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TOMMI PARZINGER  (1903-1981)  Germany/USA

WILLIAM STARK / KARL DRERUP Enamel

PETER REIMES Silversmith

Sterling and enamel  pedestal centerpiece bowl on an
attached square base with a frog, lily pad and fish motif as part of the
overall enamel design c. 1938

Marks: RP (for Peter Reimes), Parzinger, STERLING

H: 6 3/4″ (including pedestal) x Dia: 8 1/2″

MICHELE OKA DONER  (b. 1945)  USA

Terrible Chair (unique) 1981

Gilded bronze

Illustrated: Michele Oka Doner, Natural Seduction, S. Ramljak, M. Lapidus, A. C. Danto (New York: Hudson Hills Press, 2003), p. 85

H: 31 ½” x  W: 15”  x  D: 17 ½”

Excerpt from “The Furniture of the Universe” by Arthur C. Danto in Michele Oka Doner: Natural Seduction (New York: Hudson Hill Press) 2003 p. 30

The Terrible Chair

What drew me initially to the work of Michele Oka Doner was the way it acknowledges the rhetoric of sitting and the metaphorical language of furniture and, most particularly, of the chair. Consider, for examples, the work she calls Terrible Chair which a distant affinity to Adirondack furniture as it is cast from a prototype fashioned out of branches. The Adirondack chair itself refers more directly to the forest; it is made of branches and looks as If nothing more than an axe or a hunting knife were needed to construct it.  It proclaims the skill of the woodsman prevailing over the forest by seeing it in terms of opportunities for survival rather than representing threats and dangers. The Adirondack chair is a domesticated tree, a bower and as much a testament to the superior power of the seated as a chair with clawed or hoofed legs, in which we sit as master over beasts. The proper habit for it is the hunting lodge, with bearskin rugs suitably prone on the look or the long veranda of a mountain chalet.

Terrible Chair is made of thorned branches, which have a certain menacing beauty but no real use unless to fashion a mocking crown. Oka Doner is drawn to natural objects; they are her models and her motifs, the source of her metaphors. She saw a thorny branch that she found on a neighbor’s property a clear challenge: “The way the thorns were arranged was exquisite,” she recalled. But those same thorns were too threatening to invite physical approach. A thorned plant has an evolutionary advantage because it refuses to yield to human use. This was an irresistible dare to an artist bent on turning the natural into the meaningful.
Terrible Chair is a victory; it defines what it means to be an artist in Oka Doner’s conception of that role. It is equally a victory for the thorns because the utility promised by the chair they form remains unavailable to sitters: the thorned sticks are available only as art but not for use. The radical unusability of the work constitutes a draw in the match with nature, and the bronze in which it is cast forms a suitable monument to that context. Terrible Chair enshrines an objective contradiction.

Nonetheless, the components of the Terrible Chair are combined to form a chair, but because there is no seat, no one would know how to use it in a conventional way. There have been treacherous chairs that have concealed their treachery, subverted the confidence shown in the act of sitting—chairs that collapse beneath their users, The Marquis de Sade offered chairs to female sitters that rotated them through an abrupt arch onto their backs and into a position of sexual accessibility from vertical dignity to horizontal vulnerability. By contrast, no one is tempted to sit on a Terrible Chair so dignity is at least not put in threat. So what is its meaning? In its outward inhospitality, the work says, in effect, “This chair is not for sitting.” It has to have the form of a chair to deliver this message. It excludes the chair from use as if to underscore the message, it excludes the chair from use as if to deliver the truth that chairs count in the game of meanings, transmitting auras to their occupants. It acquires a fairy tale inaccessibility like the glass slipper in Cinderella into which only the tiny foot of a natural princess can slip. Terrible Chair— a name, the artist told me, her two sons helped select—promises to transform whoever claims it.  But clearly we are not its intended occupants. So it stands as a reminder of the higher meanings of chair to those who may have relegated them to the drab language of utility. Through its thorny point, brandished like the spikes on medieval armor, Terrible Chair transfers itself the power that sitting in it would confer.

