Dune

Features

Signed, Framed

Size

Medium (up to 36in.)

Color

Green

- Provenance: original artwork signed “Ed Siebert 1906.” lower left - Media: oil on canvas (later laminated with fiberglass) - Artwork Dimensions: 20”h x 14"v - Frame Dimensions: 22"h x 16"v - Condition: fair, craquelure throughout, and paint chip missing. Frame has wear. Unfortunately, the work was unprofessionally restored and laminated from behind with resin and a layer of fiberglass, then re-stretched and fastened to the frame with staples. Edward Selmar Siebert was born in Washington D.C. on July 1, 1857 was an American painter and etcher. He was trained in Germany under Prof. Albert A. Bauer of the Weimar Art School from 1(contact info removed) and under Professors Carl Hoff and Ferdinand Keller from 1(contact info removed) at the Royal Academy in Munich. In 1892 he trained under Wilhelm von Diez, the teacher of Du Veneck. Siebert opened his studio in Rochester, New York in 1911 after being commissioned to paint a portrait of George M. Saegmuller, Mr. Siebert practiced portrait and landscape painting, as well as still lifes. Critics said Mr. Siebert was master of two distinct styles – “one detailed, meticulous and careful, the other broad, atmospheric, open and full of delightful imagination. His still life scenes were done with detailed reality, while a street, for example, would be full of dreams; indefinite and left for the fantasies of the observer’s poetic imagination.” “The Flute Player” exhibited at the Corcoran Gallery of Art. Won first prize at the annual Black and White Exhibit there. He also adorned the ceiling at the Library of Congress. Industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie as well as other prominent men and women sat for their portrait by Siebert. Mr. Siebert was honored to be the last artist to paint Thundercloud, the famous Blackfoot chief and artist’s model whose face appears as the head on the Buffalo Nickel. Siebert’s work is among the collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Siebert died in Rochester on January 31, 1944. This work has an unmistakable impressionist quality characteristic of Siebert’s late nineteenth century European training, raising the question: how can something so loosely rendered appear almost photographic in its precision? The characteristic rhythm in the brush work which denotes the direction of tall sea grasses, the explosive fanning of scrub trees and the slat and wire fence off to the right, and how it is worked into the undergrowth. Vibrant blotches of bright color are blending and lending to the tableau… The periphery is deliberately out of focus, mimicking how we see in real life, ingeniously enhancing the experience and rendering the scenery more lifelike and engaging. This work is not to be discredited as a minor work on account of its simplicity, but rather for this reason it is exemplary of an early tendency toward abstraction, not entirely disassociate with the nature of impressionism.

Style

Impressionism

Medium

Oil