Two adjacent types of painting—still life and domestic “genre”—blur in this creatively arranged scene. At right, staples of the still life tradition like fruits, flowers, and drapery are displayed on a table. Yet there also is a child’s toy, and it seems the backdrop might be a blanket of some sort, trailing leftward to a radiator in the background. The domesticity and likely children implied by the toy is indicated by a sofa at left and wallpaper peeking out from behind the blanket; it’s an effective rendering of a woman artist working with her materials at hand. About the Artist: We haven’t located much reliable information about this artist. Palter graduated from Girls Commercial High School, Brooklyn, in 1929. Her paintings were exhibited in a 1938 FAP show in Flushing, NY along with NDG artist Henry Kallem. She married the abstract painter Albert Swinden—also a Federal Art Project artist—and their daughter Alice Swinden Carter went on to become a sculptor in her own right. 2 more images at FAP.
Underneath the shelter of a large tree in winter, one fox rejoins what is likely its mate with a bird in hand—perhaps a grouse. Underneath the paws of the other fox appears to be a rabbit...a good day of hunting! Palmer’s somewhat implausible scenario is created in the service of closely observed details in physiognamy, texture, and posture. Perhaps most striking of all is the action, frozen in mid-gesture, where the foxes glare at viewers interrupting them. About the Artist: Born in Farmington, UT, Palmer grew up in an agricultural family yet was encouraged in his artistic pursuits. He entered Utah State Agricultural College in 1911 before leaving for New York to study at the Art Students League and then for two years with the muralist Edwin Blashfield. Owing to this background he traveled to Spain and studied with Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida. Palmer appears to have painted as-yet unidentified murals in New York. In 1918 he served at the US Navy’s Pelham Bay training station as a Seaman 2nd Class. Immediately after the war, he traveled to Spain as an agent of the Robert Fridenberg Gallery, New York, to purchase old engravings. While there he traveled to the Louvre and sketched extensively in Spain and North Africa. Palmer also financed his stay in Europe through illustrations for periodicals like Judge, The Elks Magazine, Colliers, and John Martin’s Book for children, along with book commissions like Hidden Heroes of the Rockies (1923)—a collection of semi-historical tales set in and around his home state of Utah. In 1922 he married Beatrice Hunter and returned to Europe the following year, enacting a somewhat different itinerary than most artists: “Most everyone has covered the galleries of Europe, but few have paid as much attention to the exhibits in the various zoos along the way as I have. My sketchbooks are full of drawings made en route. The zoo at Antwerp had perhaps the most complete collection” (Green, “Utahns”). Throughout this period of commercial work, Palmer remained focused upon his goal of becoming “the greatest painter of animals in the world” (Greene, “Childhood”). Settling in New York, he spent years sketching animals at the Bronx Zoo; he traveled throughout North America toward the same ends. His animal paintings were exhibited at places like the National Academy of Design (1921), the Art Institute of Chicago (1926), and the Brooklyn Museum (1931). A collection of his works at the Sculptors Gallery (1922) was deemed “spontaneous and reveal[ing] a respect for the subtleties of animal anatomy” (New York Tribune 19 Feb. 1922: 52). An art critic for the New York Times wrote of a show at Leonard Clayton Gallery (1934) that “There could not be a more detached or colder environment” than a zoo in which to behold wild animals. Palmer nevertheless was able to convey their individuality, “every pose inconceivable as belonging to another...filled with the inherent dignity of their indifference to all humanity” (Cary). In 1940 Palmer was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship for “creative work in the graphic arts, in particular studies of wild and domesticated animals.” He served again in the military during World War II. 2 works in the National Gallery of Art. 1 work at the Brooklyn Museum. 1 work at the Chrysler Museum of Art. 1 work at <a href="http://utahdcc.force.com/public/PtlArtifactDetail?id=a0n70000001TuzSAAS&bcn=ptlartifacts&bcu=http%3A%2F%2Futahdcc.force.com%2Fpublic%2Fapex%2Fptlartifacts%3Fbcn%3DArtSearch%26bcu%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Futahdcc.force.com%252Fpublic%252Fapex%252FPtlArtSearch%253FKeyword%253DArtist%2526searchTerm%253D%26field%3DartApp__Artist__c%26heading%3DHerman%2BPalmer%26ps%3D0%26value%3Da0j70000000CbMIAA0&ps=0" target="_blank" rel="noopener">State of Utah Art Collections. Sources Consulted: Elsie Green, “Utahns in New York,” Salt Lake Telegram 21 Jan. 1923: 11; Elsie Greene, “Childhood Tales Aid Utah Artist” Salt Lake Telegram 27 Aug. 1922: 10; Elisabeth Luther Cary, “Our Artists Today See Animals as Individuals,” New York Times 1 July 1934: 132.