I think of Terrible Chair as Oka Doner signature work, transmitting the message through its sharp spins that although she makes chairs, she is no a designer but an artist. And though the chair is part of the domestic lexicon, her project is to bring meaning rather than comfort. Should her work provide comfort, it is an incidental by-product of a class that acknowledges human needs but transform their satisfaction into symbolic acts and cosmic endorsements. Gesturing toward the spiky, spiny objects that furnish her tremendous loft—transfigurations of natural forms cast in various metals that carry their own system of meanings—Oka Doner draws attention to the fact that nothing here is upholstered. She likes the hard, the skeletal, the pronged and edgy armature of carapace, the natural scaffoldings t hat give shape and structure to the vulnerabilities of living things. It is the inner architectures whose natural powers we acquires as our own when we use those forms as evocations and signs , in the manner in which peoples who live close to nature use teeth, their claws, the furs and the feathers of wild animals as talismans of great power. Her furniture consists of so many apertures through which the cosmos enters the space of domestic life, transforming a utilitarian object into something that transcends that use and transforms the user into a participants in a celestial trial. Her aim, she confides, is to ritualize ordinary life. And this is an artistic practice far more deeply connected with the meaning than making things to hang on walls or stand in corners simply for visual delectation.

MICHELE OKA DONER  (b. 1945) New York, NY

Michele Oka Doner is an internationally acclaimed New York-based artist and designer whose work translates natural forms–plant fronds, berries, shells, and life observed beneath the lens of the microscope–into objects of extraordinary power and seduction rendered in bronze, precious metals and stones, concrete handmade papers, ceramic, and now, glass. Since first appearing on the national scene in 1970 as the youngest artist showcased in the defining landmark museum exhibition Objects USA. Oka Doner has built a career encompassing monumental sculptures, public art, jewelry, and functional objects that range from fireplace tools to evening bags.
Oka Doner was born in Miami Beach in 1945. Though she received her formal education and advanced degrees at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, the artist has always cited as her primary laboratory the turbulent natural treasures of Southern Florida’s oceans, tidal pools, beaches, gardens and tropical forests–boundless living resource libraries she visits on a monthly basis to gaze upon and gather samples that later inspire pieces of every size and type. Oka Doner has said that she strives with her work to “play the role of the translator and editor of life forces creating objects that go far beyond static formal beauty to encourage contemplation and wonder.” Informed by her ongoing research into scientific literature and poetry, as well as her expeditions in the natural world, Oka Doner uses the tools of physical expression to invite us along on her wanderings through the realm of the infinite.
Oka Doner is also admired for her numerous site-specific, permanent public art commissions including such projects as the golden tiled Radiant Site at New York’s Herald Square Subway Station (1990) and A Walk on the Beach, a half-mile long expanse of terrazzo and bronze floor continually unfolding at Concourse A of Miami International Airport (1995 to present). Oka Doner’s sculptures and functional objects are included in many prestigous private and public collections, including those of The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York City, the Art of Institute of Chicago and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, among others. She has participated in scores of distinguished exhibitions internationally and has been recipient of numerous grants and awards, including honors from the Kress Foundation and the New York State Council for the Arts. In 2004 she received the coveted Award of Excellence from the United Nations Society of Writers and Artists.

RAYMOND BARGER (1906-2001) USA

Sculpture c. 1955

Polychrome contoured wood of interlocking circular forms in white, blue and pink on a bronze base.

Signed: RB (artist initials), USA, Z0I

H: 8 1/2” x L: 12 ¾” x D: 8

Price: $5,800

Raymond Granville Barger was a sculptor working in metal, plastelin, and bronze among other materials. Barger was educated at Carnegie Institute of Technology and Yale University School of Fine Art. He received a Winchester Fellowship from Yale, and a special fellowship from the American Academy in Rome. Barger moved to California, where he died in 2001.

