BeAstonished
BAKER SCHORR FINE ART MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY
BeAstonished
BAKER SCHORR FINE ART MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY
Instructions
for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.
—Mary Oliver
Lately, if you’re anything like me, the daily magnitude of current events may leave you feeling hopeless or de-sensitized. Even in my gallery world, I catch myself taking for granted the history, effort and intention that went into creating the art around me. So, I offer something to refocus our attention.
You may be familiar with Mary Oliver, whose poems celebrate the patient observation of nature. Her work encourages readers to find meaning, wonder and a sense of connection to something larger than themselves. Exploring themes of self-discovery, joy and gratitude, her poetry inspires readers to live fully in the present moment.
Oliver’s purpose is not unlike the life-long focus of many artists highlighted in this catalogue. Jessie Willcox Smith, featured on our cover, was known for her hundreds of illustrations and portraits of children. She made wonderful, personal connections with her subjects by telling stories as she drew and painted, and joining them at play.
Trailblazer Dorothy Hood immersed herself in the rich bohemian culture of Mexico City, where she surrounded herself with well- known Mexican artists and intellectuals as well as European émigrés. Her paintings reflect those connections with people and place, noted by their expansive imagery and sweeps of color indicative of the Southwest.
Wolf Kahn’s inspiration for his abstract landscapes came from his surroundings in Vermont and New York. Relentless in his exploration, his work became a unique synthesis of Realism and Color Field painting reflecting the Modern abstraction of Hans Hofmann, the palette of Matisse, Rothko’s sweeping bands of color and the atmospheric qualities of American Impressionism.
All astonishing!
Our broad eclectic inventory sets Baker Schorr apart. We offer nineteenth and twentieth century American and European paintings, and Modern and Contemporary, with a focus on post-war American abstract painters. In addition to exhibitions throughout the year, our program includes receptions, artist lectures, gallery talks and other special events.
BSFA’s diversely curated gallery demonstrates how someone might live with art in their homes. We place many incredible paintings with collectors, working hard to discern tastes and interests. Our relationships and consultation with individuals, collectors and designers in residential and corporate settings is at the heart of our program.
I have never been more deeply convinced of the incarnational aspect of creating art—making something from nothing—and the power of art in our lives.
May Baker Schorr be a place where we practice paying attention, being astonished, and telling about it!
Kathryn Schorr
Midland, Texas October, 2025
Previous left page, detail: Werner Drewes
American, 1921-1999
Untitled 1939
Oil on canvas
35 x 50 inches
Framed: 43 x 58 inches
Signed and dated lower left
Provenance: The Artist; Collection of Dr. and Mrs. Albert and Carol Rosenthal; Estate of Carol Rosenthal
Modern
The Modern Art movement emerged in 1872 with the emphasis on color, light and blurred brushstrokes of Impressionism. French painters like Monet, Degas and Renoir were at the forefront of this new era when artists were reinterpreting and challenging the rules of realistic academic painting.
The Modern art genre included several major movements including Post-impressionism, Fauvism, Expressionism, Cubism, Surrealism, and by the middle of the twentieth century, Abstract Expressionism. Abstract expressionists abandoned figurative styles in favor of an emphasis on color, form, composition, emotion, and the creative process.
One of the pre-eminent painters of the Post-Impressionist period, Louis Valtat painted in an expressive style, a Van Gogh-influenced variety of Post-Impressionism, as opposed to the more decorative style of Bonnard and Matisse. His work is hailed for its vivid colors and expressive use of thick paint. Valtat is regarded as one of the leading proponents of Fauvism, a movement that extolled the virtues of strong colors and distinctive painterly qualities over overt realism and naturalism. The Fauvist movement formally began in 1905 at the Salon d’Automne. Valtat’s use of color and brushwork creates space and light in his balanced compositions.
Born in 1869, Valtat moved to Paris at the age of 17 to study at the École des Beaux Arts under Boulanger, Lefebvre and Constant. He was involved with other influential artists including Renoir, Signac, d’Espagnat, and Luce, and exhibited widely throughout his career.
