Of the foremost realists of the 1930s, Reginald Marsh was fascinated by public behavior and the exciting commotion of New York. Tattoo and Haircut portrays a busy scene of people below the massive structure of the El on the Bowery, then an area notorious as a skid row. Rendered in Marsh’s gently satirical style are several city types: a derelict on crutches, loitering men conversing or smoking cigarettes, a chic woman walking by herself. Marsh used an egg tempera medium to fill every inch of the composition with details, from architectural elements to signs and text. Introduced to the artist by the muralist Thomas Hart Benton, the medium suited Marsh’s keen skills as a draftsman. Here he added successive films of tempera in muted colors, using its mottled, uneven surface to emphasize the grimy nature of this world. His technique thus reinforces his presentation of the subject: cacophonous, dilapidated, and dim, yet vibrantly alive.
"John S. Curry and Reginald Marsh," New York Tribune, April 8, 1933.
"Reginald Marsh's Bowery," New York Sun, April 8, 1933.
F. A. Blossom, "Reginald Marsh as a Painter," Creative Art 12 (1933), ill. p. 262, as "Tattoo–Shave–Haircut."
Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings in the Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection (Art Institute of Chicago, 1961), p. 295.
John FitzMaurice Mills, "Art Forum," The Irish Times (Jan. 11, 1966), p. 8, ill.
Matthew Baigell, The American Scene: American Painting of the 1930's (Praeger Publishers, 1974), pl. 2.
Judith A. Barter et al., American Modernism at the Art Institute of Chicago, From World War I to 1955, (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago/Yale University Press, 2009), cat. 82.
Frank K. M. Rehn Galleries, Paintings by Reginald Marsh, Apr 3–22, 1933, cat. 1, as Tattoo and Haircut.
Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress Exhibition of Painting and Sculpture, Jun 1–Nov 1, 1933, cat. 598.
New York, John Wanamaker New York, The Wanamaker Regional Art Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting, Oct 13–Nov 3, 1934, cat. 157.
New York, Ferargil Galleries, American Paintings Summer 1943, Jul 19–Sep 15, 1943, cat. 27.
New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Reginald Marsh, Sep 21–Nov 6, 1955, cat. 9, ill., traveled to Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, Nov 27–Dec 25, 1955, Detroit Institute of Art, Jan 13–Feb 12, 1956, City Art Museum, St. Louis, Mar 2–Apr 1, 1956, Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, Apr 15–May 20, 1956, Los Angeles Country Museum of Art, Jun 10–Jul 8, 1956, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Jul 25–Aug 26, 1956, San Francisco Museum of Art, Sep 13–Oct 14, 1956.
Lake Forest, Ill., Durand Art Institute, Lake Forest College, A Century of American Painting: Masterpieces Loaned by the Art Institute of Chicago, Jun 10–16, 1957, cat. 25.
New York, Gallery of Modern Art, Reginald Marsh, Dec 1, 1964–Jan 29, 1965, no cat.
Munich, Haus der Kunst, Amerikanische malerei, 1930–1980, Nov 14, 1981–Jan 31, 1982, cat. 141, ill.
Art Institute of Chicago, Mary and Earle Ludgin Collection, Sep 11–Oct 31, 1982, no cat.
Frank K. M. Rehn, by 1933; sold to John Wanamaker New York, by Oct. 1934; [Rehn Gallery again?]; [Ferargil Galleries in 1943?]; to Mr. and Mrs. Earle Ludgin, Chicago; given to Art Institute in 1947.
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