Fine American Art from 1845-1960

Comprising more than 70 paintings, as well as a number of bronze sculptures and works on paper, this exhibition and sale feature many rare and stellar works by prominent as well as little-known artists.

Those represented include John White Alexander, John Leslie Breck, Alfred Thompson Bricher, J.G. Brown, Patrick Henry Bruce, Lilla Cabot Perry, Theodore Earl Butler, Charles Warren Eaton, Frederick Frieseke, Philip Leslie Hale, Childe Hassam, Robert Henri, Franz Kline, Ernest Lawon, Paul Manship, Alfred Maurer, Thomas Moran, J. Francis Murphy, Joseph Raphael and John Singer Sargent. The exhibition will be accompanied by a catalog with 74 full-page color illustrations and biographies of the artists.

Among the compelling mid Nineteenth Century works, Thomas Moran's "Amalfi Coast," circa 1867-68, is suggestive of an era when the past was viewed through a lens of mystery and romance. Following the example of both the English painters J.M.W. Turner and John Constable, Moran inserted genre elements into a richly developed landscape, revealing a scene marked by humanity and lore rather than depicting an image merely of a scenic locale. With a sophisticated handling of lighting effects, he created a dramatic atmosphere suited to a place that was the subject of legends.

Moran's enchantment with the old world was equaled by the allure felt by the German-born painter Herman Herzog for the new one. After moving to Philadelphia in about 1870 to escape the oppression of Prussian rule, Herzog traveled far and wide, creating meticulously detailed landscapes in which he sought to portray the American landscape as a place of rugged, unspoiled beauty. In "Buck Hill Falls," circa 1877, a view of a woodland interior in the Pocono Mountains in which a waterfall cascades over rocks, he invokes an outsider's veneration for the romantic vision of America as a new Eden, expressed earlier by the Hudson River School.

In the 1890s images of elegant women at rest or engaged in quiet activities flooded American exhibitions. Yet this subject was often a pretext for artists to explore a variety of thematic issues. This was the case for John White Alexander, whose emphasis was usually not on his sitters themselves, but rather on the flowing lines, rich fabrics and coloristic harmonies of their gowns. As demonstrated in "The Green Dress," in which the subject's head is bowed and shadowed, this focus enabled him to explore the nature of elegance itself in the refined and sedate sense that was defined during his era.

Philip Leslie Hale likewise utilized the figure in his paintings of the "yellow girls" that he painted in Matunuck, R.I., during the summer of 1895 in which he sought to merge the spontaneity of Impressionism with a decorative and analytical approach to form. His method, in which a complex color weave comprised of an intricate network of small, directional brushstrokes merge and mingle when seen from a distance, is astonishingly close to that of the contemporaneous images of Italian Divisionists such as Giovanni Segantini.

John Singer Sargent also often painted women, capturing their distinctive personalities with psychological astuteness. At the same time, he used his subjects as opportunities for revealing his dashing stylistic flair. His approach is exemplified in his "Portrait of Edith French," circa 1901, which he rendered in two hours.

His technique in the creating of this work was recorded by the American art student Julie Heyneman, who was awestruck as she watched him paint with a concentrated energy, suggesting his subject's features and her atmospheric setting with a great economy of means. The painting is the only known example in Sargent's oeuvre in which both an exact eyewitness account of Sargent's creative process and the specific painting that resulted have survived.

In the early Twentieth Century many American artists continued to use stylistic modes that had originated earlier. By contrast, Patrick Henry Bruce was among those who were quick to embrace the modernist approaches that had sprung forth in Paris. There, through attending the salons of Gertrude Stein, Bruce befriended Henri Matisse and Robert and Sonia Delaunay, the founders of Orphic Cubism. Adopting an original style influenced by Cubism and Fauvism, Bruce used his subjects as a means of formal exploration, as is demonstrated in his austere and yet glowing "Still Life with Plate," circa 1912.

By contrast, the Art Deco sculptor Paul Manship created works reflecting the sustaining force of the classical tradition. In "Flight of Europa," 1925, he not only relied on antique sources for his subject matter, but also created a symmetrically composed, carefully balanced design in which smooth, flowing surfaces are modeled in the tradition of Greek sculpture.

Spanierman Gallery, 45 East 58th Street, is open Monday-Saturday, 9:30 am to 5:30 pm. For more information, 212-832-0208.