ALEXANDER LIBERMAN (1912-1999) USA

MEYER SCHAPIRO PORTFOLIO 1974

Untitled 1973

Silkscreen, patinated bronze frame
Signed: A. Liberman 1973, Artist’s proof, 2RC (embossed on paper)

Canvas: H: 33” x W: 25 1/2”

Frame: H: 42 1/2” x W 33 1/2”

Portfolio of 12 works, Edition of 100

Price: $

Alexander Liberman’s family left the Soviet Union for London as exiles in 1921.  Liberman studied there briefly before moving to Paris where he undertook philosophy and mathematics at the Sorbonne and architecture at the École des Beaux-Arts. In the 1930s Liberman designed stage sets, and worked on the staff of Vu, the first magazine illustrated with photographs.  Although Liberman quickly earned the title of managing director, he left the magazine in 1936, and devoted himself to painting and writing.  In 1941, he left Paris for New York. Again, he became involved in publishing after gaining employment at Vogue magazine. Twenty years later, in 1962, he became Editorial Director of all Condé Nast Publications, a position he held until he retired in 1994. During his time at Vogue, Liberman introduced 20th-century art to readers by using it as a backdrop for fashion shoots, as well as by profiling living artists in the magazine.  As a painter, Liberman exhibited geometric circle paintings in galleries and museums around New York in the 1950s.  Liberman also had an interest in sculpture, and began welding steel into public works in the late 1950s.  These monochrome geometric sculptures are featured in over 40 cities worldwide.

ANDREE FLAMANT-DUCANY-GIDE (1882-1970) France
VALSUANI FONDEUR (1899-1981) Paris, France

Cubist mask sculpture  20th Century

Cast bronze with rich brown-black patina (possibly cast at a later date by the Valsuani Foundry)

Marks: G. Flamant, 2/8 C. Valsuani Cire Perdue (signed on chin)

H: 11” x W: 7” x D: 5 ½”;
On stand: H: 18 ½”

Price: $35,000

ANDREE FLAMANT-DUCANY-GIDE
Flamant-Gide was born in Nimes, France on January 2nd, 1892 and died on March 28th 1970.  She was both a painter and sculptor and exhibited regularly at the Salon des Artists Francais beginning in 1923. She sculpted in an angular Cubist style influenced by African Art and was a fellow artist of Joseph Csaky, Gustave Miklos, Jacques Lipchitz and Henri Laurens who were considered the leading Art Deco sculptors in Paris during the 1920’s.

CUBISM

Cubism drew its influence from: Cezanne’s structural analysis in his oil landscapes, e.g. ‘La Montagne Sainte Victorie’ c.1887; Gauguin’s figurative landscapes, e.g. ‘Haymaking’ 1889; and African tribal Art such as Gabon masks. European artists were greatly influenced by African and Oceanic Art during the late 1890s and early 1900s. African sculpture, with its bold shapes and lines, had a great impact on the development of Cubism. Maurice de Vlaminck became a keen admirer and collector of African masks after seeing them in a Paris anthropological museum. He purchased similar masks and his excitement for these works displaying bold primitive expressions and simplistic design filtered through to Matisse, Derain, Gris and Picasso, who all became collectors as well. By the 1920s African art exhibitions were common in Paris and other cities throughout Europe.
Cubist sculpture brought the simplified shapes of Cubist painting together with the three-dimensional modeling medium of sculpture. The first Cubist sculpture, which could be properly deemed as such was made by Picasso in 1909 and was titled ‘Head of a Woman’. However Picasso did experiment with sculptural forms as early as 1907 when he found himself fascinated and deeply influenced by African masks. Cubist sculpture was mostly reminiscent of Analytical Cubism in its stripping away of illusionist details to reveal the fundamental form contained in each individual subject, be it human or still-life.

VALSUANI FOUNDRY
The Valsuani foundry was started by the brothers Claude and Attilio Valsuani who learned the foundry trade while employed at the Hebrard foundry.  While working for Hebrard, Claude Valsuani showed great promise as a finisher and eventually worked his way up to become the Technical Director of the Hebrard foundry. In 1899 Claude Valsuani started his own foundry in Chatillon, casting mostly small works for various artists primarily using the lost wax technique of casting (cire perdue). In 1905 he moved his foundry to 74 Rue des Plantes in Paris. Among the famous sculptors who had the Valsuani foundry cast their works were: Renoir, Picasso, Despiau, Paul Troubetzkoy, Matisse, and Gaugin. Claude Valsuani died in 1923 in his native Italy but his son, Marcele then took over the foundry and continued the tradition of producing extremely fine bronzes until the 1970’s.

