Title is Sketch in Teton National Park. Oil on Board. Circa 1930. 10" by 12" unframed. 19" by 20 1/4" framed. Smith studied commercial art and design at the St. Louis School of Fine Art for two years beginning in 1915. His studies were interrupted by World War I during which he served as a corporal in the U.S. Army. After the war he returned to the School of Fine Art and also studied at the Washington University School of Fine Arts in St. Louis with Fred G. Carpenter, himself a student of Jean-Paul Laurens at the Colarossi Academy in Paris. Carpenter was known as a marvelous colorist who "thought every inch of a painting should be fascinating and should be as interesting close up as from a distance." His approach is reflected in many of Smiths paintings, both representational and abstract in style, done later in Colorado. In 1921 Smith relocated to Denver where he studied for two years at the Denver Academy of Fine and Applied Arts, formerly located in Brinton Terrace on 18th Street in Denvers Capitol Hill neighborhood. His teacher was John E. Thompson, another important influence as a pioneer of modernism in Denver. The Academy hired Smith as an instructor in 1923 and that same year the Denver Art Museum included his work for the first time in its 29th annual juried exhibition. He later had two solo shows at the museum, which added his work to its Anne Evans Collection. In 1959 the museum reproduced Houses at Victor, for its Western Heritage Exhibition catalog. In 1928 he witnessed the Articles of Incorporation of the Denver Artists Guild, comprising most of the citys professional artists. He also belonged to the American Artists Professional League, also organized in 1928 by fifteen members of the Salmagundi Club in New York to protect artists interest and promote traditional American art. He was one of some two dozen Colorado artists designated to participate in the Public Works of Art Program (PWAP, 1933-34), the first federally-sponsored program for artists during the Great Depression. Around 1928 Smith became the Hermit of Stuart Street, and remained a life-long bachelor. One painting, View from My Window, depicts his immediate neighborhood. Living for more than thirty years at 1039 Stuart Street in West Denver, he gave up creature comforts that most people take for granted to have the freedom to devote his life to the pursuit of art. In the first twenty-five years of his career, his paintings focused on the Colorado landscape and its mining towns with their decaying buildings as relics of the past. Miners House at Victor, Colorado illustrates the description of his work in this genre as described by Denver artist and art writer, Arneill Downs, The jewel-like shapes and colors the artist uses give the most decrepit objects style. The decaying buildings of ghost towns, grouped together on canvas, glow like a patchwork quilt. Smith described his technique as I start lean and finish fat. He worked first with turpentine as a medium and ended up with pure pigment put on with a palette knife. In addition to Colorado scenes, he did still lifes and images in the 1940s from Mexico and New Mexico. While painting the Colorado mining towns he gathered old pieces of iron and glass, door handles, hinges off ancient stoves and other similar subjects which he elegantly termed his objects trouve and incorporated into his still lifes. Over the easel in his studio in the late 1950s hung several dolls arms, a little bluebird, some old faucet handles and a sign reading masterpiece. By the early 1950s, he adopted a largely non-representational style, initially including referential abstraction in which human faces and figures were partially visible. However, much of his work during that decade was completely non-referential, emphasizing design that transformed his paintings into a mosaic of abstract pattern. He developed it from the patchwork quilt effect of his Colorado mining town images whose buildings he tightly grouped at various angles. For his non-representational canvases he likewise adapted the jeweled palette and scumbled surfaces from his earlier work, as exemplified by two untitled abstracts: one rendered predominately in gray, green and brown with squares and rectangles set in a frame, and the other with a variety of geometric shapes resembling a welded wall sculpture hung on a red background. As noted in Smiths artist statement in the 70th Western Annual at the Denver Art Museum in 1963, he did not predetermine the style of any particular piece. There are times during the painting process, he noted, "that the painting on the easel could eventually be either abstract or subjective. I sometimes start to do a painting of a still life or landscape and end up abstract My interest in painting has to do with color, composition, balance, and self-expression. His willingness to work in a non-representational style predisposed him to become one of the founding members in 1948 of the 15 Colorado Artists, a supportive professional artists association active in Denver until the 1970s and dedicated to pursuing the progressive ideas emerging on the national art scene in the decades after World War II. In so doing the organization made an important contribution to the citys cultural landscape. The Denver Art Museum recognized the 15 with an inaugural exhibition in December 1948 that included Smiths Miners House at Victor, Colorado. Membership in the group, which changed over the years, was by invitation only. It mounted its own shows, also participating in the juried annuals of the Denver Art Museum. Smith likewise continued to exhibit with the Denver Artists Guild from which the 15 seceded, preferring to maintain his strong friendships there.
