Help Me Identify My Artwork

March 1, 2009 6:11 AM

Can you help me identify my artwork, most of which I received as a gift. I put it all up here.

After we were married, nearly seven years ago, my wife and I were at a party at the house of friends of my wife's family. Well, a house they had bought to tear down, and--along with the house already owned next door--build a big mansion (they're rich). We both remarked that we liked some of the artwork they had hanging up, and they said: Oh, that belonged to the previous owners (note: also rich); you can have it if you want. And so we got a lot of art (except a few Georgia O'Keefe prints). We acquired some more at flea markets and the like, so--to paraphrase what someone once to Picasso--about half the art in the house we know nothing about, except that we like it. So we need your help to figure it out.

posted by FeldBum to media & arts (8 answers total)

The bottom right is by Marc Chagall. Is it signed? If it's signed in pencil it may be valuable, or it may just be a run of the mill reproduction. The colour wedding looks like a derivative Chagall knock off.
posted by fire&wings at 6:20 AM on March 1, 2009

I have one that is similar to the top-left one (Asian-style print of a mountain). I bought it in Hong Kong. They sell a lot like that, usually with a mountain and writing which I believe is a poem of sorts. Mine isn't a print; it's an ink drawing with black ink and a red chop (signature) on really, really thin paper. They are not uncommon, and not terribly expensive, but pretty neat in my opinion.
posted by Houstonian at 6:41 AM on March 1, 2009

Cool - I'll check it out when I get home. Don't think it's signed though...
posted by FeldBum at 6:42 AM on March 1, 2009

One of them is here. I don't know anything about it though. Just googled it.
posted by interplanetjanet at 6:51 AM on March 1, 2009

Thanks Janet; I always read that as Paya, and was never able to find anything. Now it seems so obvious.
posted by FeldBum at 7:11 AM on March 1, 2009

Thanks fire&wings - I found the drawing here
posted by FeldBum at 7:24 AM on March 1, 2009

I believe the Asian Mountain Portrait is a modified version of this.

It is done by 錢松岩(Chien Song Yeng? 1899~1985), a renown Chinese artist who spent 70 years of his life drawing. A lot of his work apparantly are about the Culture Revolution, including the one you have. This one is called 延安頌(Song of Yen-An?) and is considered among his famous work.

I am no expert in painting/drawings, just that I can read Chinese.
posted by jstarlee at 8:07 AM on March 1, 2009

I think that the Asian Mountain Portrait is normally called "Ode to Yan'an" or Yan'an song, painted in 1976, and the artist's name is normally written Qian Songyan.
posted by gemmy at 10:39 AM on March 1, 2009 [1 favorite]