ROGER GEORGES ANDRÈ DUVAL (1901-?) Meudon (Seine-et-Oise), France

La Chambré 1924

Oil on canvas

Signed and dated: ROGER DUVAL XXIV(lower left)

Exhbited: Paris, Salon des Indépendants, 1926, no. 1122

For more information see: Dictionnaire des Peintres, Sculpteurs, Dessinateurs et Graveurs, Vol. 4, E. Bénézit (Paris: Librairie Gründ, 1976).

Painting: H: 23 2/3” x W: 36 1/5”

Framed: H: 35” x 47 5/8”

Roger Duval painted in a modernist figurative style and beginning in 1920 regularly exhibited at the Salon d’Automne and the Salon des Indépendants in Paris. In 1925 he was awarded a prize by Paul Poiret for a painting entitled Conversation and again in 1926 for another painting entitled Bal Musette. Also in 1926, La Chambrée (1924) was exhibited in Paris at the Salon des Indépendants. By 1928 Duval’s technique had evolved into a moderninst/cubist style and a group of his paintings were featured in an Exposition of Painting and Sculpture in Boston, MA.

 It is interesting to note Duval’s shared vision with Picasso in their depiction of peasant figures in repose. Their full-bodied, voluptuous and sensual forms illustrate both artists’ sculptural approach to painting in the early 1920s. However by the mid-1920s Duval and Picasso’s painting styles evolved from these softer, rounded shapes into more angular, abstracted forms.

ROTISLAW RACOFF (1904 – 1982)  Russia

The Rose  1953

Oil on panel, Dutch style ebonized frame

Signed: Racoff ’53 (lower left), R. Racoff Paris 1953, 64 (on back of frame), Far Gallery, 746 Madison Avenue, New York, Regent for 4-7287 (paper label)

Painting: H: 16 1/8”  x W: 7 5/8”
Framed: H: 20 3/4″ x D: 12 1/4″

Other works by Rotislaw Racoff are in the permanent collection of the Fondation Dina Viemy – Musée Maillol in Paris

CHRISTOPHER DRESSER (1834-1904) UK
MINTON, Stoke-on-Trent, England

“Cloisonné” vase 1867

Glazed porcelain with polychrome enamel decoration and gilding

Marks: MINTON, date cipher for 1867

Illustration: Truth, Beauty, Power: Dr. Christopher Dresser 1834-1904, exhibition catalogue, Historical Design, Inc. (New York, 1998) p. 78.

H: 9 7/8”

CHRISTOPHER DRESSER  (1834-1904)  UK
LINTHORPE ART POTTERY, Middlesbrough
HENRY TOOTH Artistic Manager Linthorpe (1842-1918) UK

“Gourd Vase”   1879-1882

Glazed Earthenware

***Extremely rare Dresser / Linthorpe model.

Marked: LINTHORPE, Chr. Dresser (facsimile signature) HT, no. 326

Illustrated:  Christopher Dresser: Truth, Beauty, Power exh. cat. (New York: Historical Design, 1998) p.75; illustrated in two drawings for gourd vases in Dresser’s 1881 design and account book under heading “Aug. 29, 1881. Sent to J. Harrison Esq. 41 Designs for Linthorpe.”

H: 7 3/4″

The contrasts in Dresser’s designs for different materials showed how his approach to design was also shaped by the properties and nature of a material. In 1879 Dresser was appointed art director at the newly established Linthorpe pottery, near Middlesbrough. Founded by John Harrison, a local businessman, the pottery’s aim was to use local clay to provide jobs for local men. Dresser’s design for the moulds for the pottery were inspired by a wide range of cultures from Japan, Peru, Mexico, Morocco and Ancient British forms. These very striking pieces, with the metal oxides in the complex and innovative glazes providing the only decoration. All of his designs were impressed with a facsimile signature. When Linthorpe closed in 1889, its moulds were acquired by a rival, Ault Pottery in Derbyshire. In 1893, Dresser signed a contract with Ault for new designs specifying that each pot should be marked with his facsimile signature.

