Skip to main content

Ray H. French Art

to
12
14
2
Overall Width
to
Overall Height
to
29
4
11
12
1
14
8
1
15
12
1
9
4
3
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
14
5
4
2
2
29
7,763
4,946
2,504
1,371
1
29
Artist: Ray H. French
The Swan
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
The Swan Etching and soft ground intaglio, 1957 Signed and dated lower right (see photo) Titled and numbered lower left (see photo) From the second edition of 75 impressions, printed...
Category

1950s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Intaglio

Debris
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Debris Etching, engraving and color aquatint, 1947 Signed, dated, titled and number Edition: 25 (1/25), never fully realized Created in the artist's first year studying at the Univer...
Category

Mid-20th Century Abstract Geometric Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving, Etching, Aquatint

Porcupine
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Porcupine Engraving, 1949 Signed and dated lower right (see photo) Titled and numbered lower left (see photo) Created while the artist was completing the MFA in Printmaking at the Un...
Category

1940s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Snowy Egret
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed, dated, and titled in pencil by the artist Dedicated: "To Jon From Ray" Edition: 100 in two printings A studio proof from the second printing by Jon Clemens, master printe...
Category

1950s Abstract Geometric Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Jedermann
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Etching in two colors Signed, dated, titled in pencil by the artist Sheet size: 19 5/8 x 25 3/4"
Category

1950s Ray H. French Art

Materials

Etching

Homage to the Square
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Happy Ray Day! For 1 week, from April 19th, 2017, all Ray H. French works of art on paper will be discounted 19% and 1 lucky random patron will receive a second FREE! Embossed relief print on heavy paper Signed, dated, titled and numbered Edition: 10 (10/10) Provenance: Estate of the artist References And Exhibitions: This work predates Josef Albers serigraph...
Category

1960s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Other Medium

Elephant
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Elephant Engraing, 1957, printed 1988 Signed, dated, and titled in pencil by the artist Dedicated: "For Jon From Ray" Edition: 100 in two printings This is an artist's proof from th...
Category

1950s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Untitled (Seascape at night)
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Untitled (Seascape at night) Tissue paper collage on Fabriano wove paper, 1964 Signed in ink lower left Annotated 42 in pencil on verso Condition: Excellent Image/Sheet size: 10 x 13 7/8 inches Part of a suite of collages created during the artist's sabatical leave from teaching, spent in Florence, Italy, studying at the Accademia D'Arte Firenze in 1963-1964. Ray H. French: The Evolution of an Artistic Innovator Printmaker, painter, and sculptor Ray H. French was born in Terre Haute, Indiana on May 16, 1919. Terre Haute was a cultural wasteland before the opening of the Sheldon Swope Art Museum in 1942. Thus, with a father as a coal miner and carpenter, art remained a luxury for Ray. Nevertheless, local art teachers Mabel Mikel Williams and Nola E. Williams helped to foster his creativity and unshakable drive to create things of beauty. After high school, Ray attended the John Herron School of Art in Indianapolis. His studies there were interrupted by the outbreak of World War II, during which he developed surveillance photographs for the Army Air Force. After the war, Ray transferred to the University of Iowa on the G.I. Bill, where he received both his BFA and MFA degrees. The University of Iowa during the 1940s was a cultural mecca with many major art historians and artists. While in Iowa, Ray played an important role in this culture by becoming a founding member of the Iowa Print Group under Mauricio Lasansky. Following his graduation in 1948, Ray experienced firsthand the rapid rise in creative printmaking in America. By 1949, he had exhibited at The Brooklyn Museum, the Walker Art Center, and MOMA New York. Ray’s early style of printmaking is characterized by pure line engraving on copper plates, a technique suited perfectly to his study of the beauty of animals. This charming and whimsical subject ran counter to the concurrent trends of Lasansky’s horrors of war and Hayter’s non-objectivity, but was equally effective in capturing the public’s attention. Walruses was purchased by the Victoria and Albert Museum, exhibited at MOMA New York and received the Arthur D. Allen Memorial Purchase Prize for its “skillful and economic use of line.” Shortly thereafter, Ray’s treatment of animals developed further into larger format mixed intaglio prints utilizing hard ground, soft ground, etching, and engraving, as exemplified in The Swan. By the late 1950s, Ray’s style evolved into organic non-objectivity, in which he incorporated personal autobiographical vignettes and symbolism. His work during this time was further characterized by a departure from the traditional squared compositional format to his cutting and rounding of the plate to accentuate organic shapes. Ray’s 1959 Enchantment remains particularly illustrative of his use of etching and soft ground intaglio. Enchantment was successfully exhibited at the Brooklyn Museum of Art for the 12th National Print Exhibition of The American Federation of the Arts and received the Pennell Purchase Prize from the Library of Congress in 1960. In the 1960s, Ray also started to focus on blind embossing, which he had first experimented with at the University of Iowa. He was extremely prolific and successful with this medium, selling hundreds of prints in small editions of 10 through the Associated American Artist Gallery in New York. In 1966, Ray built upon his mastery of embossing and began developing a shadow box presentation called a graphic construction that combined color, blind embossing, and multi-layered cutouts to revel intaglio compositions. Noted curator William Lieberman purchased Ray’s masterpiece graphic construction, Moon Rays...
Category