Louis Valtat
French, 1869-1952
Promeneuse au Bord de la Mer 1903
Oil on canvas
22 x 26 inches
Framed: 30 x 34 inches
Signed lower Right
Provenance: Private collection, France
Jean Jules Cavailles
French, 1901-1977
Promenade à Marines
c. 1960
Oil on canvas
30 x 22 inches
Framed: 35 1⁄2 x 28 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Boston, Massachusetts
Karl Albert Buehr
American, 1866-1952
Afternoon Shadows
(Giverny, France)
c.1912
Oil on canvas
25 x 30 inches
Framed: 35 1/2 x 40 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Kingston, New York
Dorothea M. Litzinger
American, 1889-1925
Autumn Birches
c. 1920
Oil on canvas
50 x 60 inches
Signed upper left
Provenance: John W. Thompson, New York; Private Collection, Connecticut;
Exhibited: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Carnegie Institute, International Exhibition , 1925 (label verso)
Theodore Earl Butler
American,1876-1937
Beach at Veules-Les-Roses 1905
Oil on canvas
19 1/4 x 28 3/4 inches
Framed: 27 1/2 x 36 1/4 inches
Signed: T.E. Butler 05 lower left
Provenance: Maxwell Galleries Ltd., San Francisco; Private Collection; Butterfield & Butterfield, San Francisco and Los Angeles, 10 December 1997; Vance Jordan Fine Art Inc., New York
Jane Wilson
American, 1924 - 2015 Beach Plum 1960
Oil on canvas
28 x 18 inches
Framed: 35 3/4 x 25 7/8 inches
Signed lower right, dated and titled verso
Provenance: Private Collection, Connecticut
American, 1915-2001
The Big Winter I 1960
50 x 73 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Connecticut
Gabor Peterdi
Acrylic on canvas
Gabor Peterdi American, 1915-2001
49 x 60 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Connecticut
Misty Brush 1960
Acrylic on canvas
Considered a forerunner of the Abstract Expressionists, Arthur Beecher Carles combined an enthusiasm for color with the formal principles of Cubism. Educated as a figurative painter, he moved towards abstraction after a trip to Europe that exposed him to the major movements in modernism. Drawing influence from Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, and later Hans Hofmann, he painted canvases that hint at colorful landscapes, figures and still lifes, behind their fragmented Cubist planes. Late in his career he started to work in a purer abstraction, leaving any remnants of representation behind.
During his years in France, Carles was particularly attracted to the work of Paul Cezanne and Henri Matisse, and his canvases from this period reveal Matisse’s influence. In 1910, Carles’ work was included in the Younger American Painters Show held at Alfred Stieglitz’s New York gallery, 291.
In its review of the show, the Philadelphia Inquirer remarked of Carles, “He represents more ably and fully than anyone else at present working in America the spirit of the modern movement in art in France today.” Stieglitz gave Carles his first one-man show at 291 in January 1912. Carles returned from France in December 1912, by this time a confirmed modernist and fervent spokesman for modern art in Philadelphia.
Arthur Beecher Carles is represented in major public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Phillips Collection, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, and the Corcoran Gallery of Art, all in Washington, D.C.; the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Philadelphia Museum of Art in Philadelphia; and the Art Institute of Chicago.
Among the many artists taught by and influenced by Carles is Jane Piper, whose work follows on pages 16 and 102.
Arthur B. Carles
American, 1882-1952
Still Life With Flowers
Oil on canvas
40 x 33 1/2 inches
Framed: 47 x 42 3/8 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: The Artist to Private Collection, Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia (thence by descent in family)
Milton Avery
American, 1885-1965
Relaxer by the Sea 1944
Watercolor and pencil on paper
22 1/2 x 31 inches
Jane Piper
American, 1916-1991
Light Through a Window 1972
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
Signed and dated lower left
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Exhibited: The Woodmere Art Gallery; Philadelphia Art Center
Framed: 37 x 45 inches
Signed and dated center right
Provenance: William Zierler, Inc., New York (label verso); Private Collection, New York
American, 1884-1974
Woman Reading on Rocks
1965 Oil on canvas
16 x 24 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, New York
Leon Kroll
Frank H. Desch
American, 1873-1934
22 x 18 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, New Jersey
Red Peignoir Oil on board
“A child will always look directly at anyone who is telling a story; so while I paint I tell tales marvelous to hear.”
Jessie Willcox Smith
Born in 1863 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Jesse Willcox Smith was known for her mixed media works depicting children and motherly love. Smith studied at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts where she studied under Thomas Eakins. Her peers included Elizabeth Shippen Green and Violet Oakley, with whom she shared a studio for many years. In 1894, she began study with Howard Pyle at the Drexel Institute, who according to Smith, made illustration seem happy and easy, an attitude she welcomed. From 1905 forward, she was inundated with commissions and celebrity.
Jessie illustrated for Century, Collier’s Weekly, Harper’s Bazaar, Frank Leslie’s Popular Monthly, McClure’s Magazine, Scribner’s Magazine, Women’s Home Companion, and Good Housekeeping. From 1918 through 1932, Smith illustrated covers exclusively for Good Housekeeping magazine, and her images influenced American life from nurseries and family rooms to elementary schools and playgrounds.
Her book credits include: A Child’s Book of Stories, A Children’s Book of Modern Stories, Dickens’ Children, A Child’s Garden of Verses, At the Back of the North Wind, Boys and Girls of Bookland, and The Water-Babies, Little Women by Louisa May Alcott and Heidi by Johanna Spyri. Her fame as an illustrator caused many parents to seek her out for portraits of their children for which she was also well known. She passed away in 1935.
Smith’s iconic work is included in numerous collections and exhibitions including the Brandywine River Museum, the Delaware Art Museum, the Free Library of Philadelphia, the National Museum of American Illustration, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the United States Library of Congress, and the University of Minnesota Children’s Literature Research Collection. She was awarded the Mary Smith Prize by the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art.
