Madeline Hewes (American, 1912-1969), Watermelon Pickers

Madeline Hewes (American, 1912-1969)
Little is known about Madeline Hewes, other than what can be gleaned from an article on her which featured in Time Magazine in July 1952. An American artist, she worked from a studio in Connecticut but also travelled to France and Germany, marrying the German artist Eber hard von Jarochowski (b. 1904). She received no formal training and began painting in 1946 after several failed careers. In 1948 she had her first show, which was a sell out, and although remaining relatively unknown, her idiosyncratic style has charmed ever since. Today her work rarely comes on to the market and it was not until Mrs. Paul Mellon's sale at Sotheby's New York, 2014 - which included a wonderful collection of 14 works by Hewes's - that her work really received any international attention. The sale achieved a world record for the artist of $118,750 for a lot of three works and $37,500 for a single work entitled Monkey and Mosquito, such prices helping to rightfully establish Hewes as one of America's leading folk-artists of the Twentieth Century.