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John McDermott (1919-1977) Original Gouache Sailing/Boating Painting - $600 (Johnston, Rhode Island)
condition:
excellent
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Please call me at show contact info with any questions or to view the painting with no obligations to buy. Thank you, Tom.
I acquired this vibrant painting from the estate of another notable illustrator, sculpture and collector, Carl J. Pugliese (1916-1982). Included in Pugliese's impressive collection were several other original John McDermott illustration paintings. I happen to believe this one to be the nicest of them all, but then again, I am from the "Ocean State" of Rhode Island and am fond of sailing images.
Also included in Carl Pugliese's outstanding collection were several other prominent illustrators including Howard Pyle, Tom Lovell, Dean Cornwell, JC Leyendecker, Norman Price and Matt Clark, amongst others. All of this original art is fresh to the market and I believe the majority of them have been published in different popular magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post, Outdoor Life and True magazine, to name a few.
Considering the quality of this particular painting, I feel as though it most likely it was published as well, although, I just have not done the legwork to figure that out. I will leave that up to the winning bidder to decide if they want to do a little research to locate which publication is was in.
For the record, John McDermott was know to have his work published with Outdoor Life, American Weekly, Argosy, Blue Book and his military illustrations were published in Leatherneck magazine as well. Additionally McDermott had many of his paintings used for the cover of various pulp fiction novels.
This is without a doubt an excellent example of his work! It is in excellent vintage condition. Under a black light it shows no signs of paint loss, in-painting or repair.
Unframed the painting measures 14" wide x 18" in height and together with the original rustic wooden frame it measures 18" x 22". The handsome vintage frame has a depth of 2 1/2" and it too is also in excellent condition.
As for the artist, John McDermott was a man of many talents who accomplished a great deal over the course of his career. John was born in Pueblo, Colorado in 1919, the younger of two sons of Henry McDermott, and oil broker. McDermott was a young child when his father committed suicide. The family eventually moved to Los Angeles where McDermott's mother, Hazel, worked in a beauty parlor.
Raised in Hollywood, McDermott showed interest in illustration and animation in his youth. After his graduation from Hollywood high school in 1936, and despite having no formal training in art education, McDermott secured a job at Walt Disney Studios as in "inbetweener or tweener." In a large animation studio, a lead artist would create the principal frames and poses. The job of the inbetweener was to create the necessary action in between these principal frames, connecting and making the animation flow. McDermott worked as an inbetweener and effects animator on several famous Disney productions including Pinocchio and Fantasia.
On September 29 1942, McDermott enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps to join the forces and fight in World War II. He served as a "Pistol and Palette" Combat Artist assigned to the map-making section. As a sergeant with the 3rd Amphibious Corps, McDermott was involved in battles in the South Pacific theater of war, documenting the Guam, Okinawa and the Guadalcanal Campaigns. Documenting the war in the South Pacific was an experience that honed McDermott's skills as an artist. In his own words: "In the Marines, as a combat artist, I traveled with the troops and for three years got all the drawing opportunity anyone would want. My work changed dramatically during this time and I'm sure it was due to constant drawing, every single day, from life, just putting down what I saw around me. In a few instances, it was a dangerous kind of scholarship."
According to the Marine Corps history journal Fortitudine, McDermott was so prolific that his contemporary style pen-and-ink sketches became easily recognizable to both Marines and civilians, from glossy copies supplied by the Marine Corps to the nation's press.
McDermott's wartime work was published in Leatherneck magazine and several other newspapers and publications. Today his wartime art work appears in World War II history books and is displayed in art museums, The National Museum of the Marine Corps, and the Pentagon.
Following the end of World War II, McDermott moved from California to New York City where he worked as a freelance illustrator. He quickly became known for his dramatic illustrations of various action and adventure tales. As mentioned, his work adorned the covers and inside story pages in many popular 1950's magazines including Argosy, Adventure, Blue Book, Outdoor Life and American Weekly, as well as the covers of many pulp fiction novels published by Dell, Fawcett Gold Medal, Bantam Mystery and others. His graphics were geared toward thriller and detective genres, such as Donald Hamilton's Matt Helm books Murderer's Row and The Betrayers. He also created covers for science fiction comic titles such as Voyage to the Deep and horror-themed paperbacks as the classic science fiction novel The Body Snatchers. Often McDermott's professional signature was the initials "McD" written in small script.
In the 1960's, McDermott began writing novels under the pen name, J.M. Ryan and Mariner. His first novel, Brooks Wilson, was adapted into the 1970 movie Loving, starring George Segal and Eva Marie Saint and in 1969 Mother's Day about Ma Barker. His novel The Rat Factory was a satirical story based upon McDermott's experiences during the 1941 Disney's animators' strike.
Another activity pursued by McDermott was amateur film making. Armed with a 16mm movie camera, and using friends and family members for the cast, he would create reenactments of historical battles. One of his films, Pickett's Charge, was used by PBS in the Odyssey TV series, and in 1958 it was aired on CBS with an introduction by Dwight D. Eisenhower and Sir Bernard Law Montgomery.
McDermott, a tall man with piercing eyes, was well liked and people enjoyed being around him. Always a beehive of activity, he was referred to as "an ongoing fireworks display." John McDermott passed away on April 20, 1977 in Westport, Connecticut, where he lived with his wife, Ruth with whom he had two daughters. He will be remembered as "a creative genius of wide-ranging talent."
Again, please call me at show contact info with any questions or to view the painting with no obligations to buy. Thank you, Tom.