Jessie Willcox Smith American, 1863-1935
The Green Gate
1917
Oil on canvas
30 x 25 inches
Signed lower left, signed on the frame and titled verso
Provenance: Private Collection, Victoria, British Columbia; By descent to the present Private Collection.
Literature: “ The Secret Was About Covers”, Good Housekeeping , November 1917, reproduced page 34 as Study for a Portrait ; S. Michael Schnessel, “Jessie Willcox Smith”, New York, 1977, pages 133, 204
Exhibited: Exhibition of Paintings by Jessie Wilcox Smith, Worcester Art Museum, March 19 - April 2, 1916 Memorial Exhibition of the Work of Jessie Wilcox Smith , Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, March 14 - April 12, 1936
John Koch
American, 1909-1978
Children at Play Oil on canvas 18 x 18 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Sale, Christie’s, New York, May 23, 1990, lot 256; Victor Niederhoer, acquired at the above sale.
John Opper
American, 1908-1994
Color Series 19 1971-72
Acrylic on canvas
53 1/2 x 53 1/2 inches
Framed: 57 x 57 inches
Signed John Opper (verso, twice)
Provenance: Private collection, Chicago, Illinois
Son of a Lutheran minister, Werner Drewes (1899–1985) is one of the founding fathers of American abstraction and among the first artists to introduce concepts of the Bauhaus School in the United States. Trained as an architect at the Bauhaus, and studying with artists such as Paul Klee, Drewes merged art, craft, and functionalism with Synthetic Cubism in his early work, blending drawing and design in highly controlled abstractions. The rigorous design of these images evokes architecture and household objects in the manner of Cubism, but he would later turn towards a freer and more complete abstraction, drawing influence from Wassily Kandinsky.
In 1930, Drewes moved from Germany to the United States, where he initially taught at the Brooklyn Museum with the WPA Federal Art Project. In 1936, the year he became an American citizen, Drewes joined the American Artists Congress, exhibited at Black Mountain College in North Carolina, and helped found the American Abstract Artists group. He was a member of the faculty at Columbia University from 1937 to 1940, and served as director of graphic art for the WPA Federal Art Project in New York. In 1946 he joined the faculty of the School of Fine Arts at Washington University in St. Louis, where he remained until 1965. Retiring in Reston, Virginia, he remained an active artist until his death in 1985.
Werner Drewes
American, 1921-1999
Untitled 1939
Oil on canvas
35 x 50 inches
Framed: 43 x 58 inches
Signed and dated lower left
Provenance: The Artist; Collection of Dr. and Mrs. Albert and Carol Rosenthal; Estate of Carol Rosenthal
Will Barnet
American, 1911-2012
Final Study for “Atalanta”
1975
Watercolor, color pencils and pencil on vellum 47 x 36 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Harmon-Meek Gallery, Naples, Florida, with the label; Estate of the artist.
Will Barnet
American, 1911-2012
Totem 1979
Oil on canvas
64 1/2 x 24 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Irving Galleries, Palm Beach, Florida; The Collection of Myrtle Katzen, Washington, D.C.
Exhibited: Long Point Gallery, Provincetown, Massachusetts, 75: A Celebration, 1989
Rodney Smith
American, 1947-2016
Edythe Standing on the Edge of a Sailboat
2007
Archival digital pigment print 20 x 20 inches
Signed, stamped by Leslie Smolan executor, Estate of Rodney Smith
Frederick Judd Waugh
American, 1861-1940
Bold Headland (The Seaside Rocks)
Oil on masonite
23 x 28 inches
Signed on frame
Provenance: Grand Central Art Galleries, New York, New York; McCarty Gallery, Philadelphia; Acquired directly from the above, 2016; By descent to the current owner
André Brasilier
French, b. 1929
La Robe Étoilée
1983
Oil on canvas
50 3/4 x 38 inches
Signed lower right: Note: Alexis Brasilier has confirmed the authenticity
Provenance: Private Collection, Japan
Frederick Milton Grant American,1886-1959
Birds of a Feather 1918 Oil on board
30 x 30 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Illinois.
Exhibited: Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, Twenty-
Second Annual Exhibition of Artists of Chicago and Vicinity, February 14 - March 17, 1918
Esteban Vicente
Spanish/American, 1903–2001
Untitled 1985
Pastel, collage and wash on paper
24 1⁄2 x 19 inches
Framed: 34 1⁄2 x 30 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, New York
Radiance 1994
Oil on canvas
50 x 42 inches
Framed: 51 3/4 x 43 3/8 inches
Signed, titled and dated verso
Provenance: Ameringer Yohe Fine Art (label verso)
Wolf Kahn
American,1927-2020
Untitled c. 1990s
Pastel on paper
30 x 44 inches
Framed: 38 x 51 1⁄2 inches
Signed lower center
Provenance: The Artist to Collection of Chris Porte
Wolf Kahn
American, 1927-2020
Untitled c. 1990s
Pastel on paper
30 x 44 inches
Framed: 36 1/2 x 49 1⁄2 inches
Signed lower center
Provenance:
The Artist to Private Collection, New York
Known to balance his color palette with unmatched finesse, Wolf Kahn created landscapes that have a luminosity unsurpassed by other artists. His well-balanced colorist technique has made him one of the most influential American artists of our generation. With studios in both New York and Vermont, Kahn drew his artistic inspiration directly from scenes in nature.