Title is Mount Bivouac Teton National Park. Oil on Board. Circa 1930. 10" by 12" unframed. 19" by 21 1/4" framed. Smith studied commercial art and design at the St. Louis School of Fine Art for two years beginning in 1915. His studies were interrupted by World War I during which he served as a corporal in the U.S. Army. After the war he returned to the School of Fine Art and also studied at the Washington University School of Fine Arts in St. Louis with Fred G. Carpenter, himself a student of Jean-Paul Laurens at the Colarossi Academy in Paris. Carpenter was known as a marvelous colorist who "thought every inch of a painting should be fascinating and should be as interesting close up as from a distance." His approach is reflected in many of Smiths paintings, both representational and abstract in style, done later in Colorado. In 1921 Smith relocated to Denver where he studied for two years at the Denver Academy of Fine and Applied Arts, formerly located in Brinton Terrace on 18th Street in Denvers Capitol Hill neighborhood. His teacher was John E. Thompson, another important influence as a pioneer of modernism in Denver. The Academy hired Smith as an instructor in 1923 and that same year the Denver Art Museum included his work for the first time in its 29th annual juried exhibition. He later had two solo shows at the museum, which added his work to its Anne Evans Collection. In 1959 the museum reproduced Houses at Victor, for its Western Heritage Exhibition catalog. In 1928 he witnessed the Articles of Incorporation of the Denver Artists Guild, comprising most of the citys professional artists. He also belonged to the American Artists Professional League, also organized in 1928 by fifteen members of the Salmagundi Club in New York to protect artists interest and promote traditional American art. He was one of some two dozen Colorado artists designated to participate in the Public Works of Art Program (PWAP, 1933-34), the first federally-sponsored program for artists during the Great Depression. Around 1928 Smith became the Hermit of Stuart Street, and remained a life-long bachelor. One painting, View from My Window, depicts his immediate neighborhood. Living for more than thirty years at 1039 Stuart Street in West Denver, he gave up creature comforts that most people take for granted to have the freedom to devote his life to the pursuit of art. In the first twenty-five years of his career, his paintings focused on the Colorado landscape and its mining towns with their decaying buildings as relics of the past. Miners House at Victor, Colorado illustrates the description of his work in this genre as described by Denver artist and art writer, Arneill Downs, The jewel-like shapes and colors the artist uses give the most decrepit objects style. The decaying buildings of ghost towns, grouped together on canvas, glow like a patchwork quilt. Smith described his technique as I start lean and finish fat. He worked first with turpentine as a medium and ended up with pure pigment put on with a palette knife. In addition to Colorado scenes, he did still lifes and images in the 1940s from Mexico and New Mexico. While painting the Colorado mining towns he gathered old pieces of iron and glass, door handles, hinges off ancient stoves and other similar subjects which he elegantly termed his objects trouve and incorporated into his still lifes. Over the easel in his studio in the late 1950s hung several dolls arms, a little bluebird, some old faucet handles and a sign reading masterpiece. By the early 1950s, he adopted a largely non-representational style, initially including referential abstraction in which human faces and figures were partially visible. However, much of his work during that decade was completely non-referential, emphasizing design that transformed his paintings into a mosaic of abstract pattern. He developed it from the patchwork quilt effect of his Colorado mining town images whose buildings he tightly grouped at various angles. For his non-representational canvases he likewise adapted the jeweled palette and scumbled surfaces from his earlier work, as exemplified by two untitled abstracts: one rendered predominately in gray, green and brown with squares and rectangles set in a frame, and the other with a variety of geometric shapes resembling a welded wall sculpture hung on a red background. As noted in Smiths artist statement in the 70th Western Annual at the Denver Art Museum in 1963, he did not predetermine the style of any particular piece. There are times during the painting process, he noted, "that the painting on the easel could eventually be either abstract or subjective. I sometimes start to do a painting of a still life or landscape and end up abstract My interest in painting has to do with color, composition, balance, and self-expression. His willingness to work in a non-representational style predisposed him to become one of the founding members in 1948 of the 15 Colorado Artists, a supportive professional artists association active in Denver until the 1970s and dedicated to pursuing the progressive ideas emerging on the national art scene in the decades after World War II. In so doing the organization made an important contribution to the citys cultural landscape. The Denver Art Museum recognized the 15 with an inaugural exhibition in December 1948 that included Smiths Miners House at Victor, Colorado. Membership in the group, which changed over the years, was by invitation only. It mounted its own shows, also participating in the juried annuals of the Denver Art Museum. Smith likewise continued to exhibit with the Denver Artists Guild from which the 15 seceded, preferring to maintain his strong friendships there.
