Herman Maril (1908-1986), At the Fairgrounds, 1946. Oil on board, 25 x 34 in.

“The gallery’s first exhibition of Maril’s work, Color and Space, concentrated on paintings done from the 1950s to the 1980s while the following exhibition, The Provincetown Paintings, was built around works done in a particular locale,” explains gallery director Bethany Dobson. “With this show, we wanted to look at the beginning of his artistic career and how his style developed from the 1920s and 1930s, when he was influenced by European artists including George Braque and Paul Cezanne, to building his own artistic language in the 1940s and 1950s, and finally to the colorful, more abstract paintings from the 1960s to 1980s.”

Dobson notes that of the 32 paintings in the new exhibition, Maril’s scenes of Baltimore and his summer home in Provincetown make up most of the works in the show. However, attendees will also notice paintings the artist completed in Maine, the Berkshires and during his travels to the Southwest. “There is a wide range of subjects featured in the show as well,” says Dobson, “[including] still lifes, construction and industrial scenes, rural landscapes, as well as seascapes and coastal scenes.”

Herman Maril (1908-1986), Interior with Pitcher, 1931. Oil on canvas, 25 x 18 in.

Herman Maril (1908-1986), Intide, 1958. Oil on canvas, 23½ x 40 in.

Starting with Maril’s earliest works in the exhibition, Interior with Pitcher, completed in 1931, we see one of several tabletop still lifes. “[This piece] reflects the simplified and abstracted forms of cubism as well as the influence of artists like Braque and Cezanne on the young Maril,” Dobson shares. “Beginning with this body of work, Maril retained certain elements, like simplified forms, as he developed his own artistic style and his work remained grounded in recognizable scenes even as he incorporated abstraction into his later paintings.”

Some of Maril’s early subjects also incorporated his interest in civil engineering and architecture, with works focused on construction or industrial themes. Maril returned to these themes throughout his career, and can be seen in works like the exhibition piece At the Fairgrounds, 1946, depicting the tents of a fairground and a pack of dogs shown distinctly in sharp, geometric shapes. “This painting demonstrates the artist’s keen interest in his surroundings.” Dobson says. “He found inspiration in his daily life and sought subject matter from the playful, as seen here, to the industrial scenes...”

Herman Maril (1908-1986), Southwest, 1972. Oil on canvas, 30¼ x 40¼ in.

Herman Maril (1908-1986), The Sea, circa 1972. Tapestry, 47 x 35 in.

In paintings like Intide, 1958, and an artist-designed tapestry, The Sea, circa 1972, we see Maril’s prevailing passion exposed; his love of Provincetown and the surrounding area. “Maril first visited Cape Cod during the summer of 1934, when Duncan Phillips visited his Chatham studio and purchased two of his paintings,” Dobson explains. “The artist returned to the area in 1948, spending his honeymoon in Provincetown. From that point on, he and his family spent most summers there until his death in 1986.”

Dobson continues, “[Intide] was done in Provincetown and demonstrates the artist’s love of painting the coastline of the area. Here, the variations in blue indicate the changing tides and depth of the water around the Cape while the dunes and rocks near the shore are reduced to simplified forms. Overall, Intide shows the artist’s bold, expressive brushwork and focus on form and color in his mature paintings.”

Herman Maril (1908-1986), Untitled (Hurricane), 1954. Oil on canvas, 30 x 38 in.  Below left: 

It’s the hope of Debra Force Fine Art that visitors of the exhibition, hanging through October 6, “can enjoy the journey from his early work, as a young artist starting to find his way, to the serene views of his beloved Provincetown in the 1970s and 1980s, done after he had been observing and painting the scenery for decades.”

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