A native of Stuttgart, Germany, Wolf Kahn attended the Hans Hofmann School of Fine Arts in New York City. It was here that he and other young artists under the direction of Hans Hofmann, forged a style that was both representational and Abstract Expressionistic. Hans Hofmann’s didactic artistic theories proved to be one of the most significant influences upon Kahn’s work. In his own words,
“We who studied with Hofmann...felt we were learning the essence of modernism, art stripped of everything extraneous. What remained was its aesthetic/philosophical foundation, its raison d’être.”
These progressive artists included Nell Blaine, Jane Freilicher, Allan Kaprow, Jan Muller, and Larry Rivers. They adopted Abstract Expressionistic spontaneity with the idea that the finished piece was an accumulated history of a process, a visual representation of energetic action and reaction.
Wolf Kahn
American, 1927-2020
Untitled c. 1990s
Pastel on paper
22 x 30 inches
Framed:
30 x 37 1/2 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance:
The Artist to Private Collection, New York
John Little American, 1907-1984
Ratigan 1962 Oil on canvas
76 x 60 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
John Little American, 1907-1984
Copeces 1974
Oil on canvas
46 1/2 x 43 inches
Signed verso
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Art Brenner
American, 1924-2013
Untitled 1959
Oil on canvas
39 x 32 inches
Signed and dated verso
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Charles Green Shaw
American, 1892-1974
Out of Above 1961 Oil on board
37 x 25 1/2 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Bertha Schaefer Gallery, New York (label verso)
Vincent Vallarino
American, b. 1953
Calla #11, Millerton, New York
1972
Archival pigment print
26 3/4 x 33 3/4 inches
Signed in pencil on verso / Printed later
Photographers copyright stamp verso
Rodney Smith
American, 1947-2016
Zoe Sleeping with Mask, Snedens Landing, New York
2007
Archival digital pigment print 20 x 20 inches
Signed and inscribed on label
From the Estate of the Artist
Rodney Smith
American, 1947-2016
Woman Balancing on Tree Limb, Snedens Landing, New York 1998
Archival digital pigment print 20 x 20 inches
Signed and inscribed on label From the Estate of the Artist
Atrailblazer among female Modernists, Dorothy Hood’s monumental works merge elements of abstraction and color field painting. Raised in Houston, Hood studied at Rhode Island School of Design and the Art Students League of New York before settling in Mexico City in 1941. Over the next two decades, she became immersed in the city’s rich bohemian culture and surrounded herself with wellknown Mexican artists and intellectuals as well as European émigrés. Hood returned to Houston in the early 1960s, where she produced some of her most celebrated canvases. Her paintings, which often refer to natural events, are noted by their expansive imagery and sweeps of color indicative of the Southwest.
The elegant Dorothy Hood received the support of influential critics and curators, including Clement Greenberg, although she did not receive the widespread acclaim of her female peers, like Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner during her lifetime, due in part to her absence from the New York art scene. Today, her increasingly soughtafter work is held in private collections and museums, most notably the Museum of Modern Art, New York and Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
Dorothy Hood
American, 1919-2000
Bounty of the Sun 1970s
Oil on canvas
70 x 60 inches
Signed, titled and dated verso and dated verso on stretcher
Provenance: The Artist to New Gallery, Houston, TX Private Collection, acquired from the above in 2010; Aaron Payne Fine Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Daniel Content
American, 1902-1990
48 x 48 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Connecticut
Untitled c.1956
Oil on canvas
Daniel Content
American, 1902-1990
Untitled 1956 Oil on canvas
48 x 48 inches
Signed and dated verso
Provenance: Private Collection, Connecticut
Werner Drewes
American, 1921-1999
Comp 134, Red in Red
1936
Werner Drewes
American, 1921-1999
Comp 1967 Mural Study
1938-39
Oil on canvas
35 x 20 inches
Framed: 44 1⁄2 x 30 inches
Dated and inscribed with artist’s peace sign symbol lower left
Provenance: Property from the Estate of Professor Cornelius Osgood and Soo Sui-ling Osgood
Oil on canvas
24 x 32 inches
Framed: 33 1⁄2 x 41 1⁄2 inches
Dated and inscribed with the artist’s peace sign symbol lower right
Provenance: Property from the Estate of Professor Cornelius Osgood and Soo Sui-ling Osgood
Born in Pomona, California, Millard Sheets grew up on a ranch where he developed a love of the land and horses. After graduating from Pomona High School, he enrolled at the Chouinard Art School in Los Angeles (1925-29) where he was a pupil of Chamberlin and Hinkle. He further studied with Theodore Modra.
