be any single, identifiable subject to Boxer’s decidedly abstract works, it is this coming-together of disparate colors, textures, and moods.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Tate Gallery, London, England
Simeon Braguin
(1907 – 1997)
Born in Ukraine, Braguin and his family fled to New York City during the Russian Revolution. He studied at Columbia University before becoming an accomplished photographer and illustrator, eventually working as the artistic director of Vogue. His paintings feature a unique combination of art and design focusing on geometric shapes with roughly finished and loosely softened edges and no prescribed orientation. Braguin took on Warhol as a disciple in the ‘50s, and one can see in Warhol’s works at that point the influence drawn from Braguin’s playful compositions.
Kresge Art Museum, East Lansing, MI
Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT
Lyman Allyn Art Museum, New London, CT
Twentieth Century Foundation Museum, NY
Findlay Galleries, Palm Beach, FL
Suzanne Caporael (b. 1949)
Caporael grew up primarily in California with her father, a civil engineer. She went to Otis College for art and developed a style of structural paintings that emphasize her brilliantly quiet and elegant lines and softened colors. She was awarded the National Endowment Grant in painting in 1986 and has been a visiting professor University of California, Santa Barbara, and San Francisco Art Institute.
Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, PA
Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, San Francisco, CA
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Richard Erdman (b. 1952)
Erdman's sculptures express a vitality that transcends their temporality. His inspirations are multi-faceted and varied, but they all express the artist's reference for nature, which crystallized during his childhood in Vermont. After graduating from the University of Vermont, Erdman traveled to Carrara Italy, which is the world's finest source of stone. Whether working in stone, bronze, or steel, Erdman's creative process is a veritable conversation with the medium, suggesting form and essence while listening to and feeling the response.
Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT
Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, MN
Norton Museum of Art, Palm Beach, FL
Rockefeller Collection, New York, NY
United Nations, New York, NY
John Evans (b. 1945)
Evans grew up in the Northeast and received his MFA from Boston University. His paintings are requiems for less frantic, more easygoing times; isolated objects are stand-ins for human presences that cannot compete with visual grandeur of nature. His influences include the 19th-century Romantic movement, Cézanne, Cubism, and Expressionism. He notes that a mental state he calls ‘ecstasy’ drives him to create his landscapes and his radar is calibrated to register those moments when nature presents itself ecstatically, without his having even to seek them.
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX
Boston Public Library, Boston, MA
Fidelity Investments, Boston, MA
Wolf Kahn (b. 1927)
Born in Germany, Kahn immigrated to the states during WWII, after which he studied with and became a studio assistant for renowned Abstract Expressionist Hans Hofmann. Kahn paints with a unique blend of realism and Color field painting, creating a synthesis of Hofmann's modern abstract training, Matisse's palette, Rothko’s sweeping bands of color, and the atmospheric qualities of American Impressionism.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Hirshhorn Museum and Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.
Emily Mason (b. 1932)
Mason, a descendant of historic painter John Trumbull, was born in New York City and encouraged to explore art from an early age. After attending Cooper Union, she was awarded a 2-year Fulbright scholarship to study and paint in Venice where she met and married Wolf Kahn. Even when the art scene in the 1960s U.S. was male dominated, she made name for herself and became a part of the 10th Street gallery scene. She uses her soft brushstrokes to add texture and depth to her Abstract Expressionist works and her fascination with and exploration of vibrant color expresses an array of emotions and vitality.
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Lehman Brothers, Kuhn and Loeb, New York, NY
Morgan Stanley, New York, NY & Tokyo, Japan
National Academy Museum, New York, NY
Rockefeller Group, New York, NY
Michael Mazur
(1939 – 2009)
Mazur grew up in New York and studied art at Yale before having his first solo show at 22. He works across many media. His paintings are characterized by the unique rounded shapes and solid brushstrokes in the background contrasted with drips running down the canvas to help create depth in the landscape. Mazur was a full-time faculty member at RISD and Brandeis University and was an overseer of the MFA Boston all while working as an artist for over 50 years.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Robert Natkin
(1930 – 2010)
Natkin was born in Chicago and studied at the Art School of the Art Institute of Chicago where he was influenced by their large Post-Impressionist painting collection. He developed his own distinct abstract style, trying to break free of the art that was trendy or popular at the time. His works are lyrical and powerful canvases which offer a deceptive serenity. They challenge the viewer to contemplate their compositions. In 1980, the BBC created a documentary on Natkin.
Centre Pompidou, Paris, France
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
Joseph H. Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.
Jules Olitski (1922 – 2007)
Originally from Ukraine, Olitski grew up in Brooklyn. During his studies, he had a broad exposure to the art world which helped develop his Abstract Expressionist style and unique color palette. He was one of the first artists to inspire Color field painting in which he focused primarily on color choices and less on form or representation. Olitski represented the U.S. at the 1966 Venice Biennale and, in 1969, became the first living artist ever to exhibit a solo show at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He was known for his creativity in exploring methods of applying paint, such as experimenting with spraying paint and used rich saturated blankets of color in broad sweeping applications.
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Tate Modern, London, England
Uffizi Portrait Gallery, Florence, Italy
Kikuo Saito
(1939 – 2016)
Saito was a Japanese American abstract painter who worked in the Color field tradition. After immigrating to the States, he became the studio assistant to Helen Frankenthaler, Kenneth Noland, and Larry Poons. He collaborated closely with directors and choreographers of theatre and dance throughout his career, and many of his compositions were significantly influenced by his theatre productions. His richly saturated colorscapes are crossed by delicately drawn lines, and he experiments with writing, calligraphy, and stenciled letters to reflect on his personal history as young immigrant to a country whose language he did not speak.
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT
Duke University Museum of Art, NC
JP Morgan Chase Collection, NY
World Bank, Washington, D.C.
Louis Schanker
(1903 – 1981)
Schanker was an American abstract artist whose youth was a rambling journey through farms, circuses, and trains before he finally moved to the Bronx. He studied in Paris in the early 1930s where he became influenced by Cubism. He was influential in the New York art scene working closely with Mark Rothko and Adolph Gottlieb and was a founding member of American Abstract Artists. He based his art in the objects, patterns, and rhythms of nature.
Museum of Fine Art, Boston, MA
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.
Metropolitan Museum, New York, NY
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Charles Green Shaw
(1892 – 1974)
Shaw began painting in his late 30s after having a successful writing career. He studied at the Art Students League in NY and privately with George Luks before traveling to Paris where he became inspired by the works of Cézanne and Picasso. Shaw’s paintings were inspired by Cubism though they are simplified and use more geometric forms. He was a founding member of American Abstract Artists and is the only American-born artist to have 2 solo exhibitions during his lifetime at Solomon Guggenheim’s Museum of Non-objective Painting.
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum of Art, New York, NY
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Estaban Vicente (1903 – 2001)
Vicente was a Spanish-American artist considered to be a central figure of the first generation of Abstract Expressionists. He had his first solo show at 25 in Madrid. During the Spanish Civil War, he immigrated to the U.S. and became the Vice Consul of the Spanish Ambassador to the U.S. and taught for 36 years at New York Studio School. Vicente uses washes of beautiful colors to create his lyrical and poetic canvases. There are two museums dedicated to him in Spain!
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, Spain
Esteban Vicente Museum of Contemporary Art, Segovia, Spain
Stop by our 33 Newbury St gallery to see these wonderful artworks in person!
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