A striking composition is achieved with very few objects: the painting’s eponymous vase, a few flowers and blooming limbs, a goldfish bowl, and two paintings. Carefully outlined shapes play against a scattering of colors applied thickly—even three-dimensionally—to the canvas. A branch traces the meandering line between a vivid goldfish in the bowl and equally bright flowers held by the jar. The painting at left creates a window upon some outdoor scene. About the Artist: Born in Budapest, Hungary, Sarkadi relocated first to London and then, in 1914, to the US. His artistic life began as a dramatist, writing one-act plays that spanned his time in both countries: Within Four Walls (1900), Children at Play (1907), The Line of Life (1916), The Gusher (1928), Fourflusher (1928), and The Angel (1929). One published collection of these plays, however, features illustrations that may be Sarkadi’s and would indicate a longstanding interest in the visual arts, although his painting career dates to the early 1930s. He also exhibited sculptures on more than one occasion, showing himself to be a multitalented artist. Sarkadi’s paintings were shown at the Balzac Gallery, Ainslie Galleries, and the American Artists Congress. His friend Willy Pogany, a fellow artist from Hungary, wrote how “it is strange that a man so saturated with transcendental philosophy antagonistic to matter, should take up painting as a means of expresssion...But with Sarkadi the process is different....Color attracts him just as much as form is evaded, and here we find that his instinctive choice of vehicle for the mysticism and yearning for limitless space is more than justified by the result” (New York Sun 10 May 1924: 6). 3 works at the Brooklyn Museum. 12 more images at FAP.
We see at close range a female of Odocoileus virginianus, also known as white-tailed deer. Their range encompasses most of the United States, and they are the most numerous of that family here. Karlan’s painting depends less upon its anatomical accuracy than the proximity at which we view a living Virginia deer; her effect is that of extending a short, but unforgettable, moment of beholding one in the wild before the deer raises its white tail in alarm, and then is gone. About the Artist: Born in New York, from a young age Karlan’s artistic endeavors cut across different forms. In the early 1920s her orchestral compositions were performed at New York’s Third Street Music School Settlement; by 1931 she was composing (and playing) avant-garde pieces written for Léon Theramin’s new electronic instrument in collaboration with modern dancer Sophia Delza. Meanwhile she was, according to a 1927 news feature, one of the few women silversmiths in America and thinking of the decorative arts in terms of self-expression: “The rudest tribes and the most luxurious civilizations realized this fact. It is by their jewelry that we know them” (Gross). She was mentioned in Rockwell Kent’s influential Creative Art magazine, and several of her pieces were selected for the Musuem of Modern Art’s 1946 show “Modern Handmade Jewelry”. 1 work at the Museum of Arts and Design. 4 more images at FAP. Source Consulted: Pearl Gross / Universal Service, “Barbaric Gems in Favor,” San Francisco Examiner 30 Oct. 1927: 42.
The pleasing daisies in a vase at center may give this painting its name, so artfully have they been created and arranged. If so, their status as humble field flowers plays against the ornate, patterned background and checkerboard table. Beautifully harmonized colors create a self-enclosed space. Another interpretation of Pandolfini’s title might observe that everything here is a sort of Trompe-l'œil with painted surfaces. About the Artist: Born in Palermo, Italy, Pandolfini immigrated to the US in 1912 and worked as an engraver in his father’s jewelry shop. Along with NDG artist James Guy, Pandolfini was among the leadership of the Unemployed Artists Group of the John Reed Club—later to become the Artists Union. His work was exhibited in places like the Corcoran Gallery (1934); the Museum of Modern Art (1936, 1938); the Pennsylvania State Museum (1939). Underneath his NDG still life painting is a body of work directly grappling with the economic injustice of his times, as a few titles will attest: “Unemployed” (1932-37); “The Pay Line” (1938); “Night Will Fall and the Homeless Shall Be Without Shelter” (1937); and “Strafing Maneuvers” (1941). He taught painting at the Brooklyn Museum. 9 more images at FAP.
