Mexican Series Circa 1940s

In the summer of 1940 Ralph and his wife Jane drove from Louisiana State University where he was Chairman of the Art Department to Guadalajara and Tosco in Mexico where they spent time with Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo. As Jane recalls, ”He was so ugly he was beautiful”. The summer yielded a series of watercolors created in the outdoors of the marketplaces of Guadalajara and Tosco.

Ralph Wickiser, Market in Tosco, 1940, Watercolor on Paper, 11.5” x 8”

Ralph Wickiser, Mexican Drawings: Guadalahara Jail, 1940, Watercolor, 11” x 8”

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 4, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5 x 8

Ralph Wickiser, Mexican Series: Taxco Chapel, 1938, Watercolor on Paper, 9.5" x 7.5”

Ralph Wickiser, Mexican Series: Patzcuaro, 1938, Watercolor on Paper, 9.5" x 7.5”

Ralph Wickiser, Mexican Series: Mexican Boys, 1938, Watercolor on Paper, 9.5" x 7.5”

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 3, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 6, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 7, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 8, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 2, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 1, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled 5, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Helen, 1938, Pastel on Paper, 11” x8.5”

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled Figure I, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Ralph Wickiser, Untitled Nude I, Circa late 1930s, Watercolor, 11.5" x 8"

Early landscapes figurative drawings Circa 1940s

Ralph Wickiser, Landscape III, Late 1940's, Watercolor, 8.5 x 11

Ralph Wickiser, Landscape V, Late 1940's, Watercolor, 11” x 8.5”

Ralph Wickiser, Landscape II, Late 1940's, Watercolor, 8.5 x 11

Ralph Wickiser, Landscape IV, Late 1940's, Watercolor, 11" x 8.5"

Ralph Wickiser, Landscape I, Late 1940's, Watercolor, 11" x 8.5"

Abstract drawing of early 1950s

Wickiser was included in the 1953 Annual at the Whitney Museum in the company of colleagues Milton Avery, Adolph Gottlieb, and Willem de Kooning. As a Woodstock Artist Association insider and head of the Pratt Institute’s Master of Fine Art program, Wickiser worked closely with friends Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Jacob Lawrence, Stephen Pace, Franz Kline, and Philip Pearlstein. Wickiser’s non-objective abstractions from the 1950s were created with lush Tonalist impasto of interlaced geometric shapes; inspired by Matthias Grunewald’s Isenheim Altarpiece, the artist sought to create a visual metaphor of uplift and resurrection.