After traveling and painting in Europe, he taught at Chouinard from 1929-34 and in 1948. During the 1920s and 1930s he came into national focus with his regionalist scenes similar to those of Thomas Hart Benton. Modernist painter Sheets was also an art professor and director at Scripps College from 1932-55 and then spent six years as director of the Otis Art Institute. In 1960, Sheets moved north to the Mendocino coast where he built his dream home “Barking Rocks” in Gualala. He lived there until his death on March 31, 1989.
Sheets’ watercolor and oil landscapes, often including horses, are inspired by California and his world travels. As an architectural designer and muralist, he produced over 100 murals and mosaics and designed a like number of buildings throughout California.
Millard Sheets
American, 1907-1989
A Magical Place (Landscape with Horses and Crows)
1979
Oil on canvas
29 x 40 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: The Artist; Acquired directly from the above, 1979; Private East Coast collection
Millard Sheets
American, 1907-1989
Horses in a Landscape
1955
Watercolor
21 1/4 x 29 1/4 inches
Framed: 32 x 39 inches
Signed lower left
Provenance: Private Collection, Los Angeles, California
Millard Sheets
American, 1907-1989
Evening Horses
1964
Watercolor, pencil and ink on board
20 x 30 inches
Framed: 30 x 40 inches
Signed and dated lower left
Provenance:
Arthur Tooth & Sons Ltd., London
Konrad Cramer
American, 1888-1963
Portrait of Florence 1958
William Matthews
American, b. 1949
Indian Summer
Watercolor on paper
34 1/2 x 28 1/2 inches
Framed: 49 1/2 x 43 1/2 inches
Provenance: The Collection of a Williamstown, Massachusetts Gentleman
Oil and collage on masonite
32 x 24 inches
Framed: 39 x 31 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Scarsdale, New York
American, b. 1942
Hill Country Oil on canvas
60 x 72 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance:
Private Collection, Texas
George Kovach
Jack Roth
American, 1927-2004
Untitled 1976
Acrylic on canvas
42 x 55 inches
Signed and dated ‘76 verso
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Untitled 1976
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
Signed and dated verso
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Jack Roth
American, 1927-2004
Untitled 1976
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
Signed and dated ‘76 verso
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Francois Aubrun
French, 1934-2009
Paysage Endormi #434
1983
Oil on canvas
51 x 51 inches
Framed: 52 5/8 x 52 5/8 inches
Signed Aubrun 83 lower right
Provenance: Estate of the artist
Ralph Della-Volpe
American, 1923-2017
Field
Circa late 1980s
Oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches
Framed: 21 x 21 inches
Signed lower left
Provenance: The Greenwich Gallery; Private Collection Mr. and Mrs. MacAllister, Greenwich, Connecticut
Carl Holty
American, 1900 - 1973
Red Gold
1958 Oil on canvas
56 x 42 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Graham Gallery, NYC (label verso); Artist Roy Dedders. Martin Diamond, New Rochelle, New York; Exhibited: 1958 solo show at Graham. Framed poster announcing that exhibition included in this sale
Karl Knaths
American, 1891-1971
One Tulip Oil on canvas 1958
24 x 30 inches
Signed lower left
Provenance: A Private Collection, 33 East 70th Street, New York
Paul Rosenberg & Co., New York, 1958
Carl Holty
American, 1900 - 1973
Collage #392 1957
Gouache and collage on paper
12 x 9 inches
Framed: 19 1/2 x 16 1/2 inches
Signed Holty - 57 lower right, Marked: 392 (verso)
Provenance: Artist to Estate of the artist (the artist’s wife) until circa 1985; Private collection, New York
Carl Holty
American, 1900 - 1973
Collage #385 1958
Gouache and collage on paper 12 x 9 inches
Framed: 19 1/2 x 16 1/2 inches
Signed Carl Holty 58 lower right
Provenance: Artist to Estate of the artist (the artist’s wife) until circa 1985; Private collection, New York
Abstract Expressionism
describes a movement in American painting that flourished in New York City after World War II, also known as the New York School. These artists used abstraction, often on large-scale canvases, to convey emotional content. Emphasizing the physical interaction of artist, paint and canvas, abstract expressionists conveyed meaning through the color, texture and application of the paint itself. Given the cultural climate of the time, the movement centered on unfettered artistic freedom and had resonance in many mediums including drawing and sculpture.
Within Abstract Expressionism were two broad groupings—Action painters, led by artists like Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning, who attacked their canvases with expressive gestural marks and brush strokes; and Color Field painters like Mark Rothko and Clyfford Still, whose work was characterized by large areas of flat color, sometimes evoking a meditative response from the viewer.
