Daniel Ralph Celentano

NYC Subway Mid 20th Century American Scene Social Realism WPA Modern 1930s

"Pelham Bay" WPA American Scene Social Realism Modern NYC Subway Transportation Daniel Ralph Celantano (1902-1980) "Pelham Bay" 12 1/4 x 16 inches Oil on canvas Signed lower cente...

"6th Avenue El" American Scene Social Realism Mid-20th Century New York City Ernest Fiene (1894-1965) "6th Avenue El" 12 1/4 x 14 1/4 Oil on canvas board, c. 1940s Signed lower righ...

Spruance, Benton (American 1904-1967). SUBWAY SHIFT - THE SECOND FRONT. Fine and Looney 223. Lithograph, 1943. Fine and Looney cite two editions, one of 35 and one of 30, this being ...

Getting Ready for the Revolution - Learning How to Ride in the Subway Litho crayons on illustrator’s board, c. 1932 Signed: Adolf Dehn (VED) lower right corner (signed by Virginia Dehn, the artist’s widow) Tilted along the upper edge of the recto in pencil by the artist Verso inscriptions: “VF 3168.D” in a circle, also annotated in red pencil “32” in a circle and “699 Provenance: Mary Ryan Gallery, exhibition entitled Adolf Dehn Lithographs, 1927-1940, Nov. 16 to Dec. 12, 1982. The original exhibition notice us affixed to the backing board of the frame Note: A drawing intended or used in the publication Vanity Fair, for whom Dehn worked in the mid 1920’s to the 1930’s. Adolf Dehn, American Watercolorist and Printmaker, 1895-1968 Adolf Dehn was an artist who achieved extraordinary artistic heights, but in a very particular artistic sphere—not so much in oil painting as in watercolor and lithography. Long recognized as a master by serious print collectors, he is gradually gaining recognition as a notable and influential figure in the overall history of American art. In the 19th century, with the invention of the rotary press, which made possible enormous print runs, and the development of the popular, mass-market magazines, newspaper and magazine illustration developed into an artistic realm of its own, often surprisingly divorced from the world of museums and art exhibitions, and today remains surprisingly overlooked by most art historians. Dehn in many regards was an outgrowth of this world, although in an unusual way, since as a young man he produced most of his illustrative work not for popular magazines, such as The Saturday Evening Post, but rather for radical journals, such as The Masses or The Liberator, or artistic “little magazines” such as The Dial. This background established the foundation of his outlook, and led later to his unique and distinctive contribution to American graphic art. If there’s a distinctive quality to his work, it was his skill in introducing unusual tonal and textural effects into his work, particularly in printmaking but also in watercolor. Jackson Pollock seems to have been one of many notable artists who were influenced by his techniques. Early Years, 1895-1922 For an artist largely remembered for scenes of Vienna and Paris, Adolf Dehn’s background was a surprising one. Born in Waterville, Minnesota, on November 22, 1895, Dehn was the descendent of farmers who had emigrated from Germany and homesteaded in the region, initially in a one-room log cabin with a dirt floor. Adolf’s father, Arthur Clark Dehn, was a hunter and trapper who took pride that he had no boss but himself, and who had little use for art. Indeed, during Adolf’s boyhood the walls of his bedroom and the space under his bed were filled with the pelts of mink, muskrats and skunks that his father had killed, skinned and stretched on drying boards. It was Adolf’s mother, Emilie Haas Dehn, a faithful member of the German Lutheran Evangelical Church, who encouraged his interest in art, which became apparent early in childhood. Both parents were ardent socialists, and supporters of Eugene Debs...