?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 4,000
LOUIS J. RHEAD (1858-1926) RICKSECKER PERFUMES. 25 1/8x15 5/8 inches. Condition B+: repaired tears in margins. Born in England (his father was a Wedgwood pottery artist), Rhead studied painting in Paris as a boy, then went to America as an Art Director for D. Appleton, a New York publisher. In 1891, he returned to Europe where he visited a show of works by Eugene Grasset at the Salon des Cent. He met the artist, and was inspired to become a poster designer. Back in America he was a prolific designer, completing about 100 posters during the second half of the 1890s. "That he was a devotee of Grasset's style was apparent in his work, and although he has often been derided for his adherence to this model, Rhead is actually the only artist to attempt to transfer the pure French Art Nouveau style to the United States" (Miller p. 222). This is a previously unrecorded poster by Rhead that likely is an early work. Many of the intricate details that are virtually a trademark of his work are absent here. Yet the charming simplicity of the illustration bears recognizable marks of the artist's mature style: the pattern on the dress and on the sail, the flowing hair and the water being churned up by the ship's prow.