Jack Roth
American, 1927-2004
Algarve – 3 1982
Acrylic on canvas
66 x 100 inches
Signed, titled and dated ‘82 verso, Knoedler label
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Youla Chapoval
Ukrainian/French, 1919-1951
Untitled
1949
Oil on canvas
8 5/8 x 6 1/4 inches
Framed: 15 x 12 1⁄2 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, New York
Ezio Martinelli
American, 1913-1980
Abstract Still Life
1949
Oil on canvas
18 3/8 x 72 inches
Framed: 20 x 73 inches
Artist’s estate stamp and dated 1949
Provenance: Estate of the Artist; Robert Henry Adams 2004
John Levee
American, 1924-2017
Paris XVI 1953
Oil on canvas
6 1/4 x 18 3/4 inches
Signed and dated upper left
Provenance: Private Collection, Boca Raton, Florida
Amajor proponent of Abstract Expressionism and influenced by the Neo-Plasticism of Mondrian, Michael Loew circulated among the upper echelons of the New York School of Abstract Expressionists. Despite their opposing approaches to abstraction, he became a longtime friend of Willem de Kooning, whom he met completing WPA projects during the 1930s.
After WWII, Loew studied with Hans Hofmann and cultivated his sensibility for color effects. He used the grid-structure of Mondrian as a base from which to experiment with the possibilities of the palette; to focus on subtle transitions of tone or harmony of color relationships. Drawing inspiration from life, he transformed subjects. He exhibited these works at the Stable Gallery Annuals. Loew participated in the International Association of Plastic Arts Touring Exhibition, Contemporary American Painting as juror and exhibitor in 1957, exhibiting alongside Milton Avery, Samuel Adler, Josef Albers, de Kooning, Reinhardt, Walkowitz and others. The same year he gained representation at Zabriskie Gallery, next to Johns, Motherwell, and Rauschenberg. A recognized pillar of American Modernism, Loew maintained an active teaching and exhibition schedule until his death in 1985.
Michael Loew
American, 1907-1985
Pendualities
(from the White Series) 1974
Oil on canvas
60 x 54 inches
Framed: 61 3/4 x 56 inches
Signed M. Loew, verso
Provenance: Estate of the artist; Private collection by descent from the above
Ilya Bolotowsky
Russian/American, 1907-1981
Abstraction in Square
1978
Oil on canvas
40 x 40 inches
Signed lower center; titled and dated 1978 verso
Provenance: Private Collection, New York
Exhibited: Borgenicht Gallery, New York
William Sylvester Carter
American, 1909-1996
Cubist Figures
c.1960
Oil on masonite
24 x 20 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Long Beach, California
Alexander Liberman
American, 1912-1999
Untitled c. 1960
Acrylic on canvas
20 x 24 inches
Framed: 21 1⁄2 x 25 1⁄2 inches
Signed verso
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist; Andre Emmerich Gallery, New York
Untitled c. 1960
Acrylic on canvas
20 x 24 inches
Framed: 21 1⁄2 x 25 1⁄2 inches
Signed verso
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Emmerson Woelffer
American, 1914-2003
Untitled 1941
Acrylic on paper
Framed: 19 x 23 inches
Signed and dated lower left
Provenance: Private Collection, Chicago
Robert Goodnough
American, 1917-2010
Abstraction A
1964
Oil on canvas
21 1/4 x 47 1/2 inches
Signed and dated lower right: Goodnough 64
Provenance: Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York (label) George Fall, Paris, France
Robert Goodnough
American, 1917-2010
Rectangles with Red and Blue 1965
Oil and graphite on canvas
56 x 56 inches
Framed: 57 1/2 x 57 1/2 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: Acquired directly from the artist, Estate of Fern Simon
Contemporary
Jasmina Danowski
German, b. 1960
Silence
2023
Vinyl on canvas
35 x 31 inches
Signed verso
Provenance:
From the artist
Contemporary Art refers to art—painting, sculpture, photography, installation, performance, and video art—produced in current day. Many art historians consider the late 1960s (the end of Modern Art or Modernism) to be the starting point of the Contemporary Art genre. In reaction to the preceeding Modern Art movement, Pop Art emerged. Pioneered by artists like Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein, pop artists were interested in portraying mass culture. Other contemporary art movements include Photo Realism, Conceptualism, Minimalism, Performance Art, Installation Art, Earth Art, and Street Art.
Jasmina Danowski
German, b. 1960
Another Night in Tunisia 2022
Vinyl, Ink on paper
20 x 20 inches
Framed: 24 x 23 3/4 inches
Signed verso
Provenance: From the artist
Babylon 2022
Vinyl, Ink on paper
20 x 20 inches
Framed: 24 x 23 3/4 inches
Signed verso
Provenance: From the artist
Ellen Heck
American, b. 1983
Sketchbook # 139
Mixed media on paper 19 x 13 inches
Numbered and titled lower left, signed lower right
From the artist
Ellen Heck
American, b. 1983
Sketchbook #1312
Mixed media on paper 19 x 13 inches
Numbered and titled lower left, signed lower right
From the artist
Alvin Hollingsworth
American, 1928-2000
Women Dancing
Oil on board
15 1/2 × 19 1/2 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: The Estate of Clara Skipworth Burgess, New York
Mizen’s majestic landscape, Lover’s Leap on the Bosque , depicts a scenic park in Waco, Texas located on a high limestone cliff overlooking the Bosque River. It is named after a romantic legend of two Native American lovers, a Waco maiden and an Apache brave, who jumped from the cliff to their deaths to avoid separation. The park remains a popular spot for locals to enjoy scenic views of the river.
