Vintage Sid Willis Toy Soldier British Military Still Life Oil Painting on Board 24"

Description

Vintage Sidney Willis (aka Sid, b.1930), still life oil painting featuring a toy solider scene or theme with British flag, horses / equestrian riders, gunmen, a cannon and nutcracker soldier. Purchased Robert William Galleries, Nantucket circa 2000.

Provenance:
Estate of J. Frederic Gagel, owner of multiple Thoroughbred race horses that competed in the Narragansett Special and Kentucky Derby. Their family heritage was strongly intertwined with the military having officers in battles dating back to the American Revolution.

Sidney F. Willis (Sid) was born in Bennington, New Hampshire, and attended the Vesper George School of Art. After graduating he began training with Robert Douglas Hunter. Being a graduate of both art school and the apprentice system, Sid builds his pictures with craftsmanship as well as artistic sensitivity.

He delights his viewers with luminous still lives and impressionistic landscapes that exude strong design and beautiful color harmonies. While his still lifes reflect solid academic values, they are also known to form unusual and interesting compositions. His subjects are often rare and distinctive antique toys, dolls, and figures as well as textiles, which are carefully chosen from throughout the New England countryside. These arrangements exhibit a truly unique elegance of design and achieve an extreme sense of pure color rarely seen.

Spending most of his time outdoors directly in nature, Sid captures all the New England scenery in his landscapes. In addition to numerous one-man shows Sid has exhibited at the Ogunquit Art Center, as well as in the Council of American Artists shows, Southern Vermont art show, and the Academic Artists show. Sid has received over 25 awards including, four Gold Medal at the Jordan Show (Boston), the Still Life Prize at the Pastel Society of America Show, Still Life Prize at the Ellsworth Gallery, Simsbury, Connecticut, Gold Medal and Best in Show, Guild of Boston Artists, and the Gold Medal, Heritage Salon Invitational. Alexandria, Virginia. Sid was also a professor at Franklin Pierce College, Sharon Art Center, New Hampshire, and the Vesper George School of Art.

Sid Willis is an artist of the Boston School Tradition. Trained by Robert Douglas Hunter, Willis does luminous still life and impressionistic landscape painting, striving for strong design, beautiful color harmonies, consummate draftsmanship, and interesting compositions.

His subjects, often rare and distinctive antiques and textiles, are carefully chosen from throughout his native New England countryside.

An American Impressionist, Mr. Willis spends much of his time painting outdoors, directly from nature. The New England countryside provides him with a never-ending supply of subjects for his landscapes. Though best known for still life, Willis has also won gold medals for landscapes and portrait, and has been honored for paintings in oil, pastel, and acrylic.

Condition

Very good, distressing to frame.

Dimensions

23.5" x 1" x 17.5" / Sans Frame - 16" x 10" (Width x Depth x Height)