24003

WILLIAM HOLBROOK BEARD (American 1824-1900)

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles Start Price:57.00 USD Estimated At:2,000.00 - 3,000.00 USD
WILLIAM HOLBROOK BEARD (American 1824-1900)
<B>WILLIAM HOLBROOK BEARD (American 1824-1900)</B></I><BR>The Turtle Bite<BR>Oil on canvas<BR>16.25in. x 20.25in. <BR>Williams, Stevens, & Williams Co, New York stamp on verso<BR>Beard was born in Plainsville, Ohio and began his artistic career as an itinerant portrait painter before moving to Buffalo, New York in 1850. In 1856 he studied and traveled through Europe where he befriended Albert Bierstadt, Sanford R. Gifford, and Worthington Whittredge. Upon his return to the United States in 1858, Beard settled again in Buffalo and began to send his paintings to the National Academy of Design in New York City for exhibition. <BR><BR>Beard was an integral force in the local art community as a teacher and participant in the early planning of the Buffalo Fine Arts Academy. In 1860, Beard moved to New York City and set up a studio in the prestigious Tenth Street Studio Building where he held a space for nearly 40 years. <BR><BR>Beard's genre and animal paintings continued to garner attention, and by 1862 was he was elected Academician of the National Academy of Design. Beard gained enormous success during the 1860s, when narrative, mythological, and fairytale paintings became treasured escapes from the cruel realities of the Civil War. His paintings such as <I>Bulls and Bears of Wall Street</B></I> (The New-York Historical Society) and <I>March of Silenus</B></I> (Albright-Knox Gallery) are foremost examples of his oeuvre. Beard exhibited extensively at the National Academy of Design until the year before his death. He also exhibited at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Brooklyn Art Association as well as the Centennial Exhibition, 1876, and the Paris International Exposition. He also showed his work at Snedicor Art Gallery, Samuel P. Avery, and William and Everett, all located in New York City. <BR><BR>In 1885, Beard published a treatise titled <I>Humor in Animals</B></I>, in which he devoted chapters to individual species of animals and birds, anthropomorphizing various aspects of each, while offering a significant key to his pictorial meanings. His work is found in the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, New-York Historical Society, Brooklyn Museum, Wadsworth Atheneum, Amon-Carter Museum, Smithsonian Museum of American Art, Art Institute of Chicago, and the Rhode Island School of Design. <BR><BR><Condition: original canvas and stretcher, old patch upper center with inpaint, minor areas of inpaint upper right corner and lower left corner, otherwise good condition.> <BR><BR><B>Important notice:</B> Heritage usually auctions material at the rate of 200-250 lots per hour. On some occasions eBay Live bid software or the Internet may not be able to keep up with the pace of the auction. We recommend placing a realistic absentee bid now as insurance to avoid disappointment. Occasionally the auctioneer may eliminate or reject an eBay Live bid, and the auctioneer may also reopen a lot after the close of the eBay live bidding (usually because we missed an audience bid), and may reject your bid even if it shows you as the winning bidder. By bidding via eBay Live, you agree that Heritage may award the lot to another bidder at its sole discretion under the circumstances described above or any other reasonable circumstances. Since eBay bids are not shown to us until we open the lot on the floor, we treat those bids just like floor bids. In most cases the floor responds before the eBay bid is presented to us, due to Internet lag time, so for consistency we have made it a policy that floor bids are always considered first over tie eBay live bids. Also please note that all Heritage lots purchased through eBay Live carry a 24.5% Buyer's Premium. Please make sure you read the Terms and Conditions before you bid.