Born in Chicago, Frederic Mizen was a noted western genre and landscape painter as well as illustrator, portraitist and art teacher. From childhood, he had heard stories of the West from his father who was secretary to three generals active on the frontier. He studied at both the Art Institute of Chicago and the Academy Julian of Paris. In addition to painting, Mizen was a a commercial illustrator, creating ads for Coca Cola, Oldsmobile and Cadillac and numerous Saturday Evening Post covers. In 1936, he founded the Frederic Mizen Academy of Art in Chicago and created Indian studies and Southwest landscapes for the Santa Fe Railroad.
For eight years, 1952 to 1960, Mizen chaired the Department of Art of Baylor University in Waco, Texas.
Curt Walters
American, 1888-1964
Lover’s Leap on the ‘Bosque’ 1958
Oil on canvas
40 x 64 inches
Framed: 47 1⁄2 x 71 inches
Signed, dated and titled lower right
Provenance: Private collection, Hurst, Texas
American, b. 1950
Desert View
c. 1970s
Oil on canvas
24 x 24 inches
Framed: 34 x 34 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Massachusetts
Frederic Kimball Mizen
Carl Clemens Moritz Rungius
American, 1869-1959
Moose and Lake Oil on canvas 22 x 34 inches
Framed: 34 x 46
Provenance: Charles Haak, of the Museum of Fine Art, Boston (Haak worked for the museum); and then by descent to his daughter, Vermont
Robert Preusser
American, 1919-1992
Two Surfaced Painting
c. 1938-1942
Oil on linen stretched over plywood
16 x 12 inches
Provenance: The Downtown Gallery, New York, New York (label verso)
Jan Müller
German/American, 1922-1958
Untitled c. 1953-55
Oil on canvas
39 1/2 x 39 1/2 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, New York
John Little
American, 1907-1984
Alaska
1959
Oil on canvas
42 3/8 x 51 3/4 inches
Signed verso
Provenance:
The Estate of the Artist
Jean Lurçat
French, 1892-1966
Nature Morte Sur Table (Still Life on Table)
1923
Oil on canvas
32 x 21 inches
Framed: 41 x 30 inches
Signed upper right
Provenance: Galerie Thannhauser, Paris, 1938 (label verso); Property of J.K. Thannhauser, sold Parke Bernet Galleries, Inc., New York, 12 April 1945, Lot 117; Martin Kodner, Gallery of the Masters, St. Louis, Missouri; The collection of Edward Fritzie, acquired from the above before 1981; Gilda Lowinger, Gilda’s, Beverly Hills, California, 1981; Property from the Collection of Walter Arlen and Howard Myers
Walasse Ting
Chinese/American, 1929-2010
Much More Rain
1968
Acrylic on canvas
60 x 35 1/2 inches
Signed, titled and dated verso
Provenance: Private Collection, New York
Norman Bluhm
American, 1921-1999
Frozen Summer 1963
Mixed media on paper
30 x 22 inches
Framed:
43 x 34 1/2 inches
Signed, titled and dated verso
Provenance: The Artist; Private Collection, New York
American, 1921-1999
Untitled 1967
Mixed media on paper
30 x 22 inches
Framed: 42 x 34 1⁄2 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance: The Artist; Private Collection, New York
Norman Bluhm
Detail: Robert Natkin
American, 1930-2010
Redding-Winter 1973
Acrylic on canvas
30 x 60 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Property from the Estate of Helen Elliot Scott, Wayne, Pennsylvania
Recognized by critics as one of Philadelphia’s foremost painters and teachers, Jane Piper enjoyed a career that spanned fifty years and included thirtyfive solo shows. Known for her abstract still lifes, she has been described as an ‘instinctive individualist’ whose independent spirit characterized her art, education and approach to teaching.
Building on the French modernist tradition of Matisse and Cezanne, Piper gave color precedence over representation. She was interested in spatial organization and in creating space through color. By 1952, her work was growing increasingly abstract, and she began using white as the dominant color of her palette. Piper liked “the spatial sense of brilliance” it brought to her other colors.
Piper studied with Hans Hofmann in Provincetown and with Arthur Carles at the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts. She taught painting and drawing at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the mid 1950s and the Philadelphia College of Art from 1956-1985. Her works are in numerous collections including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and the National Academy of Design.
Jane Piper
American, 1916-1991
Spring Woods, Wellfleet 1965
Oil on canvas
28 x 34 inches
Framed: 36 x 42 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: The Estate of the Artist
Jules Pascin
French, 1885-1930
Printemps
1917 Oil on canvas
28 1/8 x 20 3/8 inches
Framed: 32 5/8 x 27 inches
Signed lower left: The authenticity of this painting has been confirmed by M. Abel Rampert (certificate accompanies the painting).
