Feb 04, 2021 - Sale 2557

Sale 2557 - Lot 149

Price Realized: $ 552
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200

HUGO GELLERT (1892-1985)


Karl Marx, Capital in Pictures: Plate 28.
Lithograph. 356x330 mm; 14x13 inches, wide margins. Edition of 133. Signed in pencil, lower right. From the same-title portfolio. Printed by Desjobert, Paris. 1933.

A very good impression.

Gellert was born in Budapest and immigrated to New York in 1906. He studied at Cooper Union and the National Academy of Design. During World War I, he became interested in politics and began making illustrations for radical political publications. A member of the Communist Party of America, he focused his career on making artwork that was accessible to the public, such as illustrations in newspapers and magazines, murals and posters. In 1938, he painted the murals at the Communications Building at the New York World's Fair; during the fair's planning he also oversaw he formation of a labor union to protect the rights of artists as it was being planned. He continued to remain loyal to the Communist Party throughout his career and life, founding the American Artist's Congress, a Communist organization, and eventually facing investigation by the House of Un-American Activities Committee.