1960s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Tissue Paper

Untitled (Tuscan Landscape)
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Untitled (Tuscan Landscape) Tissue paper collage on Fabriano support Signed and dated lower right in ink Provenance: Estate of the artist Martha A. French Trust Created while the art...
Category

1960s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Mixed Media

Vienna Lipizzaner
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Vienna Lipizzaner Engraving, 1962 Signed and dated lower right (see photo) Titled and numbered lower left (see photo) This impression is from the second edtition printed c. 1992 1st ...
Category

1960s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

The Web
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
The Web Engraving and soft ground, 1950 Signed, titled, dated and numbered by the artist Edition: 35 (26/35) Printed by Master Printer, Jon Clemens, 2000 Provenance: Estate of the ar...
Category

1950s Surrealist Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving, Etching

Strange Animals
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Strange Animals Engraving, 1949 Signed, dated, and titled in pencil by the artist The composition was created at the Univerisity of Iowa while the artist was enrolled in the famous M...
Category

1940s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Walruses
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Walruses Engraving, 1952 Signed, dated, titled and numbered (see photos) Edition: 100, this from the second printing with the artist's initials in an edition of 25 (16/25) Condition:...
Category

1950s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Aardvark
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Aardvark Engraving, 1951 Signed, dated, titled in pencil by the artist (see photo) Annotated "To Jon from Ray" (see photo) Printed by Jon Clemens, Master Printer, c. 1990 Condition: ...
Category

1950s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Crucifixion
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Crucifixion Engraving, etching, and ground printed in colors, 1947 Signed, titled and numbered in pencil (see photos) From the second printing by Jon Clemens, master printer in the 1990's Done while the artist was at the Iowa Print Group, MFA Program, University of Iowa . Condition: excellent Image/Plate size: 15 3/4 x 15 3/4 inches Provenance: Estate of the artist Printmaker, painter, and sculptor Ray H...
Category

1940s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Strange Animals
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Strange Animals Engraving, 1949 Signed, dated, and titled in pencil by the artist The composition was created at the Univerisity of Iowa while the artist was enrolled in the famous M...
Category

1940s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Three Graces
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Three Graces Pentel marker on paper, 1965 Signed and dated by the artist lower left (see photo) Part of a series of 100 drawings, this number 97 (annotated lower right corner) Condition: Excellent Sheet/Image size: 20 x 15 inches Provenance: Estate of the Artist Martha A. French Trust Ray H. French: The Evolution of an Artistic Innovator Printmaker, painter, and sculptor Ray H. French was born in Terre Haute, Indiana on May 16, 1919. Terre Haute was a cultural wasteland before the opening of the Sheldon Swope Art Museum in 1942. Thus, with a father as a coal miner and carpenter, art remained a luxury for Ray. Nevertheless, local art teachers Mabel Mikel Williams and Nola E. Williams helped to foster his creativity and unshakable drive to create things of beauty. After high school, Ray attended the John Herron School of Art in Indianapolis. His studies there were interrupted by the outbreak of World War II, during which he developed surveillance photographs for the Army Air Force. After the war, Ray transferred to the University of Iowa on the G.I. Bill, where he received both his BFA and MFA degrees. The University of Iowa during the 1940s was a cultural mecca with many major art historians and artists. While in Iowa, Ray played an important role in this culture by becoming a founding member of the Iowa Print...
Category

