Clare Leighton

I recently bought a collection of 27 wood engravings by the incredible English-American artist Clare Leighton . These came from the estate of Carolyn Goldberg and were purchased prior to 1949.  They have literally sat in a box for eighty years! They are all in excellent shape, with full margins and well matted.


Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
The Birdcage, 1940
ed. 22/30
Wood engraving
7 x 5″

$1200

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Ellen hoeing, no date
ed. 15/50
Wood engraving
6 & 1/4″ x 4″

$800

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Lily, 1934
ed. 6/30
Wood Engraving

$600

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Flora
ed. 7/30
Wood engraving
4 x 3″
(I believe this to be a very rare print. It is listed in the estate documents as modern but not dated. I can find evidence of no other copy anywhere.)

$800

 

The Reverend Hill's Dream

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
The Reverend Hill’s Dream, 1942
ed. 12/50
Wood engraving
4 3/4 x 5 1/4″
How the Devil Came to the Reverend Hill, Illustration for Southern Harvest (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1942; London: Victor Gollancz, 1943)

$1200

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Tobacco Loopers, 1942
ed. 17/50
Wood engraving
7.5 x 5.5″

$950

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
The Landing, 1931
ed. 39/100
Wood engraving
8 3/8 × 12 1/2

sold

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Scything, 1935
ed. 12/30
Wood engraving
8.5″ x 5.75″

sold

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Top of the rise
ed. 25/50
wood engraving
8 & 1/8″ x 5 & 7/8″
$850

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
The Lovers, 1940
ed. 22/30
Wood engraving
7 .25 x 5″
From Under the Greenwood Tree

$1200

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Lovers in a wheatfield, 1944
Wood engraving
6.5″ x 4″

$950

 

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Ellen with her children, 1944
ed. 15/50
Wood engraving
6.5 x 4″

$850

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Dragging Brush, 1944
ed. 13/50
Wood engraving

$475

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Dressing the bride, 1940
ed. 18/30
wood engraving
7 x 5″

$1600

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Waterfall
ed. 2/30
Wood engraving
2 x 2.5″

$375

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Cotton Telescope
ed. 4/50
wood engraving
n.d.

$1600


Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
The Wreck, 1950
6/150
Wood engraving

sold

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Cotton Picker, 1942
ed. 13/50
wood engraving
2 x 3 & 1/8″

$650

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Windblown Tree
ed. 17/150
wood engraving
4.5 x 6.34″
n.d.

sold

 

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Some better country, 1944
ed. 7/50
wood engraving
2.5 x 3.5″

$475

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Driving Home
ed. 20/30
wood engraving
1.75 x 2.25″

$375

Clare Leighton (1901-1989)
Cotton Picking, 1941
ed. 18/50
Wood engraving
4.5 x 5.5″

$1250 

From Askart:

Clare Veronica Hope Leighton — engraver and writer — was born in London, England on April 12, 1898 and died in 1988, probably while residing in Woodbury, CT. Leighton immigrated to the United States in 1939 and became a citizen in 1945. Her oeuvre consists of market scenes, genre, docks, woodcuts, and wood engravings. Leighton studied at the Slade School of the University of London, and earned an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from Colby College in Waterville, Maine.

Leighton was a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters in New York City; an academician of the National Academy of Design in New York City; a fellow of the Royal Society of Painters, Etchers and Engravers in London; and the Society of American Graphic Artists. She exhibited at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts; the Art Institute of Chicago; and the Boston Public Library held a major retrospective in 1977.

Leighton’s work is represented in the collections of the Whistler House Museum of Art in Lowell, MA; the Museum of Modern Art in New York City; the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City; the Art Institute of Chicago in IL; the Cleveland Museum of Art in OH; the Mobile Museum of Art in Mobile, AL; the Lowe Art Museum in Coral Gables, FL; the Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens in Jacksonville, FL; the Michael C. Carlos Museum in Atlanta, GA; the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA; the Baltimore Museum of Art in MD; the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis, MN; the Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art in Loretto, PA; and the Print Club of Albany in NY.

References:
Davenport’s Art Reference 2001/2002, page 1133; Mantle Fielding,1986, page 532; Mallett, page 250; Dealer’s Choice Biographical Encyclopedia of American Painters… page 818; Whistler House Museum of Art files.