Title is Mount Bivouac Teton National Park. Oil on Board. Circa 1930. 10" by 12" unframed. 19" by 21 1/4" framed. Smith studied commercial art and design at the St. Louis School of Fine Art for two years beginning in 1915. His studies were interrupted by World War I during which he served as a corporal in the U.S. Army. After the war he returned to the School of Fine Art and also studied at the Washington University School of Fine Arts in St. Louis with Fred G. Carpenter, himself a student of Jean-Paul Laurens at the Colarossi Academy in Paris. Carpenter was known as a marvelous colorist who "thought every inch of a painting should be fascinating and should be as interesting close up as from a distance." His approach is reflected in many of Smiths paintings, both representational and abstract in style, done later in Colorado. In 1921 Smith relocated to Denver where he studied for two years at the Denver Academy of Fine and Applied Arts, formerly located in Brinton Terrace on 18th Street in Denvers Capitol Hill neighborhood. His teacher was John E. Thompson, another important influence as a pioneer of modernism in Denver. The Academy hired Smith as an instructor in 1923 and that same year the Denver Art Museum included his work for the first time in its 29th annual juried exhibition. He later had two solo shows at the museum, which added his work to its Anne Evans Collection. In 1959 the museum reproduced Houses at Victor, for its Western Heritage Exhibition catalog. In 1928 he witnessed the Articles of Incorporation of the Denver Artists Guild, comprising most of the citys professional artists. He also belonged to the American Artists Professional League, also organized in 1928 by fifteen members of the Salmagundi Club in New York to protect artists interest and promote traditional American art. He was one of some two dozen Colorado artists designated to participate in the Public Works of Art Program (PWAP, 1933-34), the first federally-sponsored program for artists during the Great Depression. Around 1928 Smith became the Hermit of Stuart Street, and remained a life-long bachelor. One painting, View from My Window, depicts his immediate neighborhood. Living for more than thirty years at 1039 Stuart Street in West Denver, he gave up creature comforts that most people take for granted to have the freedom to devote his life to the pursuit of art. In the first twenty-five years of his career, his paintings focused on the Colorado landscape and its mining towns with their decaying buildings as relics of the past. Miners House at Victor, Colorado illustrates the description of his work in this genre as described by Denver artist and art writer, Arneill Downs, The jewel-like shapes and colors the artist uses give the most decrepit objects style. The decaying buildings of ghost towns, grouped together on canvas, glow like a patchwork quilt. Smith described his technique as I start lean and finish fat. He worked first with turpentine as a medium and ended up with pure pigment put on with a palette knife. In addition to Colorado scenes, he did still lifes and images in the 1940s from Mexico and New Mexico. While painting the Colorado mining towns he gathered old pieces of iron and glass, door handles, hinges off ancient stoves and other similar subjects which he elegantly termed his objects trouve and incorporated into his still lifes. Over the easel in his studio in the late 1950s hung several dolls arms, a little bluebird, some old faucet handles and a sign reading masterpiece. By the early 1950s, he adopted a largely non-representational style, initially including referential abstraction in which human faces and figures were partially visible. However, much of his work during that decade was completely non-referential, emphasizing design that transformed his paintings into a mosaic of abstract pattern. He developed it from the patchwork quilt effect of his Colorado mining town images whose buildings he tightly grouped at various angles. For his non-representational canvases he likewise adapted the jeweled palette and scumbled surfaces from his earlier work, as exemplified by two untitled abstracts: one rendered predominately in gray, green and brown with squares and rectangles set in a frame, and the other with a variety of geometric shapes resembling a welded wall sculpture hung on a red background. As noted in Smiths artist statement in the 70th Western Annual at the Denver Art Museum in 1963, he did not predetermine the style of any particular piece. There are times during the painting process, he noted, "that the painting on the easel could eventually be either abstract or subjective. I sometimes start to do a painting of a still life or landscape and end up abstract My interest in painting has to do with color, composition, balance, and self-expression. His willingness to work in a non-representational style predisposed him to become one of the founding members in 1948 of the 15 Colorado Artists, a supportive professional artists association active in Denver until the 1970s and dedicated to pursuing the progressive ideas emerging on the national art scene in the decades after World War II. In so doing the organization made an important contribution to the citys cultural landscape. The Denver Art Museum recognized the 15 with an inaugural exhibition in December 1948 that included Smiths Miners House at Victor, Colorado. Membership in the group, which changed over the years, was by invitation only. It mounted its own shows, also participating in the juried annuals of the Denver Art Museum. Smith likewise continued to exhibit with the Denver Artists Guild from which the 15 seceded, preferring to maintain his strong friendships there.