1960s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Permanent Marker

Survivor
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed , dated and titled in pencil by the artist Artist proof from the second printing by Jon Clemens Annotated "To Jon from Ray"
Category

1980s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Etching

The Gull
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed, dated, titled in pencil by the artist; Annotated "To Jon from Ray" Reproduced in the artists Retrospective Exhibition catalogue. In the collection of the Wichita Art...
Category

1950s Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Untitled
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed and dated lower left Created in 1964 while the artist was living in Florence, Italy Collage with tissue paper and printed images and text From the Estate of the Artist
Category

1960s Abstract Expressionist Ray H. French Art

Materials

Mixed Media

Crucifixion
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Crucifixion Engraving, 1958 Signed, dated, titled, and annotated 'Printers Proof II' in pencil A printed by Master Printer Jon Clemens, c. 2000 A brilliant impression full of burr Im...
Category

1950s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Untitled
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed and dated "1962" by the artist lower right. Mixed media on heavy paper. Done for a show to fund a trip to Italy.
Category

1960s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Ink, Mixed Media

Enchantment
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed, dated, titled, and annotated 'Printers Proof' in pencil References And Exhibitions: Printed by the master printer John Clemmens. Exhibited by the Brooklyn Museum in ...
Category

1950s Ray H. French Art

Untitled (Abstraction)
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed and dated by the artist vertically lower left edge. Part of an experimental series of works using motor oil, India Ink, adhesives, sand, and various other mediums.
Category

1960s Ray H. French Art

Seascape at Sunset
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Seascape at Sunset Collage with tissue paper and gold foil on Fabriano paper, 1964 Signed and dated in ink, lower right (see photo) Provenance: Estate of the artist Martha A. French...
Category

1960s Ray H. French Art

Materials

Mixed Media

Olympian Games
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Olympian Games Engraving, 1957 Signed, dated, titled and numbered (see photos) Edition: 25 (7/25) From the first and only edition, probably less than 8 impressions printed Printed by the artist Condition: Excellent soft fold in upper left margin Image size: 15 7/8 x 19 7/8 inches Sheet size: 18 1/2 x 22 3/8 inches Provenance: Estate of the artist Martha A. French Revocable Trust Item Reference LU14013763732 Crucifixion, color etching, 1947 Item Reference LU14013160582 The Web, engraving, 1950 Item Reference LU14011892032 The Swan, mixed media (etching & soft ground), 1957 Item Reference LU1404294651 Snowy Egret, engraving, 1954, third edition c. 1990, printed by the master printer Jon Clemens Item Reference LU1402253433 Debris, color etching, c. 1940, printed by the artist at the John Herron Art Institute, Indianapolis, Indiana Item Reference LU140331242 Crucifixion, engraving, 1958 Item Reference LU140145330 Strange Animals, engraving, 1947 Item Reference G130708140172 The Gull, engraving, 1955 Item Reference LU14012448972 Moon Rays...
Category

1950s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

La grande incognita (The great unknown)
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
La grande incognita (The great unknown) Collage elements with paint, paint and paper foil, 1964 1964 Created while the artist was studying at the Accademia d'Arte, Florence Signed an...
Category

1960s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Mixed Media

Moon Rays
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Moon Rays Graphic Construction (three sheets layered in a shadow box presentation), 1967 Signed lower right. Editioned lower left. (see photos) Edition: 60 f...
Category

1960s Op Art Ray H. French Art

Materials

Other Medium

Sea Forms
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed and dated center right edge; Annotated "48" lower left Provenance: Estate of the artist One of a suite of 120 drawings that the artist did in 1 month. Most were sold thro...
Category

1960s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Ink, Pen

Related Items
Original Signed 1970s Blue Birds Colored Lithograph - Mid Century Modern Artwork
Located in Denver, CO
This vintage original lithograph by renowned artist Mary Chenoweth features an abstract depiction of birds in flight, showcasing her unique technique of layering various textures of ...
Category

1970s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Original 1942 Pour L'An II COMPAGNONS Rooster vintage French poster
Located in Spokane, WA
Professionally archival linen-backed vintage French poster: pour L'An II COMPAGONS Tous Unis Celebrons, Notre Pain, Notre Sang, Notre Terre. This full lithograph antique poster fe...
Category