The structures depicted here are in all likelihood those of the Theron Higgins Mill located alongside the Little River in Worthington, MA. They’re rendered in a somewhat telescopic view so as to compress a nearly impossible number of scenic elements: river, dam, bridge, buildings, and several layers of foliage receding into the distance. Thick brushstrokes of vivid fall colors, arranged in bold masses, are typical of Owen’s painting style. About the Artist: Born in North Adams, MA, Owen grew up in a farming family, moving to Boston at age twenty on a scholarship to study at the Eric Pape School of Art. Later, he would study at Art Students League, the Chase School and the National Academy of Design. Like many other aspirational artists of the day, Owen created illustrations for periodicals—Cosmopolitan, Scribner’s, Harper’s, Life—and for literary works, including the well-known author Hamlin Garland’s short story “The River’s Warning” (1902), Helen Fuller Orton’s Bobby of Cobblefield Farm (1922), and Percy K. Fitzhugh’s “Tom Slade” series of Boy Scout books. A turning point arrived in 1910, when Owen visited Connecticut and devoted himself to painting this region, regardless of the season; farmers called him “the feller who don’t mind the weather” (“Owen’s Pictures”). In 1920 Owen returned to New York with the novel idea of opening a gallery devoted to selling his own work, the Robert Emmett Owen New England Landscape Gallery. It would remain open at different locations until World War II, after which he was artist in residence at the Thomas Paine Cottage Museum. 5 works viewable at a 1935 Rains Gallery auction catalog. 3 more images at FAP. His papers are at the Archives of American Art. Source Consulted: “Owen’s Pictures on Exhibition,” Orlando Sentinel 1 June 1925: 5.
The familiar phrase “peak color” receives an ecstatic new meaning in Nordell’s transcendentalist vision, where sun illuminates woodland foliage in fiery hues, then doubles them in a reflecting pool. His figurative rendering of the scene edges toward an impressionist composition in leaf-colors; upstate New Yorkers know this moment and this feeling. About the Artist: Born in Copenhagen, Denmark, Nordell immigrated to the US when he was seven years old and grew up in “a large family with poor parents” in Westerly, RI (Norwich Bulletin 7 April 1910: 6). He nevertheless was able to attend the Rhode Island School of Design, where his talents soon were recognized and led to a productive career, both as a landscape painter and sought-after portraitist. Nordell studied at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, under Edmund C. Tarbell; the Art Students League under George Bridgman and Frank DuMond; and the Académie Julian, Paris, under Jean-Paul Laurens. In 1910 he was awarded the James William Paige Traveling Scholarship for study in Europe. He married Emma Alice Parker, an accomplished painter in her own right, in 1912. Nordell’s art was exhibited widely, at the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition, San Francisco; the Corcoran Gallery; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts; and many others. Nordell appears to have had a special affinity for Western New York, often showing his work at Buffalo’s Albright-Knox Gallery and Rochester’s Memorial Art Gallery; beginning in the late 1920s he spent summers at Chautauqua painting landscapes. Later he lived not far from Lake Erie in Westfield, NY. 2 works at Mead Art Museum. 2 works at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Source Consulted: Michael Preston Worley, “Carl Nordell,” askART
This enigmatic watercolor is organized around the small figurine at left, perhaps a mythical Japanese fox-spirit called kitsune. Their intelligence and shape-shifting ability renders them an ambiguous omen: perhaps as shapeshifting tricksters, perhaps as spirit messengers. They could have as many as nine tails—suggested here by an additional eight curling cacti—at which time their fur turned white. This would be a very old, wise, and powerful kitsune. Two lotus blossoms in the dish, symbols of purity, render this compact still life to be of profound spiritual importance, and we see waves of fabric rippling around the moment. About the Artist: Born Tokorogo, Japan, Kadowaki immigrated to Seattle, WA in 1909, giving as his profession a tailor for the famous Mitsukoshi department store in Tokyo. He appears to have lived in California shortly after arrival. As of 1917, he was a waiter at an Oyster Bay, NY restaurant; in 1920 he was butler to the son of a US Vice President in Wayne, NJ; in 1930 he was servant to a Murray Hill attorney; in 1940 he was a cook. These occupations all were considered "appropriate" for Japanese immigrants, and yet Kadowaki persisted in his pursuit of art. While in California he took classes at the Los Angeles School of Art and Design, exhibiting there in 1910; while in New York, he took classes at the Art Students League and exhibited at the ACA Gallery and Salons of America. In 1926 he designed a whimsical cockatoo light made of celluloid. After the Japanese attack upon Pearl Harbor, he was one of seven (along with NDG artist Thomas Nagai) to sign and publish a “Declaration of Japanese-American Artists”: “Let us express here and now our tremendous anxiety for national defense of America; our determination to support it to our utmost as artists and men, and further, to bear arms if necessary to ensure the final victory for the Democratic forces of the world. Whether a Fascist calls himself German, Italian, or Japanese, he is part and parcel of the same plot against all mankind.” Kadowaki became a US citizen in 1953. Source Consulted: Ruth L. Benjamin, “Japanese Painters in America” Parnassus 7.5 (October 1935): 13–15. For helpful suggestions, sincere thanks to Mai Sato.