Title is Sketch in Teton National Park. Oil on Board. Circa 1930. 10" by 12" unframed. 19" by 20 1/4" framed. Smith studied commercial art and design at the St. Louis School of Fine Art for two years beginning in 1915. His studies were interrupted by World War I during which he served as a corporal in the U.S. Army. After the war he returned to the School of Fine Art and also studied at the Washington University School of Fine Arts in St. Louis with Fred G. Carpenter, himself a student of Jean-Paul Laurens at the Colarossi Academy in Paris. Carpenter was known as a marvelous colorist who "thought every inch of a painting should be fascinating and should be as interesting close up as from a distance." His approach is reflected in many of Smiths paintings, both representational and abstract in style, done later in Colorado. In 1921 Smith relocated to Denver where he studied for two years at the Denver Academy of Fine and Applied Arts, formerly located in Brinton Terrace on 18th Street in Denvers Capitol Hill neighborhood. His teacher was John E. Thompson, another important influence as a pioneer of modernism in Denver. The Academy hired Smith as an instructor in 1923 and that same year the Denver Art Museum included his work for the first time in its 29th annual juried exhibition. He later had two solo shows at the museum, which added his work to its Anne Evans Collection. In 1959 the museum reproduced Houses at Victor, for its Western Heritage Exhibition catalog. In 1928 he witnessed the Articles of Incorporation of the Denver Artists Guild, comprising most of the citys professional artists. He also belonged to the American Artists Professional League, also organized in 1928 by fifteen members of the Salmagundi Club in New York to protect artists interest and promote traditional American art. He was one of some two dozen Colorado artists designated to participate in the Public Works of Art Program (PWAP, 1933-34), the first federally-sponsored program for artists during the Great Depression. Around 1928 Smith became the Hermit of Stuart Street, and remained a life-long bachelor. One painting, View from My Window, depicts his immediate neighborhood. Living for more than thirty years at 1039 Stuart Street in West Denver, he gave up creature comforts that most people take for granted to have the freedom to devote his life to the pursuit of art. In the first twenty-five years of his career, his paintings focused on the Colorado landscape and its mining towns with their decaying buildings as relics of the past. Miners House at Victor, Colorado illustrates the description of his work in this genre as described by Denver artist and art writer, Arneill Downs, The jewel-like shapes and colors the artist uses give the most decrepit objects style. The decaying buildings of ghost towns, grouped together on canvas, glow like a patchwork quilt. Smith described his technique as I start lean and finish fat. He worked first with turpentine as a medium and ended up with pure pigment put on with a palette knife. In addition to Colorado scenes, he did still lifes and images in the 1940s from Mexico and New Mexico. While painting the Colorado mining towns he gathered old pieces of iron and glass, door handles, hinges off ancient stoves and other similar subjects which he elegantly termed his objects trouve and incorporated into his still lifes. Over the easel in his studio in the late 1950s hung several dolls arms, a little bluebird, some old faucet handles and a sign reading masterpiece. By the early 1950s, he adopted a largely non-representational style, initially including referential abstraction in which human faces and figures were partially visible. However, much of his work during that decade was completely non-referential, emphasizing design that transformed his paintings into a mosaic of abstract pattern. He developed it from the patchwork quilt effect of his Colorado mining town images whose buildings he tightly grouped at various angles. For his non-representational canvases he likewise adapted the jeweled palette and scumbled surfaces from his earlier work, as exemplified by two untitled abstracts: one rendered predominately in gray, green and brown with squares and rectangles set in a frame, and the other with a variety of geometric shapes resembling a welded wall sculpture hung on a red background. As noted in Smiths artist statement in the 70th Western Annual at the Denver Art Museum in 1963, he did not predetermine the style of any particular piece. There are times during the painting process, he noted, "that the painting on the easel could eventually be either abstract or subjective. I sometimes start to do a painting of a still life or landscape and end up abstract My interest in painting has to do with color, composition, balance, and self-expression. His willingness to work in a non-representational style predisposed him to become one of the founding members in 1948 of the 15 Colorado Artists, a supportive professional artists association active in Denver until the 1970s and dedicated to pursuing the progressive ideas emerging on the national art scene in the decades after World War II. In so doing the organization made an important contribution to the citys cultural landscape. The Denver Art Museum recognized the 15 with an inaugural exhibition in December 1948 that included Smiths Miners House at Victor, Colorado. Membership in the group, which changed over the years, was by invitation only. It mounted its own shows, also participating in the juried annuals of the Denver Art Museum. Smith likewise continued to exhibit with the Denver Artists Guild from which the 15 seceded, preferring to maintain his strong friendships there.
