Original Rare 1935 1st Edition Pencil Signed, Numbered and Dated Paul Cadmus Ltd. Ed. Etching "Shore Leave"

Description

"Shore leave ", a fabulous etching by the controversial American artist Paul Cadmus is from the 1st ed. of 50 … more "Shore leave ", a fabulous etching by the controversial American artist Paul Cadmus is from the 1st ed. of 50 printed in 1935. also did not generate the controversy that "Shore Leave " did. Small edition,first edition, very good cond., evoked much controversy and publicity and one of Cadmus' most desirable and rare ltd. ed. prints. This is the only example of this etching that we can find on the open market.

Both The Fleet's In! and Shore Leave are based on Paul Cadmus' paintings of the same subjects. The artist called himself "a satirist by nature," and here he lampoons the raucous exploits of sailors on leave. The paintings especially made Cadmus notorious. At the time it was painted, he was employed by the federal Public Works of Art Project. The painting was accepted for inclusion in a 1934 PWAP exhibition at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., but officials at the Navy Department objected to the subject and had it removed. In response, Cadmus produced an etching of the same subject and its companion, Shore Leave, commenting, "I'm going to do the picture as an etching. They can tear up the canvas, but they'll have a sweet time eating copper."

Paul Cadmus's Shore Leave depicts a lusty scene of carousing sailors and their new-found playmates in west side Manhattan's Riverside Park, then a notorious site for temporary liaisons. At left, one sailor in a tight-fitting uniform and his eager companion stand cheek to cheek in a clinging embrace, an empty gin bottle discarded on the ground. At right in a tangle of interlocking arms and legs, three couples engage in a boisterous partner-grabbing game as two laughing women and one hesitant sailor are restrained by their companions. Between these groups animated by carnal desire, a man lies on the ground with his legs wide apart; Cadmus skillfully foreshortened his body and his head, which appears to nestle against another reclining figure's legs. In the middle ground to the right, a dapper man places a hand on a sailor's shoulder in an overture to intimacy. Beyond them, high-rise apartment buildings stand on a hill under bulbous high clouds.

In 1934, ten years after he made his first intaglio prints, Cadmus began to create etched versions of his paintings. This one, based on his painting Shore Leave (1933, Whitney Museum of American Art), demonstrates the artist's use of precedents from Renaissance art, notably in the pyramidal arrangement of figures, which also recalls the composition of the etching The Barker (TF 1995.44)by Reginald Marsh, a contemporary of Cadmus's who also pictured typical modern American urban types. Shore Leave is typical of Cadmus's art in its exuberant celebration of the human figure. This precisely-drawn etching demonstrates his skillful draftsmanship, mastery of social realism, and talent for evoking a carnival of debauchery with a wink and a smile.
Shore Leave
etching
signed l.r. in margin
titled on mat l.l.
framed
10.25 x 11.5 in. (plate size); approx 12"H x 15"W (sheet size)
Condition: Good, light toning

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