EDWARD (PECHMANN) RENOUF, AMERICAN, CONNECTICUT 1906-1999, UNTITLED, Cast iron, 117 x 23 x 20 1/2 in. (297.2 x 58.4 x 52.1 cm.)

EDWARD (PECHMANN) RENOUF
AMERICAN, CONNECTICUT, 1906-1999
UNTITLED
Cast iron
Catalogue note:
Born in China to an American academic father and a German mother, Edward von Pechmann Renouf attended Harvard and Columbia before moving to Mexico City in 1941. Renouf spent fifteen years in Mexico, where he studied art with muralist Carlos Merida and worked closely with influential Surrealist painter and philosopher Woolfgang Paalen. Around 1959, Renouf left Mexico and settled in Washington, Connecticut. He began frequently exhibiting his iron sculptures, often made with repurposed farm equipment, at galleries and museums in New York City. In 1960 the artist Fairfield Porter, a former Harvard classmate of Renouf, wrote: "He welds sculpture out of junk like Stankiewicz ... and he makes things that illustrate his memory and fantasy...Edward has developed an almost academic manner of the best sort, meaning, a kind of morality of openness, as one who has seen enough to become civilized..."

In the 1960s, Renouf's sculpture was featured in three of the Whitney Museum of American Art's annual exhibitions. His work was also the subject of solo exhibitions at the New York Botanical Garden, Sculpture Center New York and Ruth White Gallery, and group exhibitions at Zabriskie Gallery and Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, among others. Around 1971, Renouf expanded his focus to include abstract paintings and drawings as well as sculpture. He was represented by Allan Stone Gallery, who hosted two solo exhibitions of Renouf's paintings in 1978 and 1980, as well as Renouf's final New York show in 1982. Renouf passed away in 1999; two years later, the Washington Art Association in Connecticut held a retrospective exhibition of his work.

Renouf's work is featured in the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Art (Washington, D.C.), Whitney Museum of American Art (New York, NY), Phoenix Art Museum (Phoenix, AZ) and Yale University Art Gallery (New Haven, CT), among others.

Provenance:
From the artist and by descent to the present owner Dimensions: 117 x 23 x 20 1/2 in. (297.2 x 58.4 x 52.1 cm.) Artist Name: EDWARD (PECHMANN) RENOUF Medium: Cast iron

Condition: For a detailed condition report please request more information.