Wolf Kahn and Robert Indiana at Surovek

Wolf Kahn 1927-2020

As we write this post, it’s a balmy and beautiful 79-degree spring day in Palm Beach and a snowy, 39 degree day in Brattleboro, Vermont, where Kahn spent summers painting the beautiful scenery.

Wolf Kahn
A Slight Curve in the Meadow’s Edge, 1989
Oil on canvas
52 x 72 inches
For sale at Surovek Gallery

Though Kahn loved his time in Vermont, he said that he did his best work in his Manhattan studio.

Wolf Kahn’s Manhattan Studio

Kahn died in 2020, at age 92, just three months after the death of  Emily Mason, his wife of more than 60 years.

Emily Mason and Wolf Kahn in their studio, 1958
Photographed by Tinto Brass

Next month, works from the couple’s private collection will be auctioned by Chiristie’s. Fields of Vision: The Private Collection of Artists Wolf Kahn and Emily Mason will feature Modern, Post-War and Contemporary paintings.

The collection includes works on paper, prints and sculptures, done by many of the artists with whom they admired and often befriended, like Richard Diebenkorn.

Richard Diebenkorn
Blue with Red, 1987
Image: 33 7/8 x 23 inches Sheet: 37 1/2 x 25 1/2
Woodcut in colors, on Echizen kozo Mashi paper
Edition: 174/200
Signed (initialed) lower right and dated. Numbered lower center
For sale at Surovek Gallery

Proceeds will go to the Wolf Kahn/Emily Mason Foundation to support art education.

Robert Indiana 1928-2018

Robert Indiana’s work of LOVE was one of the most recognizable artworks of the twentieth century. The artist himself called it the 20th century’s “most plagiarized work of art.”

Indiana moved from New York to a Victorian five-story house in the island town of Vinalhaven, Maine, in 1978, where he lived a quiet, seclusive life, much like the early twentieth century American artist, Marsden Hartley.

Robert Indiana
The Hartley Elegies: The Berlin Series, KVF l, 1991
Silkscreen on paper
59 1/2 x 59 1/2 inches
Edition of 50
Signed and titled: R. Indiana ’90 (l.r.) KVF (l.l.)
For sale at Surovek Gallery

Hartley was born in Maine in 1877, traveled extensively through Europe during his lifetime, and returned to Maine in 1937, at age 60. Indiana felt an intense kinship and admiration for the artist. In the 1990s, Indiana did a series of works, dedicated to Hartley called The Hartley Elegies. The Berlin Series, KVF l, part of The Hartley Elegies series, is an homage, not just to Hartley, but also to Karl von Freyburg, a young Prussian officer whose death was devastating to Hartley.

The Hartley Elegies. The Berlin Series, KVF l is currently on loan to the Farnsworth Art Museum as part of the exhibit Robert Indiana: The Hartley Elegies, which runs through January 2, 2022.

Robert Indiana
Picasso, 1974
Oil on canvas
60 x 50 inches
Signed and dated
For sale at Surovek Gallery

Picasso, done in 1974, is an homage to the Spanish artist, and incorporates Picasso’s middle name, Ruiz (which was also his father’s name) and the dates of his birth and death in the circular motif that Indiana incorporated in many of his works.

Since Robert Indiana’s death in 2018, his estate has been in litigation with a New York-based copyright holder. A settlement has recently been reached, the details have not been made public, but it has been reported that the settlement brings the estate a step closer to transforming Indiana’s home into a museum.

Please contact us if you would like more information about the works of Wolf Kahn, Robert Indiana or any of the other fine artists whose works are available at Surovek Gallery.