Provenance: Jean-Marc Delvaux, 2008
Charles Webster Hawthorne
American, 1872-1930
Twilight 1917 Oil on board
40 x 40 inches
Framed: 48 1/2 x 48 1/2
Provenance: Estate of the Artist, 1930; Private Collection, acquired circa 1990
Andre Cottavoz
French, 1922-2012
Les Cartes à Jouer
1955
Oil on canvas
19 3/4 x 28 3/4 inches
Framed: 28 x 37 inches
Signed lower right and verso with date
Provenance: Artist to Mr. M. Rosenshaft, then by descent to the present
Julie Delance-Feurgard
French, 1859-1892
Les Enfants à la Grille Oil on canvas
21 x 17 1/2 inches
Signed lower left
Provenance: Private Collection, New York
Frederick John Mulhaupt
American, 1871-1938
High Autumn Oil on canvas
36 1/8 x 36 1/8 inches
Framed: 42 x 42 inches
Signed lower left
Provenance: Private Collection, Charlotte, North Carolina
Emma Fordyce MacRae
American, 1887-1974
Pink and Freckled Lilies
1922
Oil on canvas laid down on board
30 1/8 x 34 inches
Signed and dated lower left
Provenance: Louis Levy Horch (1888-1979) and Nettie (née Silverstein) Horch (1896-1991), Hallandale, Florida.
Gift to the present owner from the above, grandson of the above, October 20, 1976.
Exhibition Highlights: The National Academy of Design, New York, Winter Exhibition, November 17-December 17, 1922; Dudensing Galleries, New York, February 1923; Twelfth Annual Exhibition of Pictures by American Painters, The Art Association of Newport, July 14-August 11, 1923; The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 119th Annual Exhibition, February 3-March 23, 1924; Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, Twenty-Third International Exhibition of Paintings, April 24-June 15, 1924; The Art Institute of Chicago, The Thirty-Seventh Annual Exhibition of American Paintings and Sculpture at the Art Institute of Chicago, October 30-December 14, 1924; Los Angeles Museum, First Pan-American Exhibition of Oil Paintings, November 28, 1925-February 28, 1926.
Andre Cottavoz
French, 1922-2012
Le Petit Garcon
1955
Oil on canvas
25 3/4 x 19 1/2 inches
Framed: 37 1/4 x 28 1/4 inches
Signed lower right, titled and signed COTTAVOZ verso
Provenance: Artist to Mr. M. Rosenhaft then by descent to the present
Born Jennie Christine in Elgin, Illinois, Jane Peterson officially changed her name in 1909 after her first success as an artist. From humble family origins, she became famous for a wide range of works from landscapes to still lifes that blend Impressionist and Expressionist movements. As a woman, her life was more independent and adventurous than those of most of her contemporaries. She traveled widely to paint, including joining Louis Comfort Tiffany on a continental painting expedition in his private railway car.
Peterson’s early works were strongly Impressionist, much influenced by Joaquin Sorrola y Bastida, a Madrid painter under whose teaching she abandoned dark tonalities for spontaneous, painterly brushwork.
At age 18, Peterson, with a gift from her mother of $300, enrolled in the Pratt Institute in New York City and studied with Arthur Wesley Dow, graduating in 1901. She also studied at the Art Students League with Frank DuMond. Subsequently she studied in Paris and lived around the corner from Gertrude and Leo Stein, who invited Peterson to many soirees with leading intellectuals including Picasso and Matisse.
Peterson’s first successful American exhibition was in 1909 at the St. Botolph Club in Boston, and from that time her work was the subject of over 80 onewoman shows. Peterson’s work is in the collections of the Brooklyn Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Fogg Museum at Harvard, the Richmond Indiana Art Museum, and the Society of Four Arts in Palm Beach among others.
Jane Peterson
American, 1876-1965
Sunday Mass, France
c. 1909
Oil on canvas
23 x 9 inches
Framed: 29 x 15 1/2 inches
Signed lower right
Provenance: Private Collection, Massachusetts
Installation view, a Midland, Texas home
Gene Davis
American, 1920-1985
Gate Keeper 1983
Acrylic on canvas
76 1/4 x 90 inches
Cover image: Jessie Willcox Smith, The Green Gate, detail, see pg 20-21
Back cover image: Dorothy Hood, Bounty of the Sun, detail, see pg 48-49
Inside front cover and page 1: Gabor Peterdi, Misty Brush, detail, see pg 13
Page 2: Werner Drewes, Untitled, 1939, detail, see pg 24-25
Page 3: Kathryn Baker Schorr at Baker Schorr Fine Art, photograph by Heather Rowland
Page 34-35: Photograph by Audrey Benninghoff
Design by Lilla Hangay, Santa Fe, New Mexico Printing: Prisma/Capital Printing, Austin, Texas
© Copyright 2025 All rights reserved. No portion of this catalogue may be reproduced, stored in any form, of transmitted by any means, without written permission from Baker Schorr Fine Art.
Kathryn Schorr, owner/director Camila Brooks, gallery associate
Julie Musselman, gallery associate
Allison Scarborough, gallery associate
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