Steven Albert - En Francais

From the forests of Northern Maine, where he was raised, to the streets of San Francisco, Steven Albert's paintings have always been informed by patterns of clear, bright sunlight and shadows. Although architectural designs dominate his imagery, doors and windows are often the focus, creating a sense of portal into often missed aspects of our concrete reality, whether it be rooms of mysterious and Zen-like calm, or the fractured and frenetic multiplicity of urban cafes and storefronts. Albert seeks to highlight the small moments, common in our lives, but often unexperienced.

Albert's work is represented by galleries in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York and has been exhibited in various museums and venues around America. His paintings are included in several important collections worldwide. In 2006, he was awarded a Pollack-Krasner Foundation grant.

[Oil on canvas, 48 x 40 inches]

James Tissot - Holiday [c.1876]

Yellowing leaves of the chestnut tree shade a group of well-dressed men and women who are enjoying a picnic beside a pond. The canvas, painted in the backyard of Tissot’s London house which was near Lord’s Cricket Ground, sparkles with colour and exquisite detail. In his depiction of daily life in an outdoor setting, Tissot shares the realism of French artists such as Eduoard Manet. His style is also akin to that of the Impressionists, who were working at exactly the same time as Tissot, but his paintings differ in their crystal-clear vision and elegant society subjects. Tissot often focused on finely dressed women, adorned in the latest fashions and casting a spell over their men. His paintings have recently enjoyed a well-deserved revival in popularity; for many years they were regarded as the epitome of late Victorian vacuous and decadent society.

[Oil on canvas, 76.5 x 99.5 cm]

Claudio Missagia - Composition [2010]

Claudio Missagia is an Italian artist born in Valdagno, Italy on May 27, 1959 - he has been an artist since 1994.

[Mixed media on canvas, 60 x 60 cm]

Thomas Eakins - Between Rounds [1898–99]

During the 1890s Eakins (American, 1844–1916) focused his energies on probing portraits, except for a few canvases devoted to boxing and wrestling in which he returned to male athletics, his groundbreaking theme of the early 1870s. Eakins's boxing and wrestling paintings are, however, even bolder in their subject matter than his early rowing pictures. Although the popular press about 1900 featured images of prize fighting and accounts of boxers such as John L. Sullivan, most artists turned away from depicting ring sports, which were associated with sanctioned violence, gambling, and alcohol. For his ringside view of a match in Philadelphia's Arena, Eakins invited Billy Smith, a local featherweight, to pose for the boxer, asked other figures from the boxing world to re-enact their real-life roles in his Chestnut Street studio, and enlisted friends and relatives to pose for the spectators. As usual, he minimises drama, showing Smith catching his breath rather than struggling against Timothy Callahan, his unseen, and ultimately successful, opponent.

[Oil on canvas, 127.3 x 101.3 cm]

Gertrude Beals Bourne - Haystacks, Autumn [c.1895]

Gertrude Beals Bourne (Boston, Massachusetts, 1868 - Boston, Massachusetts, 1962) grew up on Dartmouth Street in the Back Bay of Boston. Around 1890, she began to study art privately first with Henry Rice, 1853-1934 (who had learned his craft from Ross Turner, 1847-1915) and later, in the early 1910s, with Henry B. Snell (1858-1943), one of the founding members of the New York Watercolour Club. An important part of her education was the trips she took to Europe with her family in the 1890’s; she painted in Norway, France, and Great Britain.

[Watercolour and pencil on paper]

Edward Moran - Life Saving Patrol [c.1893]

Many of the paintings of Edward Moran (Bolton, England, 1829 - New York City, 1901) show powerful scenes of shipwrecks and storms that emphasise the struggle between man and nature. In Life Saving Patrol, however, the sea and the sky appear relatively calm. The dramatic scale of the lifeguard against the moonlit water suggests a balance of power between the ocean and the brave men who risk their lives to rescue its victims.

[Oil on canvas, 91.6 x 138.4 cm]

Isaac Israels -Donkey Riding on the Beach [c.1898-1900]

Three girls are riding donkeys on the beach while a boy walks along behind. Isaac Israels (Amsterdam, February 3, 1865 - The Hague, October 7, 1934) painted this cheerful seaside scene around 1900 with a loose brushstroke and light, bright colours. The artist was one of the Amsterdam Impressionists. 'Donkey Riding' was part of the huge collection of nineteenth-century art amassed by the Drucker-Frasers of London. The couple bequeathed a large part of their collection to the Rijksmuseum.

The girls in the picture are the Pauw sisters and their friend. Obviously it was not Israels's intention to paint portraits of the girls: the faces are rendered with a few rough strokes of paint. Isaac Israels painted numerous works on this theme. At the time Israels painted these works he was living in Amsterdam. In the summer he would go to The Hague, where his father lived. There he would find lodgings in Scheveningen and paint his characteristic paintings. He was fascinated by the clear light of the sea front.

[Oil on canvas, 51 x 70 cm]