Recent-Arrivals

Insights into historic American artwork newly available from galleries and dealers around the country

William Merritt Chase (1849-1916), Alice Dieudonnée Chase Sullivan, ca. 1912. Oil on canvas, 36 x 29 in., signed lower right: ‘Will. M. Chase.’

William Merritt Chase (1849-1916)
Alice Dieudonnée Chase Sullivan
An artist renowned for his work in many genres, William Merritt Chase had a special fondness for portraiture. The portraits he created throughout his career include many of his finest works. This portrait, which is paired with Arthur White Sullivan, depicts the artist’s eldest daughter Alice Dieudonnée Chase (1887-1971) and her husband Arthur White Sullivan (1887-1957) shortly after their marriage in 1911. Alice (“Cozy”) had been the subject of her father’s paintings since infancy. As she grew, she posed for formal portraits and appeared in more spontaneous moments in Chase’s interiors and landscape paintings. The paintings descended in the sitters’ family following Alice’s death in 1971, and were acquired by the current owner in the late 1980s.
Debra Force Fine Art, Inc.
13 E. 69th Street, Suite 4F • New York, NY 10021
(212) 734-3636 • info@debraforce.com • www.debraforce.com

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Mercedes Matter (1913-2001), Table Top Still Life, ca. 1936. Oil on canvas board, 16 x 20 in., signed and titled verso: ‘J Carles / Provincetown’.

Mercedes Matter (1913-2001)
Table Top Still Life
Mercedes Matter was born Jeanne Carles, to two creative parents: her father was the American modernist Arthur B. Carles and her mother, Mercedes de Cordoba, worked as a model, actress and musician. She started painting at the age of 6 under her father’s direction and excelled from there. In the late 1930s, she was a foundational member of the American Abstract Artists organization and assisted Fernand Léger on a mural project under the Federal Works Progress Administration. Matter was a part of the artist community in Provincetown, Massachusetts, spending many summers there. Her abstraction style, as exemplified in this painting, takes a still life subject and breaks it down into unrecognizable forms in a type of codified abstract language.
Graham Shay 1857
17 E. 67th Street, No. 1A • New York, NY 10065 • (212) 535-5767 • www.grahamshay.com

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Frank Diaz Escalet (1930-2012), Tango No. 12, 1977. Cut leather on Masonite, 24 x 18 in.

Frank Diaz Escalet (1930-2012)
Tango No. 12
Opening April 29 at Meredith Ward Fine Art in New York City, is Frank Diaz Escalet: Sing Me the Blues, an exhibition of paintings and inlaid cut leather works. Centered on music and dance, the show is the second exhibition of the artist’s work at Meredith Ward Fine Art. The gallery successfully debuted Escalet’s work last year, which was the first exhibition since his death. Almost entirely self-taught, Puerto Rican-born Escalet was a painter and master leathercrafter, and developed his own technique for creating images out of cut leather that vividly capture the dynamics of a scene. Included in the exhibition is this work, Tango No. 12, created in 1977. The exhibition continues through June 24.
Meredith Ward Fine Art
44 E. 74th Street, Suite G • New York, NY 10021 • (212) 744-7306 • www.meredithwardfineart.com

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Winslow Homer (1836-1910), Orange Tree, Nassau, 1885. Watercolor on paper, 14 x 20½ in., signed and dated lower left: ‘Winslow Homer 1885’.

Winslow Homer (1836-1910)
Orange Tree, Nassau
Created in 1885, Orange Tree, Nassau was inspired by Winslow Homer’s December 1884 trip to the Caribbean with his father while on assignment for Century magazine.

“This watercolor has a freshness and spontaneity that combines Homer’s discovery of the Caribbean and his mastery of the waercolor technique at that time,” Thomas Coleville notes in a video about the work. Coleville also notes that upon Homer’s return to the United States, Orange Tree, Nassau found critical acclaim. The work has been exhibited in numerous exhibitions and appeared in several books on Homer, including the 2018 book Winslow Homer and the Camera: Photography and the Art of Painting.
Thomas Coleville Fine Art
111 Old Quarry Road • Guilford, CT 06437 • (203) 453-2449 • www.thomascolville.com

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William Gropper (1897-1977), Backstage, ca. 1950. Oil on canvas, 30 x 24 in., signed lower left.

William Gropper (1897-1977)
Backstage
Opening May 1 at Helicline Fine Art in New York is You’ll Be Swell! You’ll Be Great! The Fine Art of Performance, a new exhibition featuring about three dozen works of art depicting theatre, film, dance, music and the circus. Featured works include paintings, costume and set design drawings, illustrations, photographs and more from iconic Broadway shows and films. Productions featured include Hello Dolly!, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, My Fair Lady, Cabaret, The King & I, Daughters of Atreus, On the Town, Bye Bye Birdie and many others. The works were created between the 1920s and 1970s, and include this William Gropper work Backstage, created around 1950.
Helicline Fine Art
(212) 204-8833 • www.heliclinefineart.com