Terrell James Art

Abstract Expressionist piece infused with vibrant colors of a carnival by Allie Bill Skelton (American, 1942-1986). This original painting is primarily yellow, with swirls of red, blue, and orange. Signed and dated "A Bill Skelton '85" in the lower right corner. Unframed. Allie William “Bill” Skelton (American, 1942-1986) was a painter and sculptor active in San Francisco who was involved in the gay art...

Remo Farruggio Castello (Castle), ca. 1958 Oil on paper painting (hand signed twice by the artist) Hand signed twice by the artist on the lower front (center and right), and titled "...

Ripples in Space - Abstract Composition Original Oil Painting Vibrant abstract composition of paint, paper, enamel, and glitter by unknown artist "DeZulio" or "Dejulio". Several pie...

Walter Darby Bannard Ammersee #2, 1975 Watercolor and acrylic painting on paper Signed, titled and dated lower recto This is a unique work Frame included: elegantly floated and frame...

Alan Fenton (1927 - 2000) Untitled, 1965 Charcoal and graphite on paper 23 x 17 inches Signed and dated lower right Fenton's quiet and contemplative nonob...

Title : First Floor Biogram Materials : Acrylic, gouache, oil pastel, marker, charcoal, graphite, and conté crayon on paper Date : 2018 Dimensions : 24 x 18 x .1 in. Description : ...

Simon Samsonian (1912 - 2003) Colorful Geometric Abstraction, 1981 Oil on paper 16 x 22 inches Signed and dated lower right Provenance: Estate of the artist This survivor of the Armenian genocide wound up in a Cairo orphanage in 1927. He rose to fame as one of Egypt’s great modernists, but after moving to Long Island late in life he withdrew into anonymity. Now his compelling story is being told. Art historians are finally beginning to realize that the power of abstraction in its early years was a zeitgeist not limited to the major European centers of the avant-garde — Paris, Munich, and Moscow — but one that quickly rippled to major cities throughout the world. Within a few decades that original shock of a new vision had inspired thousands of artists from different cultures — particularly those the Middle East — whose translations were not slavish imitations of works by seminal figures like Picasso, Braque, Malevich, and Kandinsky but creative variants colored by their respective cultures. This essay focuses on an extraordinary Armenian artist, his harrowing survival of the genocide, his rise to fame in Cairo, and his creation of a unique style of abstraction. Art historians have typically formed a chorus that teaches the history of abstraction like this: Just before and during the World War I era, several avant-garde artists emerged to create shockingly different new forms by which artists could express themselves. In Paris, Picasso and Braque broke out with cubism, quickly followed by Mondrian. In Moscow, Malevich created Suprematism, the ultimate hard-edge geometric abstraction. And in Munich, Kandinsky emerged as the father of Abstract Expressionism. Within these few short years a zeitgeist was sensed throughout the art world. American pioneers, too — particularly Stanton Macdonald-Wright and Morgan Russell — felt this explosive freedom of expression. When Europe was recovering after World War I it became clear that Paris would retain its title as capitol of the art world, lasting through the Roaring Twenties and even through the Great Depression. But the end of World War II changed everything. A parallel war had been won by a group of irascible young Abstract Expressionists in New York — led by Pollock, Rothko, DeKooning, and Kline. No sooner had Paris been liberated from the Germans than Picasso, Matisse, Breton, and Duchamp surrendered to the Americans. From that point on New York would be the epicenter of the art world. But a lens that focuses myopically on the war between the avant-garde of Paris and New York misses the wider narrative of multiple aesthetic modernities that developed in the several decades following World War I. For Armenian artists the matter is even more complex owing to the genocide of 1915 where more than 1.5 million people — seventy-five percent of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire — were massacred. Those not shot on the spot were sent on death marches through the Mesopotamian desert without food or water. Frequently, the marchers were stripped and forced to walk naked under the scorching sun until they dropped dead. As a child Samsonian witnessed the murder of his parents and most of the members of his family. Soon thereafter, his older sister, Anahid, quickly shepherded him into a line of children being rescued by Greek nuns. But they became separated and he lost her, too. He was sent to a Greek orphanage in Smyrna (now Izmir), on Turkey’s west coast. Because he only knew his first name, the orphanage gave him a last name based on the place where they found him — Samsun — a major port on Turkey’s north coast on the Black Sea. His birth date was unknown, too. According to Samsonian’s vague recollections he assumed he was about three or four years old at the onset of the genocide, which would place his birth year in 1911 or 1912. In 1922, when Samsonian was about 10, the Turks ended their war with the Greeks by putting Smyrna to the torch in what has been called the “Catastrophe of Smyrna.” Once again, the child was on the run, escaping the fire and slaughter. He found temporary refuge in Constantinople, but within a year that major port would fall to the Turks, too, and become renamed as Istanbul. This time, Samsonian was whisked away to an orphanage in Greece founded by the American charity, Near East Relief — which is credited with saving so many Armenian orphans that the American historian Howard M. Sachar said it “quite literally kept an entire nation alive. Any understanding of Samsonian’s approach to modernism requires careful consideration of the impact of his early years because his art is inseparable from the anguish he experienced. In 1927, when he was a teenager, he was transferred to Cairo, Egypt, then a cosmopolitan city hosting a sizable portion of the Armenian diaspora. There he lived with thirty-two other children on the top floor of the Kalousdian Armenian School. Upon graduating in 1932 he won a scholarship to attend the Leonardo da Vinci Art Institute — an Italian art school in Cairo — where he won first prize in final examinations among one hundred students. He found work with an Armenian lithographic printer and he returned to the Kalousdian Armenian School to teach drawing. In 1939 he married one of his students, Lucy Guendimian. The Cairo in which Samsonian matured as an artist was home to many prominent art collectors after World War I. In this receptive environment Samsonian exhibited widely and won many awards. Beginning in 1937 and for the next thirty years he exhibited annually at the prestigious Le Salon du Caire hosted by the Société les Amis de l’Art (founded in 1921). After World War II he hit his stride as a modernist in Cairo, counting among his peers other artists of the Armenian diaspora such as Onnig Avedissian, Achod Zorian, Gregoire Meguerdichian, Hagop Hagopian...

