Print of the Day!! Fri, Aug 25, 2023 is by Max Pollak (1886-1970): "San Francisco, Between the Bridges", color intaglio, 1949, 91/150.

Print of the Day!! Friday, August 25, 2023. American printmaker Max Pollak (1886-1970). Check out our virtual booth at the Satellite Print Fair's on-line website: OnPaper.art: https://onpaper.art/the-annex-galleries ?

"San Francisco, Between the Bridges" is a color intaglio - a drypoint and aquatint, printed a la poupée, done in 1949. The platemark measures 12-7/8 x 20 inches. This impression is pencil signed, titled, and editioned "91/150" by the artist beneath the lower platemark. This impression was from the artist's personal collection. It was printed by the artist on a sheet of ivory wove paper that measures 16-3/8 x 22-3/8 inches. A reference for this image is the Triton Museum catalogue 63, illustrated page [16]. Our inventory number for this work is 23279.

This color intaglio by Max Pollak is available from the gallery for $1,500.00. Shipping costs will be discussed. California residents will have sales tax added. Out of state residents may be responsible for use tax, depending on state law.

This view is from the Marin Headlands looking southeast toward San Francisco, California. At top left is the Bay Bridge connecting San Francisco to east bay cities and at right are the towers of the Golden Gate Bridge which connects the city with Marin County and cities north. At the base of San Francisco Bay is Horseshoe Cove which is a historic marina at Fort Baker and at the top of the bay is San Francisco, often referred to as Baghdad by the Bay by columnist Herb Caen.

The cove was quiet and protected and the San Carlos, the first Spanish ship to sail into San Francisco Bay, anchored near these waters in 1775. The U.S. Army purchased the land in 1866 and the began building a breakwater. This area was used for the production of concrete for building the Golden Gate Bridge and the fort was instrumental for the defense of the San Francisco Bay during World War II.

Max Pollak was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia on February 27, 1886. As an infant his family moved to Vienna, Austria where he was raised and in 1902, at age sixteen, he entered the Vienna Academy of Art. There, he studied painting and printmaking under William Unger and Ferdinand Schmutzer. In 1912 he traveled to Italy, France, and Holland to study and paint. During the First World War, he was appointed official painter of the Austrian Army and documented the stark landscapes of the places where his battalion was stationed. On December 4, 1924 he married Friederike "Friedl" Knedel, daughter of Arnold Knedel and Bertha Schweinburg, who was born in Vienna in March of 1898.

Max and Friedl immigrated to the U.S. in 1927, arriving on December 16 in in New York and living for a time on the East Coast where Max traveled about and produced a series of color aquatints of New York, Cincinnati, and Detroit. His first exhibition at the 57th Street Art Gallery in New York was a commercial success and he was commissioned by Theodore Dreiser in 1929 to illustrate his book, My City, reproducing eight of Pollak's color aquatints of Manhattan.

In 1938, Max and Friedl moved to San Francisco, California. Pollak was inspired by his new city and its environs and produced views of San Francisco neighborhoods, the Golden Gate Bridge, and Sausalito. Later travels included frequent trips to Mexico and Guatemala in the 1930s, '40s, and '50s. Many of Pollak's European prints and most of his paintings were later confiscated by the Nazis, who considered them "degenerate" because he was Jewish.

To purchase this work, see other works, or read a biography for Max Pollak use this link to our website: https://www.annexgalleries.com/inventory/artist/1894/Pollak/Max

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