Oil on artist board, circa 1940-50. 500x605 mm; 19 3/4x24 inches. Signed in pencil, lower right recto.
Beatrice Mandelman (1912-1998) worked in the Federal Art Project, WPA, New York, from 1935-42, first as a muralist then as a printmaker. During this period she associated with many New York School artists, including Willem De Kooning, Arshile Gorky, Stuart Davis and Jackson Pollock. In 1942, she married Louis Ribak, who studied under John Sloan; on his recommendation they moved to New Mexico and in 1944 they traveled to Santa Fe, finally settling in Taos. In the 1940s and 1950s an influx of artists arrived from New York and California including Agnes Martin, who along with Mandelman, Ribak, Ed Corbett, Agnes Martin, Oli Sihvonen and Clay Spohn, became known as the 'Taos Moderns".