Hans Hofmann Composition in Blue, 1952 Color silkscreen with unique hand painted gouache additions Hand signed and numbered 76/120 on the front in ink (each example is a unique variant with hand painting) Published by Esther Gentle and 167 Gallery, New York Frame included Dazzling mid century modern (1952) mixed media silkscreen and gouache by Hans Hofmann - one of the most influential artists of the 20th Century. The gouache additions are done by hand, making each work in this series absolutely unique. A superb impression of this extremely scarce, early print with strong colors. According to Reba and Dave Williams (Reba and Dave Williams, American Screenprints, New York, 1987, page 32), Hofmann was persuaded to make this print by Esther Gentle (who later married Abraham Rattner), his student at the time, who was starting to publish screenprints reproducing well-known artists' paintings. Unlike other screenprints by Abstract Expressionist artists, Hofmann's is an original work which does not reproduce a painting. An unusual feature of Composition in Blue is that the blue background varies; the artist authorized different color mixtures and strengths for each example in the printing of this particular silkscreen (Williams, page 32). Measurements: Work: 16⅞ by 15 inches Framed: 24⅝ by 21¼ inches HANS HOFMANN (1880-1966) Hans Hofmann (1880–1966) is one of the most important figures of postwar American art. Celebrated for his exuberant, color-filled canvases, and renowned as an influential teacher for generations of artists—first in his native Germany, then in New York and Provincetown—Hofmann played a pivotal role in the development of Abstract Expressionism. Between 1900 and 1930, Hofmann’s early studies, decades of painting, and schools of art took him to Munich, to Paris, then back to Munich. By 1933, and for the next four decades, he lived in New York and in Provincetown. Hofmann’s evolution from foremost modern art teacher to pivotal modern artist brought him into contact with many of the foremost artists, critics, and dealers of the twentieth century: Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Wassily Kandinsky, Sonia and Robert Delaunay, Betty Parsons, Peggy Guggenheim, Lee Krasner, Jackson Pollock, and many others. His successful career was shepherded by the postwar modern...

Dorothy Dehner Untitled Mid Century Modern abstract sculptural drawing, 1955 Marker and graphite on paper Signed and dated by Dorothy Dehner in black felt tip pen on the front Frame ...

Alan Fenton (1927 - 2000) Untitled, 1958-1960 Oil on canvas 88 x 82 1/2 inches Signed on the stretcher Fenton's quiet and contemplative nonobjective paintings and drawings were widely recognized for their demanding yet understated means of revealing a serious and sober essence. He identified greatly with Mark Rothko, a friend, as well as Adolph Gottlieb and Jack Tworkov, with whom he had studied privately. Fenton painted in New York City in the late 50's as the explosion of Abstract Expressionism turned into a rebellion against gestural, emotional painting. More concerned about his art than his posture, he expanded upon a tradition in painting with influences as diverse as Whistler and Turner as well as Ad Reinhardt and Joseph Albers. Alan Fenton was born in Cleveland in 1927, studied at the Cleveland School of Art, The Arts Students League, The New School, and at NYU, earning his BFA at Pratt Institute, where he later taught painting for many years. At seventeen, Fenton served in the Merchant Marines where he began a career as a professional boxer, a skill he had honed on the streets. He moved successfully through the graphic design business en route to becoming a painter in New York at the height of the art revolution of the fifties and sixties. Fenton enjoyed success with his subtle washes and pencil drawings as well as large abstract canvases...

Beautiful and arresting oil painting of women in an abstracted springtime forest bringing flower leis to Hawaiian Island Earth Spirit by Marguerite Louis Blasingame (American, 1906-...

Balancing act 2 (Abstract Painting) Gouache, graphite and ink on Rives paper. Unframed. Balancing Act 2 is part of a series of works on paper started in 2016. They are created in the evenings and aptly named after busy days of teaching and other responsibilities. The artist establishes parameters involving the use of a particular palette, certain mark-making gestures and amount of time spent on each drawing. This work incorporates graphite, ink, and gouache, and is a combination of intuition-based and planned execution. Tracey Adams is an American abstract painter and printmaker. Her artworks reflect a strong interest in musical patterns, rhythms, lyrical compositional elements and what she calls a sense of performance. She lives and works in Carmel, California. Work by Adams is part of the permanent collections of several museums, including the Bakersfield Art Museum, the Monterey Museum of Art, the Fresno Art Museum, the Tucson Art...