Paul Kauvar Smith (American, 1893-1977) Oil on Board Undated, initial signed 'PKS' within image near upper left edge, in a painted rusticated wood frame Property from: a Private Collector, Glen Ellyn, Illinois Category: Fine Art > Paintings Estimated Sale Time: 11:12 am CST Shipping Status: Leonard Auction, Inc. will provide direct shipping for this lot. Please visit our website for a shipping estimate. Last modified: January 30, 2024, 9:11 am
Unusual two in one oil paintings by well listed American artist Paul Kauvar Smith ( 1893-1977 ). One side is " Black Eyed Susan" flowers. And other side is midcentury abstract painting.Paul Kauver Smith studied commercial art and design at the St. Louis School of Fine Arts from 1915-16 with a brief interruption during World War I. After the war, he returned to the School of Fine Arts and went on to the study at Washington University in St. Louis. In 1921, Smith moved to Colorado to study under John E. Thompson at the Denver Academy of Fine and Applied Arts. Thompson, who is considered to be the pioneer of modernism in Denver, was a strong influence on Smith. In 1923, Smith was hired by the Academy as an instructor. That same year, his work was accepted for the first time for display at the Denver Art Museum and he was also awarded two solo exhibitions. The museum later added his work to their Anne Evans collection. In 1959, the Denver Art Museum also reproduced one of his paintings titled Houses at Victor for their Western Heritage exhibition catalogue. Smith became a permanent resident of Denver and was a member of the American Artists Professional League, as well as, the Colorado and the Denver Art Guilds. He also joined a Denver group called The Colorado Fifteen. "The Fifteen" came into existence in 1948 as an association of professional artists dedicated to the avant-garde. The group was well known and considered to be an important contribution to Denver's cultural landscape. Size : 22 1/8 x 18 1/2 inches.~~ DEAR BIDDERS, Please View More Detailed Close-Up Images by visiting our website - Sofedesignauctions.com ~ Thank you ! ~~~~~~. Detailed condition reports are not included in this catalog. For additional information, including condition reports, please contact us at info@sofedesignauctions.com
Paul Kauvar Smith (American, 1893-1977). Highly textured oil painting titled "Paint Tube Collage No. 2" depicting used paint tubes on an abstract blue background. Signed along the lower right corner. Inscription along the verso reads "18 x 13 oil, Paul K. Smith, Denver, Colo. 'Paint Tube Collage No. 2.'"
Paul Kauvar Smith, (American, 1893-1973) Portrait of a Woman. Oil on Board. Signed verso. Purchased from Toomey Galleries in 2013. Sight Size: 12 x 10 in. Overall Size: 19.5 x 17.5 in.
Paul Kauvar Smith (American, 1893-1977) View from My Window, 1950, oil on board, signed Paul K. Smith (lower left) 22 x 28 inches Property from an Important Private Collection of Modernist West Art
Paul Kauvar Smith, (American, 1893-1973) Portrait of a Woman. Oil on Board. Signed verso. Purchased from Toomey Galleries in 2013. Sight Size: 12 x 10 in. Overall Size: 19.5 x 17.5 in.
Paul Kauvar Smith (American, 1893-1977), "Untitled Abstract", oil on canvas, unsigned, verso with "David Cook Galleries, Denver, CO" label, 24" x 18". Framed.
Riverscape. Oil on canvasboard, signed in the lower left corner and dated '23, framed in a hand carved Arts and Crafts frame overall 11-3/4" x 14". Board size 8" x 10".
Paul Kauvar Smith (American, 1893-1973) "Eternity," c. 1970, acrylic on paper on board, 22" x 14.5", signed lower right and upper right, titled on verso, framed
