Lot: 152
WILLIAM GLACKENS
1870-1938
Title: Nude, influenced by Renoir
Medium: Oil on canvas. Signed, circa 1925
Size: 32 x 26 in. (81 x 66 cm.)
Provenance: Heritage Auctions Texas May 24, 2007[Lot 23141]
LITERATURE:
Touchstone 7 (June 1920): 193 (reproduced); List made in 1943 of works in estate of William J. Glackens left for Mrs. William J. Glackens, William Glackens File, Whitney Museum of American Art Papers, Archives of American Art, microfilm reel no. N658, frame 601, no. 47; William Glackens File, Whitney Museum of American Art Papers, Archives of American Art, microfilm reel no. 658, frame 273; Card file of works by William J. Glackens, William and Ira Glackens Papers, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll 4710, frame 376, no. 30; Richard Joel Wattenmaker, "The Art of William Glackens," Ph.D. Dissertation, New York University Institute of Fine Arts, 1973, pp. 247-248m 454, 457 (reproduced)
William Glackens was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1891, following his graduation from Philadelphia's Central High School where John Sloan was a fellow student, he joined the Philadelphia Record as an artist-reporter, and worked in a similar capacity from 1892 to 1895 for the Philadelphia Press. Also working for the Press at this time were Sloan, George Luks, and Everett Shinn-all of whom became associated with a group of progressive painters known as "The Eight." In 1893 Glackens studied briefly with Thomas Anschutz at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Glackens and the artist Robert Henri shared a studio in 1894 and traveled to Europe together the following year. Upon his return to America in 1896 Glackens settled in New York and worked as an illustrator for the New York Herald and later for the New York World. In 1908 he became a member of the Eight (Henri, Sloan, Shinn, Luks, Maurice Prendergast, Arthur B. Davies, and Ernest Lawson) who held a landmark exhibition at the Macbeth Galleries. This exhibition marked the ascendancy of a realist style of American painting, later dubbed the "Ashcan school."
Glackens went to France in 1912 as an agent for the important Philadelphia collector of European modernist art, Dr. Albert C. Barnes, returning with works by Degas, Manet, Renoir, and Matisse, among others.
In 1913 Glackens was chairman of the committee selecting American entries in the Armory Show, and in 1917 was elected the first president of the Society of Independent Artists. The growing recognition of his paintings enabled him to accept only occasional illustrating assignments from then on. Upon his death in 1938, a memorial exhibition of his work was organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Nude Pulling on Stocking is one of a radiant group of female nudes by Glackens from the 1920s. The present work is an outstanding example of this aspect of Glackens' production which was inspired a close study of nudes by Renoir in the collection of Dr. Barnes. A painting closely related to the present work was awarded the Temple Gold Medal from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1924. Glackens' nudes usually feature young models posed in interior settings, and feature some of the artist's most harmonious and complex arrangements of color and marvelous expressions of volume. Richard Joel Wattenmaker has noted that in many of his nudes, Glackens studied the 'figure in its entirety. Often [they] were portrayed in pictorial settings which included . . . draperies . . . and a background . . . of striking wallpaper floral or vegetative pattern. The nude itself was almost always . . . represented in some casual informal attitude, and frequently was partially attired in [an] undergarment' ('The Art of William Glackens' Ph.D. dissertation, New York University Institute of Fine Arts, 1973, p. 247). A small oil
study for this work is recorded in the artist's inventories although its present whereabouts are unknown. (Location Unknown).
Estimate: $150,000 - $250,000
SOLD: $250,300
Lot: 153
CHILDE HASSAM
1859-1935
Title: The Rocks of Cape Ann, 1918, Gloucester, MA
Medium: Oil on canvas laid on panel
Size: 12 x 25 in. (30.5 x 63.5 cm.) Signed and dated lower center: Childe Hassam 1918
Monogrammed, dated, and titled verso: CH / 1918 / The Rocks of Cape Ann
PROVENANCE:
American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York; Frank K.M. Rehn Gallery, New York; The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; Senator William Benton, Connecticut; William Benton, Jr., by descent from the above; ACA Galleries, New York; Private collection, Chicago, Illinois; F.B. Horowitz Fine Art, Ltd., Hopkins, Minnesota; Private collection, New York, acquired from the above, July 1985.
EXHIBITED: Hammer Galleries, New York, n.d.
The present work will be included in The Childe Hassam Catalogue Raisonné by Kathleen M. Burnside and Stuart Feld.
Condition Report: This painting remains in very good condition; under UV exam, there does not appear to be any previous restoration. Framed Dimensions 20.25 X 33 Inches
Estimate: $80,000 - $120,000
SOLD: $218,750
Lot: 154
FREDERICK CARL FRIESEKE
1874-1939
Title: Girl with a Basket of Ribbons, painted by 1915
Medium: Oil on panel. Signed lower right: F.C. Frieseke
Size: 31-3/4 x 25-1/4 in. (80.6 x 64.1 cm.)
PROVENANCE:
Private collection, circa 1930.
By descent to the present owner.
Ford Art Auctions May28,2019 lot #0038
PROPERTY FROM THE JANE W. PETTUS TRUST, SAINT LOUIS, MISSOURI
EXHIBITED:
Saint Louis Art Museum, Saint Louis, Missouri, "Impressionism Reflected: American Art, 1890-1920," May 6-June 27, 1982.
LITERATURE:
Saint Louis Art Museum, Impressionism Reflected: American Art, 1890-1920, exhibition catalogue, Saint Louis, Missouri, 1982, n.p.
Frederick Carl Frieseke's Girl with a Basket of Ribbons is an exquisite example of the intimism practiced by the American artists in Giverny. This genre, developed by the Nabis, featured artfully posed female models in decorative interiors illuminated by natural light. With its subtle light and beautiful tonal harmonies, Girl with a Basket of Ribbons demonstrates Frieseke at the height of his abilities.
Frieseke was one of the leading figures among the second generation of American expatriates in France. He first studied at the Art Institute of Chicago and the Art Students League in New York before leaving for Paris in 1898 to continue his studies. There Frieseke enrolled at the Académie Julian and at the Académie Carmen, James McNeill Whistler's short-lived school. Whistler's passion for Japanese art, for decoration, and for distinctive color arrangements had a lasting influence on Frieseke's work. By 1900, Frieseke was spending summers in Giverny and, after achieving artistic and financial success, was able to purchase a home there in 1906. He chose American Impressionist Theodore Robinson's former house next door to Claude Monet's. Like Monet, Frieseke found inspiration in the local landscape and the sunshine.
In the present work, Frieseke's model appears lost in reverie, with her fingers looped into the colorful threads of yarn in her basket. The mood is contemplative and serene. The basket set upon her lap at center creates a diagonal through the composition, juxtaposing the vertical and horizontal moldings on the wall of the room. The woman's curved chair unites the composition, instilling depth, balance, and harmony to the scene. The structure of the composition is similar to those of Édouard Vuillard. Both Vuillard and Frieseke often presented their figures in corners of rooms, viewing them diagonally and from a slightly elevated vantage point. While deeply influenced by the French Impressionists and the Nabis, Frieseke's compositions also possess techniques revolutionized by the post-Impressionists. As William H. Gerdts writes, "Frieseke's use of flat, interlocking patterns to achieve two-dimensional effects allies his art to French Post-Impressionism" (Monet's Giverny: An Impressionist Colony, New York, 1993, p. 174).
Frieseke was at the height o