Gouache on artist's board, monogrammed and dated 1955 at lower left, titled and inscribed on the verso, framed.

DOA 11.75 x 17 in.

From the Estate of the Artist

Exhibited: "Two Modernists Revisited," Kouros Gallery, Jan. 6-29, 2011, New York, NY.

This painting was completed during the Cold War in the year of the Warsaw Pact. The fantasy figure is reminiscent of the work by Paul Klee, as referenced in a Wall Street Journal review of Danella's work:
"Mr. Danella began his career creating Paul Klee-inspired abstractions including the small, substantial figurative gouache Nail Biter (1955)" (The Wall Street Journal, Jan. 8, 2011).

Danella began his early studies in Utica at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute. By the age of sixteen, in 1944, he had moved to NYC and enrolled at the Art Students League. While in NYC he befriended Alfred Stieglitz and John Marin. He later met and impressed Josef Albers, whose geometric abstractions and color studies greatly influenced Danella during the period this painting was completed. Danella went on to influence his own cadre of students, never setting the brush down himself.

$500 - 1,000