1940s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Joan Miro
By Joan Miró
Located in Washington, DC
Artist: Joan Miro Title: Joan Miro Medium: Lithograph in colors Date: 1974 Edition: Unnumbered Frame Size: 15 1/8" x 22 3/4" Sheet Size: 7 7/8" x 15 1/2" Signature: Signed in the pla...
Category

1970s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Joan Miro
Joan Miro
H 15.125 in W 22.75 in
Joan Miro (Plate 3)
By Joan Miró
Located in Washington, DC
Artist: Joan Miro Title: Joan Miro (Plate 3) Portfolio: Joan Miro Medium: Original lithograph Year: 1956 Edition: Unnumbered Framed Size: 16 1/4" x 22 1/4" Sheet Size: 9" x 15" Signa...
Category

1950s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Joan Miro
By Joan Miró
Located in Washington, DC
Artist: Joan Miro Title: Joan Miro Medium: Lithograph in colors Date: 1975 Edition: Unnumbered Frame Size: 15 1/8" x 22 3/4" Sheet Size: 7 7/8" x 15 1/2" Signature: Signed in the pla...
Category

1970s Abstract Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Joan Miro
Joan Miro
H 15.125 in W 22.75 in
Alexander Calder Circus Reproduction Lithograph After a Drawing
By (after) Alexander Calder
Located in Surfside, FL
(after) Alexander Calder "Calder's Circus" offset lithograph on wove paper after drawings by the artist Published by Art in America and Perls gallery in 1964 (from drawings done in the 1930's) these range slightly in size but they are all about 13 X 17 inches (with minor variations in size as issued.) These have never been framed. The outer folio is not included just the one lithograph. James Sweeny from the introduction “The fame of Calder’s circus spread quickly between the years 1927 and 1930. All the Paris art world came to know it. It brought him his first great personal success. But what was more important, the circus also provided the first steps in Calder’s development as an original sculptor” Clive Gray wrote ”A visit to the studio of Alexander Calder led to the chance discovery of some hundred masterful circus drawings completed over thirty years ago. We publish, for the first time, a choice of sixteen from that group.” With signed introduction by Miro. These whimsical drawings, done in the style of wire sculpture, include acrobats, clowns, jugglers, trapeeze artists, an elephant, dog and lion. they are great. Alexander Calder is widely considered to be one of the most important American sculptors of the 20th century. He is best known for his colorful, whimsical abstract public sculptures and his innovative mobiles, kinetic sculptures powered by motors or air currents, which embraced chance in their aesthetic. Born into a family of accomplished artists, Calder's work first gained attention in Paris in the 1930s and was soon championed by the Museum of Modern Art in New York, resulting in a retrospective exhibition in 1943. Major retrospectives were also held at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (1964) and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (1974). Calder’s work is in many permanent collections, most notably in the Whitney Museum of American Art, but also the Guggenheim Museum; the Museum of Modern Art; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; and the Centre Georges Pompidou. He produced many large public works, including .125 (at JFK Airport, 1957), Pittsburgh (Carnegie International prize winner 1958, Pittsburgh International Airport) Spirale (UNESCO in Paris, 1958), Flamingo and Universe (both in Chicago, 1974), and Mountains and Clouds (Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C., 1976). Although primarily known for his sculpture, Calder was a prodigious artist with a restless creative spirit, whose diverse practice included painting and printmaking, miniatures (such as his famous Cirque Calder), children’s book illustrations, theater set design, jewelry design, tapestry and rug works, and political posters. Calder was honored by the US Postal Service with a set of five 32-cent stamps in 1998, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, posthumously