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Major Estate Collection

Louis Lazare Schaff

American Artist · 1898-1982

 

Oil/canvas/board - Cafe Entrance - Portland - dated 1959-60 - 24" x 18" - SOLD

An Artist Rediscovered

What is perhaps the highlight of being an art scholar, dealer or museum curator is the rediscovery of a forgotten and forsaken artist. Twenty-five years after his death, the estate collection of Louis Lazare Schaff found its way to Matthew's Galleries, as opposed to a flea market, garage sale or trash can.

Schaff was born in New York, July 28, 1898. His early art studies were at Art Students League in New York during the late 1920s and early 1930s. He began to exhibit his work in the early 1930s at the Salons of America, Rockefeller Center, and other New York venues. Schaff had ties to Oregon early as 1923 when he climbed Mt. Hood. He ultimately settled in Portland, Oregon in the 1940s. While supporting himself selling life insurance, Schaff continued his painting, and studying art. In 1956 he was accepted as an "Artist Member" of the Portland Art Museum through the Portland Art Association. His work was exhibited at the Portland Art Museum and other locations during the 1950s.

With his roots in New York, and obvious exposure to the "Ashcan School", it is no surprise that Schaff was essentially a genre artist, a painter of the common person in ordinary surroundings. People in various activities appear in most of his paintings: street scenes, dances, restaurants, the theatre, horse races, ball games, the circus, and wherever the public gathers. Schaffs style evolved into an energetic expressionist manner. He used color and lively brushwork to evoke an optimistic mood in most of his art, and he did not hesitate to express his distinct personality. Known as a man with a sense of comedy, this wit is often evident in his paintings. At times his work brings to mind that of Oregon artist Charles Heaney, an artist whom he greatly admired.

Schaff's early representational drawings show technical skill, especially in figure studies and portraits. He would later apply this ability to modern styles in oil, acrylic, watercolor, pastel, encaustic, complex mixed media and some sculpture. Besides his painting, Schaff was a skilled printmaker working in etching, aquatint, lithograph, monotype, linocut and woodcut. Schaff painted while vacationing with his wife Ava Marie, whom he married late in life in 1971. As a result, his Portland and New York subjects were supplemented with scenes of Europe and Mexico during the 1970s and early 1980s. Again, his work in foreign countries would depict people in everyday activities.

Louis Lazare Schaff died in Portland, Oregon in 1982 leaving behind a diverse body of work spanning almost 60 years.

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Walking the Dogs - oil/canvopaper 16" x 20" - SOLD Figures and Faces - oil pastel/acrylic Circa 1960s - 15" x 18" - #6183 Grocery - oil/canvas board Dated 1952 - 16" x 20" - SOLD Passover - oil/canvas board Dated 1962 - 16" x 20" - #6006

Click here to see a small selection
of our Schaff estate collection