RARE JAMES APOSTLE (AMERICAN, b.1917) 'THE RED FIELD,' 1960, ARTIST SIGNED, PSYCHEDELIC, SURREALIST FIGURATIVE EXPRESSIONIST OIL on CANVAS, VERY LARGE PAINTING, measuring 51" in LENGTH
x 37 1/2", ALLEGORICAL, FANTASTIC LANDSCAPE, featuring SEVEN SCREAMING GREEN CATS HOWLING UNDER a NOCTURAL MOON SHROUDED in CLOUDS
(Dated 1960)
Post WWII, American vintage figurative expressionist oil painting, featuring surrealistic, psychedelic, fantastic landscapes & depictions of fauna
DIMENSIONS:
51" Width x 36 1⁄2" Height
Weight: 11 lbs. 14 oz.
BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION/BACKGROUND:
James Apostle (American, 20th century) was born in Thompsonville, Connecticut in 1917 and was once a rising star in the art world, in the American Post-WWII, late 1940's, where abstract expressionism was ready to turn the entire art establishment completely on its head and the center of the art world was to be unceremoniously transferred from Paris, France to New York City in the United States of America, which wasn't ravaged by the Second World War and whose focus clearly shifted away from representational art in all its forms and expressions, to non-representation, non-referential image making. James Apostle, born some 28 years before the end of the Second World War, would have been keenly aware and interested in this sudden shift in artistic preferences and the fact that the entire center of the art world was now just tens of miles away from his childhood home of Thompsonville, Connecticut. In 1949, James Apostle was even invited by the popular and widely read 'Life' magazine editors to send them pictures of his work for inclusion in their story on emerging American artists. He was however, to financially disadvantaged to send the editors processed photographs of his paintings and other works. His career seems to have been more affected by financial disadvantage than by some lack of talent or artistic vision. Art history is ripe with these stories of aspiring, promising artistic talents who abandoned their life work and vocation due to financial distress. It was about at this time that Mr. Apostle's mother-in-law became seriously ill and the young artist was forced to work as a commercial lithographer in order to financially support his wife and mother-in-law. He continued to paint however and to create very unusual and maverick works of visionary art.
DESCRIPTION:
American artist James Apostle's often extremely visionary, inventive, surrealistic and often described as para-normal, psychedelic, surrealistic landscapes and figurative oil paintings on canvas, often take on an apocalyptic, nightmarish and other-worldly character, where skies are cataclysmic, dark and brooding and in the case of this particular painting, with cats lined up in the foreground, like birds on a fence, exaggeratedly screaming and wailing with open mouths, under a nocturnal sky, with the moon seen in a swirling whirlpool of phantasmagoric colors, creating a menacing and foreboding scene. It's as if the painting gives off a distinct sound. It's estate fresh and new to the marketplace, with the artist's estate liquidated after the artist's death by his surviving family and trustees principally through auction. This 1960 dated, large oil on canvas is titled 'The Red Sky' and is signed by the artist 'Apostle' in the lower right. The original distressed wood frame is raked and has a raised painted interior liner. Absolutely outstanding. Not your 'same old, same old, pedestrian, white bread painting. Alive. Simply incredible. A veritable 'wild child.'
CONDITION:
Very Good to Excellent overall vintage condition.
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