1. Jean Francois Bosio (French, 1764-1827)

Girl Feeding a Canary.
Oil on canvas, unsigned, framed.
13-1/2" x 15".

Bosio was born in Monaco and went to Paris as a young man where he trained under the most famous Neoclassical painter of the day, Jacques-Louis David. David's emphasis on meticulous draftsmanship had a powerful effect of Basio's art, a quality apparent in this sweet image of a girl with a caged bird. Basio enjoyed a long tenure as Professor of Drawing at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, and exhibited regularly at the annual Salons.

Note: Period Empire frame.

6,000/8,000     SOLD: $5,865.00

2. Charles Gill (British, 18th-19th Century)

Portrait of a Girl in White.
Oil on canvas, unsigned, framed.
18-1/2" x 16".

Charles Gill was a student of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and was known principally for his portraiture. Between the years 1772 and 1819, he exhibited numerous portraits at the Royal Academy in London. Like Reynolds, Gill achieved wonderful creamy flesh tones which he accented by using bright red for the shadows and concavities in the face, neck and head. These effects can be observed in this luminous portrait of a young girl in the corners of the eyes, nostrils and ears. A genre scene of children at play by Gill is preserved in the collection of the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.

4,000/6,000     SOLD: $2,357.50

3. Samuel John Egbert Jones (British 1800-1865)

Hunstmen and Dogs.
Pair of oils on canvas, unsigned, framed.
9-3/4" x 11-3/4".

A prolific and extremely successful 19th-century painter of sporting subjects, Samuel John Egbert Jones specialized in scenes of the hunt, often painting scenes in suites or related pairs, as in the case of the present companion pictures. His fox and pheasant hunts, and scenes depicting the return from the hunt were subjects he exhibited frequently in London, notably at the Royal Academy and at Suffolk Street between the years 1820 and 1845.

6,000/12,000     SOLD: $3,910.00

4. Adolphe Yvon (French 1817-1893)

Portrait of an elegant woman in a black evening dress, holding a fan, wearing gloves, a fur wrap tossed on a chair beside her.
Oil on canvas, signed lower left, framed.
39-1/2" x 23-1/4".

Before he became a versatile and prolific artist of history paintings, religious compositions, military and genre scenes as well as portraits, Adophe Yvon worked as a mounted guard who patrolled the forests and lakes which were part of the royal domain of France. When he was in his twenties, he decided to study painting and trained under Paul Delaroche at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He made his Salon debut in 1841, won an enviable succession of medals, and became a member and eventually an officer of the Legion of Honor in 1855 and 1867 respectively. He went to Russia in 1845 during the Crimean campaign. During the Second Empire Yvon enjoyed tremendous popularity, not simply for his religious compositions, but for his military subjects and portraits. He recorded the French victories in Crimea and Italy, and these works attracted the attention and admiration of Napoleon III, particularly since they played into his imperialist politics. In 1861 he painted a portrait of the Prince Imperial, and in 1868, he painted the emperor. As this portrait of a wealthy artistocrat demonstrates, Yvon was able to capture a good deal of personality in his likenesses and handle a variety of textures with great mastery.

6,000/9,000     SOLD: $6,275.55

5. Alexis Joseph Mazerolle (French 1826-1889)

Cupid Stealing Arrows from Sleeping Venus.
Oil on canvas, signed lower right A.J. Mazerolle, framed.
12" x 7".

This sensuous dozing Venus surrounded by playful putti is the work of Alexis Joseph Mazerolle, a French genre, history, portrait and decorative painter. A student of Dupuis and Gleyre, Mazerolle lived and worked most of his life in Paris although he studied painting abroad in Italy and in Holland. He made his debut at the Paris Salon of 1847, and received numerous decorative mural commissions for the Comedie Francaise, for the Vaudeville theatre, and for the Paris Opera house. He was a prolific artist, and no doubt one who produced very quickly. His work demonstrates a skillful command of anatomy, for without labored brushwork he was able to capture the voluptuous serpentine pose of the main figure. As an anatomist, Mazerolle might be considered a 19th-century equivalent of Boucher, who particularly excelled at painting the female nude.

2,000/4,000     SOLD: $2,185.00

6. Walter Gould (American, 1829-1893)

Henry Clay.
Oil on canvas, signed indistinctly lower left, framed.
34-1/4" x 27".

Note: This painting is a fine copy of a portrait of the noted American statesman painted from life by John Neagle (American, 1799-1865) in 1843. Neagle's original painting is in the Collection of the Union League of Philadelphia, and an autograph copy is in the U.S. Capitol Building. Yet another larger copy made in 1852 by Ambrose Andrews resides in Clay's estate, Ashland, in Lexington, Kentucky. In this smaller painting made after Neagle's composition, Gould skillfully captures all the nuances of Neagle's original, notably the remarkable expression in the mouth.

Both Neagle and Gould were natives of Philadelphia and two of the most respected portraitists of their day. Gould also enjoyed a considerable artistic reputation in Europe, both for the originality of his designs and for his skill as a colorist and draftsman. His American portrait work is quite rare since most of these pictures which he housed in Fredericksburg, Virginia were destroyed in the Civil War. This powerfully painted piece demonstrates his skill at its best.

5,000/8,000     SOLD: $10,351.15

7. August Laux (German, 1852-1921)

Fowl in a Barnyard.
Pair of oils on canvas. Painting of chickens signed lower right. Painting of chickens and peacock signed lower left, both framed.
10" x 14".

Laux was a popular and prolific Victorian painter who specialized in decorative and romantic subjects, particularly kittens at play, barnyard scenes, still lifes of fruit spilling out of baskets, and scenes of courtship.

3,000/5,000     SOLD: $3,538.55

8. Karl Witkowski (American, 1860-1910)

Young Woman with Chrysanthemum.
Oil on canvas, signed upper left and inscribed copyright 1900, framed.
12" x 10-1/4".

Karl Witkowski was an Austrian-born portraitist who trained under Jan Matejko in Poland, and eventually settled in the United States. He died in Newark, New Jersey. This romantic painting of a young girl is deceptively simple. The foreshortening of her face as it tilts back in space is a difficult pose impeccably rendered, and shows Witkowski's roots as a classically trained academic painter.

1,000/3,000     SOLD: $1,393.93

9. John Kavanaugh (American, 1857-1898)

Forest Landscape.
Oil on canvas, signed lower right, inscribed Paris 1884, framed.
21-1/2" x 15-1/4".

Kavanaugh used Cleveland as his home base throught his career. He studied and worked in Europe under several of the masters of the day, and exhibited work in the Paris Salons. He painted in Fountainbleau during the summers. Returning to Cleveland for the later portion of his life, he taught and was the director of the Art Club.

1,000/2,000     SOLD: $862.50

10. Frederick Carl Gottwald (American, 1860-1941)

Interior Scene: The Lesson.
Oil on canvas, signed lower right, framed.
18" x 22".

Note: Gottwald, who was born in Austria, lived and taught in Cleveland for a great deal of his career. He was instrumental in founding the Cleveland Society for Artists in 1913. Despite his strong Cleveland conenction, he traveled, studied, and exhibited widely in the United States and Europe.

2,000/4,000     SOLD: $1,611.15