Carroll Cloar (Tennessee, 1913-1993) large signed graphite drawing on paper, doublesided, the first side depicting a smiling man wearing a hat and seated on a wooden crate, with three figures in the background. Titled lower left "Stevedore in Guayaquil, Ecuador" and signed "Carroll Cloar" lower right. Sketches en verso of a young girl. Float mounted and housed in a textured giltwood frame. Sheet: 40 1/2" H x 26 1/2" W. Framed: 50 3/8" H x 36 1/4" W. Likely one of Cloar's drawings from his travels in South America, circa late 1940s. Provenance: the Collection of Sylvia Roberts, Nashville, TN, formerly in the collection of Dr. Benjamin Caldwell of Nashville; acquired Brunk Auctions, May 20, 2006, lot 508. Biography: Carroll Cloar was known for incorporating nostalgic images from his Southern childhood, often merged with dreamlike motifs, into powerful magic realist scenes, and noted that literature, particularly by Southern Gothic writers such as William Faulkner or Eudora Welty, influenced his artistic approach. Cloar graduated from Southwestern College (now Rhodes College) in Memphis, Tennessee, and went on to study at the Memphis Academy of Arts under the artist George Oberteuffer. In 1936, he moved to New York to attend the Art Students League. There, CloarÕs achievements earned him a McDowell fellowship which he used to travel across the American Southwest, West Coast and Mexico. Cloar served with the Army Air Corps during World War II and upon his return, he was awarded a Guggenheim traveling scholarship to fund an extended sojourn to Central and South America. Two years later, several of his images were featured in a Life Magazine article titled 'Backwoods Boyhood', and Cloar's career went on to receive additional national acclaim. By the mid-1950s, Cloar had settled permanently in Memphis, where he produced paintings, often executed in casein tempera and acrylic paints. His works are in the collections of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, Brooks Museum of Art, and Library of Congress. In 1993, Cloar's painting, Faculty and Honor Students, Lewis Schoolhouse, was one of six paintings by American artists selected to commemorate the inauguration of President Clinton. (Source: The Johnson Collection/Memphis Brooks Museum of Art). Condition: Overall good condition. Perimeter of paper with creasing, minor scattered losses and very slight tears visible lower edge and left margin. Losses to paper upper left corner. Some minor brown specks, left mid section.