in 1977, after refusing to receive it from Gerald Ford one year earlier in protest of the Vietnam War. Calder moved to New York and enrolled at the Art Students League, studying briefly with Thomas Hart Benton, George Luks, Kenneth Hayes Miller, and John Sloan. While a student, he worked for the National Police Gazette where, in 1925, one of his assignments was sketching the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Calder became fascinated with the action of the circus, a theme that would reappear in his later work. In 1926, Calder moved to Paris, enrolled in the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, and established a studio at 22 rue Daguerre in the Montparnasse Quarter. In June 1929, while traveling by boat from Paris to New York, Calder met his future wife, Louisa James (1905-1996), grandniece of author Henry James and philosopher William James. They married in 1931. While in Paris, Calder met and became friends with a number of avant-garde artists, including Fernand Léger, Jean Arp, and Marcel Duchamp. Cirque Calder (on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art at present) became popular with the Parisian avant-garde. He also invented wire sculpture, or "drawing in space," and in 1929 he had his first solo show of these sculptures in Paris at Galerie Billiet. Hi! (Two Acrobats) in the collection of the Honolulu Museum of Art is an early example of the artist's wire sculpture. The painter Jules Pascin, a friend of Calder's from the cafes of Montparnasse, wrote the preface to the catalog. A visit to Piet Mondrian's studio in 1930, where he was impressed by the environment-as-installation, "shocked" him into fully embracing abstract art, toward which he had already been tending. Dating from 1931, Calder’s sculptures of discrete movable parts powered by motors were christened “mobiles” by Marcel Duchamp, a French pun meaning both "motion" and "motive." At the same time, Calder was also experimenting with self-supporting, static, abstract sculptures, dubbed "stabiles" by Jean Arp in 1932 to differentiate them from mobiles. Public commissions increasingly came his way in the 1960s. Notable examples are .125 for JFK Airport in 1957, Spirale for UNESCO in Paris 1958 and Trois disques, commissioned for Expo 67 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Calder's largest sculpture at 25.7 meters high was El Sol Rojo, constructed outside the Aztec Stadium for the 1968 Summer Olympics "Cultural Olympiad" events in Mexico City. Many of his public works were commissioned by renowned architects; I.M. Pei commissioned his La Grande Voile (1966), a 25-ton, 40-foot high stabile for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Part of Calder's repertoire includes pivotal stage sets for more than a dozen theatrical productions, including Nucléa, Horizon, and most notably, Martha Graham’s Panorama (1935), a production of the Erik Satie symphonic drama Socrate (1936), and later, Works in Progress (1968). In addition to sculptures, Calder painted throughout his career, beginning in the early 1920s. He picked up his study of printmaking in 1925, and continued to produce illustrations for books and journals.As Calder’s professional reputation expanded in the late 1940s and 1950s, so did his production of prints. Masses of lithographs based on his gouache paintings hit the market, and deluxe editions of plays, poems, and short stories illustrated with fine art prints by Calder became available for sale. One of Calder's most celebrated and unconventional undertakings was a commission from Dallas-based Braniff International Airways to paint a full-size Douglas DC-8-62 four-engined jet as a "flying canvas." Calder created over 2,000 pieces of jewelry over the course of his career, many of them as gifts for friends and relatives. For his lifelong friend Joan Miró, he set a shard of a broken porcelain vessel in a brass ring. Peggy Guggenheim received enormous silver mobile earrings and later commissioned a hammered silver headboard...
Category

