This Harry Beckhoff illustration is masterfully rendered and intricately designed in line and wash. It's as abstract as it's representational with its graphic style, clean lines, and flat patterning. Every element in the composition works in harmony without a line out of place. The flat and abstract nature of the work rivals that of the great modernist painters of the 1930s.
Perhaps this was done for a major newsstand magazine like Collier's.
Although he studied with Dean Cornwell and Harvey Dunn, he didn't pursue the style of painterly brushstrokes and impastos. Instead, he defined his forms with flat shapes, whose internal forms are defined by thin lines. The emphasis is more on silhouette and line than it is on texture and lighting. Beckhoff also described his work as having been influenced by illustrators like Pierre Brissaud.
As with all the illustrators of the Golden Age of American illustration, Beckhoff is overlooked and underappreciated.
The work is framed from the pioneering collector and illustration advocate Estate of Charles Martignette
framed to an overall size of 23 x 12.5
Harry Beckhoff, American 1901 -1979
16.5- 6 inches US$12,000