New Deal Gallery, Genesee Valley Council on the Arts Object #FA18185
Ritz, Abigail (photography) Cooper, Ken (biography)
The identity of this unusual church isn’t clear. Its design and steeple are characteristic of many found throughout New England; at the top of its steeple is a small “onion dome” turret usually found on Russian or Greek Orthodox churches. Jones may have found this subject matter intriguing, along with what appears to be a very old graveyard in the foreground. Lightly etched environmental details—clouds, trees, bushes—surround the central building like a nimbus. About the Artist: Born in Manchester, NH, Jones studied painting at the Cowles Art School in Boston under Ernest Major and Joseph de Camp. His early career involved commercial illustration for the publisher Frank A. Munsey, an indication of that style during this period possibly shown in his whimsical illustrations for a children’s book called Monkey Shines (1904). Among the places where Jones’ work was exhibited include the Salmagundi Club (1907, 1917, 1929), the Panama Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco (1915), and the Brooklyn Museum of Art (1930-31). In addition to the etching housed at the NDG, Jones’ other work for the WPA appeared at a rotating exhibition in Patchogue, NY (1936) and a posthumous print exhibition at Keuka College, Penn Yan, NY (1941). From about 1933 to 1940, he taught art at the Stony Brook School for Boys, a Christian co-ed college preparatory school. 12 works at The Athenaeum. 1 work at the Birmingham Museum of Art. 1 more image at FAP.
Gaige uses just enough visual cues to suggest some depth to his landscape, but its main interest appears to be the play of willow trunks and branches against grass and foliage. The latter, rendered in a limited pallette of colors, nevertheless plays out in many permutations and textures. About the Artist: Born in Candor, NY, Gaige grew up in Binghamton and graduated from the School of Art at Syracuse University. He then moved to New York City where he worked as a painter, a freelance designer, and a teacher at the Parsons School of Design. His own innovations for a line of women’s compacts, cigarette cases, and coin cases for Volupté was recognized at the Museum of Modern Art’s exhibition “Useful Objects of American Design Under Ten Dollars” (1940). Along with his design work during the 1930s, Gaige was employed by the Federal Art Project. In 1942 he enlisted in the Army, serving first as a structural draftsman at Fort Dix, NJ, where he was featured in a humorous article on subject of slang between soldiers and their sweethearts:“This sugar report is coming straight from second heaven. You should cop a gander at the taxpayers straggling in. This new bunch of handcuffed volunteers has everything including short pants, battle wagons, moss backs, cruisers, modern guineas and a Hollywood private to snow ‘em under” (Cross). Gaige later became a writer-artist for Yank newspaper, traveling to the Middle East. The probable cause for this shift in direction was the positive reaction to his cartoons about military life, eventually collected into a book entitled Me and the Army. One critic wrote that “Every right page is filled with rough and ready sketches, full of life and keen observation, of all that goes on during the early days of training. Gaige may not be a great artist, but is a great observer of human activity from the mass nudity of medical inspection to the calm dignity of church service. The book is really a letter from a soldier to the folks at home—any soldier to any parents” (Dungen). After the war Gaige lived first in Pennsylvania and then in Miami. 11 images at OpenValley. 4 more images at FAP. Sources Consulted: Christopher Cross, “How to Write to Him in His Own Language” (Albuquerque Journal 18 Oct 1942: 15. H.L. Dungen, “Witty Discourse on Army Life,” Oakland Tribune 20 June 1943: 19.