1930s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Conquest of Cosmos The Last Comer of The Last Planet
By Salvador Dalí­
Located in Hollywood, FL
ARTIST: Salvador Dali TITLE: Conquest of Cosmos The Last Comer of The Last Planet MEDIUM: Etching SIGNED: Hand Signed EDITION NUMBER: EA MEASUREMENTS: 27.5" x 39.5" YEAR: 1974...
Category

1970s Surrealist Ray H. French Art

Materials

Etching

Original "Keep Him Free, Buy War Savings Stamps" excellent vintage WW1 poster
Located in Spokane, WA
Original WW1 US propaganda poster designed by Charles Livingston Bull (1874-1932) and entitled “Keep Him Free Buy War Savings Stamps”. This poster was issued to promote the US Treasu...
Category

1910s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Three Birds Flying - Original Lithograph (Mourlot #82)
By Georges Braque
Located in Paris, IDF
Georges BRAQUE (1882-1963) Composition with Birds, 1965 Original lithograph (Mourlot workshop) Signed in the plate On vellum 30 x 24 cm (c. 11.8 x 9.4 in) REFERENCES : - Catalog r...
Category

1960s Abstract Geometric Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Alexander Calder Circus Reproduction Lithograph After a Drawing
By (after) Alexander Calder
Located in Surfside, FL
(after) Alexander Calder "Calder's Circus" offset lithograph on wove paper after drawings by the artist Published by Art in America and Perls gallery in 1964 (from drawings done in the 1930's) these range slightly in size but they are all about 13 X 17 inches (with minor variations in size as issued.) These have never been framed. The outer folio is not included just the one lithograph. James Sweeny from the introduction “The fame of Calder’s circus spread quickly between the years 1927 and 1930. All the Paris art world came to know it. It brought him his first great personal success. But what was more important, the circus also provided the first steps in Calder’s development as an original sculptor” Clive Gray wrote ”A visit to the studio of Alexander Calder led to the chance discovery of some hundred masterful circus drawings completed over thirty years ago. We publish, for the first time, a choice of sixteen from that group.” With signed introduction by Miro. These whimsical drawings, done in the style of wire sculpture, include acrobats, clowns, jugglers, trapeeze artists, an elephant, dog and lion. they are great. Alexander Calder is widely considered to be one of the most important American sculptors of the 20th century. He is best known for his colorful, whimsical abstract public sculptures and his innovative mobiles, kinetic sculptures powered by motors or air currents, which embraced chance in their aesthetic. Born into a family of accomplished artists, Calder's work first gained attention in Paris in the 1930s and was soon championed by the Museum of Modern Art in New York, resulting in a retrospective exhibition in 1943. Major retrospectives were also held at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (1964) and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (1974). Calder’s work is in many permanent collections, most notably in the Whitney Museum of American Art, but also the Guggenheim Museum; the Museum of Modern Art; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; and the Centre Georges Pompidou. He produced many large public works, including .125 (at JFK Airport, 1957), Pittsburgh (Carnegie International prize winner 1958, Pittsburgh International Airport) Spirale (UNESCO in Paris, 1958), Flamingo and Universe (both in Chicago, 1974), and Mountains and Clouds (Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C., 1976). Although primarily known for his sculpture, Calder was a prodigious artist with a restless creative spirit, whose diverse practice included painting and printmaking, miniatures (such as his famous Cirque Calder), children’s book illustrations, theater set design, jewelry design, tapestry and rug works, and political posters. Calder was honored by the US Postal Service with a set of five 32-cent stamps in 1998, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, posthumously in 1977, after refusing to receive it from Gerald Ford one year earlier in protest of the Vietnam War. Calder moved to New York and enrolled at the Art Students League, studying briefly with Thomas Hart Benton, George Luks, Kenneth Hayes Miller, and John Sloan. While a student, he worked for the National Police Gazette where, in 1925, one of his assignments was sketching the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Calder became fascinated with the action of the circus, a theme that would reappear in his later work. In 1926, Calder moved to Paris, enrolled in the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, and established a studio at 22 rue Daguerre in the Montparnasse Quarter. In June 1929, while traveling by boat from Paris to New York, Calder met his future wife, Louisa James (1905-1996), grandniece of author Henry James and philosopher William James. They married in 1931. While in Paris, Calder met and became friends with a number of avant-garde artists, including Fernand Léger, Jean Arp, and Marcel Duchamp. Cirque Calder (on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art at present) became popular with the Parisian avant-garde. He also invented wire sculpture, or "drawing in space," and in 1929 he had his first solo show of these sculptures in Paris at Galerie Billiet. Hi! (Two Acrobats) in the collection of the Honolulu Museum of Art is an early example of the artist's wire sculpture. The painter Jules Pascin, a friend of Calder's from the cafes of Montparnasse, wrote the preface to the catalog. A visit to Piet Mondrian's studio in 1930, where he was impressed by the environment-as-installation, "shocked" him into fully embracing abstract art, toward which he had already been tending. Dating from 1931, Calder’s sculptures of discrete movable parts powered by motors were christened “mobiles” by Marcel Duchamp, a French pun meaning both "motion" and "motive." At the same time, Calder was also experimenting with self-supporting, static, abstract sculptures, dubbed "stabiles" by Jean Arp in 1932 to differentiate them from mobiles. Public commissions increasingly came his way in the 1960s. Notable examples are .125 for JFK Airport in 1957, Spirale for UNESCO in Paris 1958 and Trois disques, commissioned for Expo 67 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Calder's largest sculpture at 25.7 meters high was El Sol Rojo, constructed outside the Aztec Stadium for the 1968 Summer Olympics "Cultural Olympiad" events in Mexico City. Many of his public works were commissioned by renowned architects; I.M. Pei commissioned his La Grande Voile (1966), a 25-ton, 40-foot high stabile for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Part of Calder's repertoire includes pivotal stage sets for more than a dozen theatrical productions, including Nucléa, Horizon, and most notably, Martha Graham’s Panorama (1935), a production of the Erik Satie symphonic drama Socrate (1936), and later, Works in Progress (1968). In addition to sculptures, Calder painted throughout his career, beginning in the early 1920s. He picked up his study of printmaking in 1925, and continued to produce illustrations for books and journals.As Calder’s professional reputation expanded in the late 1940s and 1950s, so did his production of prints. Masses of lithographs based on his gouache paintings hit the market, and deluxe editions of plays, poems, and short stories illustrated with fine art prints by Calder became available for sale. One of Calder's most celebrated and unconventional undertakings was a commission from Dallas-based Braniff International Airways to paint a full-size Douglas DC-8-62 four-engined jet as a "flying canvas." Calder created over 2,000 pieces of jewelry over the course of his career, many of them as gifts for friends and relatives. For his lifelong friend Joan Miró, he set a shard of a broken porcelain vessel in a brass ring. Peggy Guggenheim received enormous silver mobile earrings and later commissioned a hammered silver headboard...
Category