CHRISTOPHER DRESSER  (1834-1904)  UK
JAMES DIXON & SONS Sheffield, England

“Gothic Arch” toast rack c.1881

Silver-plate

Marks: JD&S (stamped), EP, #72, “D”

Drawing illustrated: Christopher Dresser’s 1881 design and account book

For more information see: Truth, Beauty, Power: Dr. Christopher Dresser 1834-1904, exhib. cat. Historical Design, Inc. (New York, 1998); Charles Handley-Read, “High Victorian Design:  An Illustrated Commentary” in ‘Design 1860-1960’ sixth conference report of the Victorian Society (London, 1968); Victorian and Edwardian Decorative Art: The Handley-Read Collection, ed. Simon Jervis (London:  Diploma Galleries,1972); Christopher Dresser:  pottery, glass, metalwork, (London:  The Fine Arts Society Ltd., 1972); Isabelle Anscombe & Charlotte Gere, Arts & Crafts in Britain and America (New York:  Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., 1978); Truth, Beauty and Design, Victorian, Edwardian and later Decorative Art (London:  Fischer Fine Art Limited),; A Thing of Beauty:  Art Nouveau, Art Deco, Arts & Crafts Movement and Aesthetic Movement Objects in Atlanta Collections (Atlanta, GA:  The High Museum of Art, 1980), cat. no. M2; Widar Halén, Christopher Dresser (Oxford: Phaidon, 1990),; Judy Rudoe, Decorative Arts 1850-1950:  A Catalogue of the British Museum Collection (London: Trustees of the British Museum, 1991),; Gerda Breuer, Von Morris bis Mackintosh – Reformbewegung zwischen Kunstgewerbe und Sozialutopie,  Arts and Crafts (Darmstadt: Institut Mathildenhöhe, 1994/95); “The Silver Designs of Dr. Christopher Dresser,” Shirley Bury, Apollo (December, 1962)

H: 6″ x D: 4 1/8″ x W: 4 5/8″

CHRISTOPHER DRESSER (1834-1904) UK

JAMES COUPER & SONS Glasgow, Scotland

“Clutha” vase   c. 1890

Blown strawberry glass

This Dresser form appears as Linthorpe Pottery model no. 114.

Illustrated: Truth, Beauty, Power: Dr. Christopher Dresser 1834-1904,exhib. cat. Historical Design, Inc. (New York, 1998) p. 70.

Rare model.

H: 5 1/8” x W: 6”

CHRISTOPHER DRESSER  (1834-1904)  UK
BENHAM & FROUD  London, England

Kettle    c. 1885

Copper, brass, wood handle and finial

Marks: maker’s cipher

Illustrated: Minor Masters of the XIXth Century: Christopher Dresser, Industrial Designer, by N. Pevsner, (Architectural Review, 1937), p. 184, illus. 1; Truth, Beauty, Power: Dr. Christopher Dresser 1834-1904, exhib. cat. Historical Design, Inc. (New York, 1998) p. 67.

H: 9 1/2″ x Dia: 9″

Price: $4,450

CHRISTOPHER DRESSER  (1834-1904)  UK
HEATH & MIDDLETON  Birmingham, England

Claret jug   1881

Very rare model in sterling silver with a bone handle, crystal body

Marks: JTH JHM, Reg. mark for May 9, 1881, London assay marks for 1881 (“F” in a shield)

Illustrated: Truth, Beauty, Power: Dr. Christopher Dresser 1834-1904, exhib. cat. Historical Design, Inc. (New York, 1998) p. 63

This signature Dresser claret jug appears in Nikolaus Pevsner’s landmark book from 1936 entitled “Pioneers of Modern Design”.

H: 8 3/8″