ALBERT ALEXANDER SMITH (1896 - 1940) Untitled (Funeral Procession, Florence).
Etching printed in brown on cream wove paper, 1922. 159x235 mm; 6¼x9¼ inches, full margins. Signed and numbered 2/75 in pencil, lower margin. Inscribed "April/22 Florence" in pencil on the frame back.
Provenance: Albert Alexander Smith; Alfred Renforth Smith, father of the artist (1940s); Reverend Frederick Rickford Meyers, Detroit, MI (1950s); private collection, Michigan (2023).
With a typed label on the frame back, "Work by Albert Alex Smith, 116 Rue Lamarck, Paris, France, Arr XVIII, American Agent, Alfred R Smith, 229 East 75th St, Manhattan", and a handwritten exhibition number 12 on the glass.
This scarce etching is part of an incredible trove of artworks by Albert Alexander Smith recently discovered in a 1920s large steamer trunk. It belonged to his father Alfred R. Smith who worked as his son's agent in New York. In the 1950s, Alfred Smith shipped this trunk to the Rev. Frederick R. Meyers of Detroit, a fellow World War I veteran and friend of Albert Alexander Smith who had become a minister. The undisturbed trunk was recently purchased from a storage facility and unpacked for the first time seventy years later.
