Feb 13, 2014 - Sale 2338

Sale 2338 - Lot 54

Price Realized: $ 2,750
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,500 - $ 2,500
CHARLES SALLÉE (1911 - 2006)
Untitled (Portrait of a Young Boy).

Conté crayon on buff laid paper, mounted to thin cardstock, 1937. 254x178mm; 10x7 inches. Signed and dated in conté crayon, lower right.

Provenance: private collection.

Cleveland artist Charles Sallée taught at Karamu House while obtaining a BS degree in education in 1938 at Western Reserve University. He also worked on Works Progress Administration projects from 1935 to 1941. He was initially commissioned to make prints - many of his etchings are now housed in the Cleveland Public Library WPA collection and the Cleveland State University Art Gallery - before joining the mural division. A mural he painted for the Portland Outhwaite Homes, this country's first federal housing project, is a neoclassical portrayal of the expectations and ambitions of black families moving to Cleveland. Sallée also did WPA-commissioned murals for Sunny Acres Hospital, the Cleveland Municipal Airport, and the Fort Hays Homes in Columbus, Ohio.