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At the beginning of his career, Frank Brangwyn was considered pioneering: Vassily Kandinsky named him as one of the first artists to use color in the modern manner, Siegfried Bing invited him to paint decorations at his famous Paris shop L’Art Nouveau, and Louis Comfort Tiffany commissioned stained-glass designs. He became best known as a muralist, and his highly ornamental compositions lent themselves to grandly scaled architectural decoration. In the United States, he painted murals in the elevator lobby at 30 Rockefeller Center. In keeping with a British artistic tradition dating back until at least the time of Canaletto, Venice was one of Brangwyn’s favorite places to paint. The subject of this painting is the Bucintoro, the state barge of the Venetian Doge. By the end of his career, Brangwyn, who painted figures in historical costume and felt that Picasso was a bad influence on younger artists, was viewed as a traditionalist.

Gallery label for installation of YCBA collection, 2016