Lot 203: Meyer Wolfe Lithograph, Mooney’s Place

Meyer R. Wolfe (Tennessee/New York, 1897-1985), “Mooney’s Place,” 1936, American Regionalist lithograph depicting two African American men in a room, possibly a bar, in Nashville, Tennessee. A partially empty bottle sits on a table in the foreground while a third man, seen through a window, enters the room. Titled and numbered “Ed 20″ lower left. Signed and dated lower right. Housed under glass in a simple, ebonized wood frame with cream mat. Sight: 16 1/2″ H x 13 1/2″ W. Framed: 24 3/4″ H x 20 3/4” W. Note: this print belongs to a series of approximately 15 lithographs created by Wolfe that depict the lives of African Americans in Nashville during the Jim Crow era. It may depict a relatively new drinking establishment following the end of prohibition in Tennessee a few years earlier, in 1933. This particular image, along with Wolfe’s “Women Bathing” and “Brother Mathew Preaching” from the same series, are among the Wolfe lithographs in the collection of the Smithsonian Museum of American Art. Biography: Meyer (“Mike”) Wolfe was born into a Jewish Lithuanian immigrant family, the second of ten children. He was raised in a low-income, multiracial neighborhood of Nashville just north of the Tennessee State Capitol, where he observed the social and cultural lives of his African American friends. As a teen with an interest in drawing, he became a protege of Pulitzer Prize-winning Nashville cartoonist Carey Orr. In 1917 he studied briefly at the Art Institute of Chicago and worked as an illustrator. In 1918 he moved to New York and met Ashcan School painter John Sloan, who became one of his most influential teachers. Wolfe traveled to Paris in 1926 to train at the Academie Julian in Paris. While overseas, he met (and later married) the fashion photographer Louise Dahl-Wolfe. Meyer exhibited at the San Francisco Art Association, the New York 1939 World’s Fair, and in Nashville, where he later returned to live. However, much of his later life was spent supporting and managing his wife’s career, and as a result, many of Wolfe’s paintings and prints were never publicly shown or sold. His narrative lithographs of African American life in Nashville during the 1930s are considered among his most important works and very rarely come on the market. His work is also held by the National Museum of American Art-Smithsonian Institution, the Tennessee State Museum, and the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum, Minneapolis. Sources: “Meyer Wolfe: The Star of All Things” (digital catalog for the 2021 exhibition at the Nashville Parthenon); Dr. Lawrence Wolfe; Robert Ikard, Tennessee Historical Quarterly, Summer, 2007.

PROVENANCE: Estate of Dr. Lawrence Wolfe, Nashville, Tennessee.

CONDITION: Overall very good condition. With marginal foxing at left and lower right, outside of image. Not examined outside of frame. Negligible abrasions and paint loss to frame. Negligible abrasions and paint loss to frame.