1930s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Original Coppertone suntan lotion vintage poster - Italian
Located in Spokane, WA
Original “Coppertone” Colore di Rame vintage Italian poster. Colore de Rame translates into the color of copper. Abbronzatevi! (suntan) Non bruciatevi! (don’t burn) Archival linen-backed in fine condition, ready to frame. This original Coppertone poster is in A condition. The background in the poster is a brighter yellow; after all, it is a sunny day, and you need suntan lotion! Coppertone is an American suntan cream. Interestingly, the American poster of this famous little girl and dog...
Category

1960s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Offset

Nebraska Evening
By Thomas Hart Benton
Located in London, GB
A fine impression with good margins published by Associated American Artists.
Category

1940s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Lithograph

Previously Available Items
Louisiana Heron
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Louisiana Heron Engraving, 1953 Signed lower right corner in pencil (see photo) Titled and numbered in the lower left corner (see photo) Second edition...
Category

1950s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Engraving

Crucifixion
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed dated and titled in pencil by the artist; Annotated "printers proof" in pencil. From the Estate of the Artist Sheet: 23 1/8 x 19" Image: 15 3/4 x 15 1/2"
Category

1940s American Modern Ray H. French Art

Materials

Etching

Crucifixion
H 23.18 in W 19 in
Untitled (Tuscan Landscape)
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed and dated lower right in ink Provenance: Estate of the artist References And Exhibitions: Created while the artist lived in Florence, Italy. Tissue paper collage...
Category

1960s Ray H. French Art

Materials

Mixed Media

Intrigue
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed, dated, and titled in pencil by the artist Edition: 100 in two printings; This impression an artist's proof from the second printing by Jon Clemens, master printer. Sheet: ...
Category

1950s Ray H. French Art

The Swan
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed, dated, titled in pencil by the artist; Annotated "To Jon from Ray" Edition: Studio Proof
Category

1950s Ray H. French Art

Materials

Etching

The Swan
H 22.75 in W 25.625 in
Enchantment
By Ray H. French
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Signed, dated, titled, and annotated 'Printers Proof' in pencil Printed by the master printer John Clemmens. Exhibited by the Brooklyn Museum in 1960. Received the 1960 Pennell Pu...
Category

1950s Ray H. French Art

Ray H. French art for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Ray H. French art available for sale on 1stDibs. If you’re browsing the collection of art to introduce a pop of color in a neutral corner of your living room or bedroom, you can find work that includes elements of blue, red and other colors. You can also browse by medium to find art by Ray H. French in engraving, mixed media, etching and more. Much of the original work by this artist or collective was created during the 20th century and is mostly associated with the abstract style. Not every interior allows for large Ray H. French art, so small editions measuring 8 inches across are available. Customers who are interested in this artist might also find the work of Casey Haugh, Peter Halley, and Linda Whittemore. Ray H. French art prices can differ depending upon medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $300 and tops out at $4,500, while the average work can sell for $1,750.

Artists Similar to Ray H. French

Recently Viewed

View All