Friday, December 23, 2011

"Naboo", 2011, oil/baltic birch, 24"-28" by Marc Salz. I got the title from watching the "Star Wars" movie series with my grandson Sammy. The planet Naboo intrigued me. It was a planet where art and architecture were highly regarded. This painting and the following two were part of eight of my paintings featured in a group show titled "REAL ABSTRACT" at the Hopkins House Gallery of Contemporary Art in Haddon Township, New Jersey (May 21-June 25, 2011).
Space Walking", 2010, oil/baltic birch, 24"-28".
"Pipe Dreams", 2010, oil/baltic birch, 18"-28". The painting is related to that scene in Jacques Tati’s “Mon Oncle” as Mr.Hulot visits a plastics tubing factory when the main conveyer turns out irregular tubes some parts with more air in them than others. Great movie and director. This work is from the “Science Frictions” series. 

Saturday, December 17, 2011

My mother, stage name Marina Franca, being waited on in the Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo production of "Gaite Parisienne".

Saturday, December 10, 2011

"Star Child”(for George Crumb), 2002, oil on baltic birch,18"-15". From the series “Other Languages”(2001-2005). For composer George Crumb. 

Monday, November 28, 2011

 “
Winter/Spring”, 2006, oil/Baltic birch, 16"-20". Two fields for Vincent.

Friday, November 18, 2011

"Castle"(for Kafka), 2003, oil/baltic birch.
                   19"-17".
                  This painting is for Franz Kafka
                   and Paul Klee, the two "K"s.
            
                   Klee's paintings contain arrows that lead to
                   no specific direction
                   for those wandering characters
                   in Kafka's novels.

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

                       The painting wall of my studio.
                       A studio rented from 1976-2013.
        My painting wall in the studio but without a painting.
        The wall tells all.
                                                 

Sunday, October 30, 2011

“Tract", 2008, oil/baltic birch, 16"-17".
         
"Gong"(for Anton Webern), 2008, oil/baltic birch, 18"-16". Anton Webern composed miniatures in sound where every note counted. Even the sound of a gong. I have wanted most of my work to be the visual equivalent of the resonating sound of a gong. You see it(“hear it”) and leave with a resonance.
   Red Hot"(for Charlie Feathers), 2009, oil/baltic birch, 16"-16". Named for rockabilly legend Charlie Feathers.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

 From 2021 by Andre Salz, 20”-24”, oil/canvas. More of my brother’s paintings can be seen on posts 11/23/07.

Monday, October 3, 2011

Sam Salz and Erich Maria Remarque.

The photo above is of one of my father's best friends: writer Erich Maria Remarque ("All Quiet On the Western Front", "Three Comrades"). Around 1942 when Remarque was in New York, he would visit my father (Sam Salz) many times at my father's apartment at the Ambassador Hotel where they would have long discussions on art. The writer was also a collector of Impressionist paintings and would buy several works from him (Cezanne, Degas and others). Along with Marlene Dietrich, they would all play cards at the Ambassador while World War Two raged on and Hitler marched through one country after another. The film director Billy Wilder("Some Like It Hot") was also an expatriot who would stop by and buy art as well. Later my father would visit Remarque and his wife the actress Paulette Goddard when he was near his home in the town of Porto Ronco, Switzerland.  As a result of their friendship, my brother Andre was given the middle name of "Eric". Here is a link to the Erich Maria Remarque Peace Center in Osnabruck, Germany: http://www.remarque.uos.de/internet.htm









Saturday, August 20, 2011





”Floating Islands”, 2000-2023, watercolor/gouache, 14”-17”. 
  Dancers from the Ballet de Paris, 1937. My mother Marina Franca(Marina Salz) is third from the right. Alexandra Danilova is first on the right. My mother, along with Danilova, would go on to dance for "Les Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo".  Her stage name then was Marina Franca. 



Saturday, August 13, 2011

“Blue Dancer”, 2001, watercolor, 12”-10”. In memory of my mother.



Friday, July 29, 2011

My mother Marina Salz (Marina Franca) doing the can can in a publicity photo for the Ballet Russe production of Gaite Parisienne(1939).


Saturday, May 28, 2011

Penumbra", 1995, oil/wood, 24"-32" by Marc Salz. This painting and the painting below ("Dimitri's Dream") were both in a solo show in Millersville University in 1996 curated by John Markowitz. The photos are by Will Brown. 







“Dimitri's Dream", 1995, Oil/wood, 25"-33". The "Dimitri" in the titled refers to composer Dimitri Shostakovich. I was also looking at the films of Andrei Tarkovsky and their use of the elements earth, water, fire and air: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25LlcZDHhXg
For more triptychs from the series, please go to posts made on September 5, 2010 and on July 2, 2008.





Thursday, April 14, 2011

"The Ages"(for Agnes Martin), 2001, oil/Baltic birch, 27"-23". From the series “Other Languages”(2001-2005). The ages as seen in a section of a tree or in the wrinkles in our skin. The fingerprints of time. 



  “Field”(for Vincent), 2002, oil/baltic birch, 30"-23". From the series “Other Languages”(2001-2005). Dedicated to all immigrants and to their many language that surround our own. 

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

“Spirit”, 2002, watercolor, 12”-10”. From the “Meditations” series. 
“Vanishing Spirit”, 2002, watercolor, 12”-10”. .

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Sam Salz, Marc Chagall's dealer.

"The Art Dealer Sam Salz"("Kunsthandler"), a photo by August Sander from his series on professions during the 1920s Weimar period in Germany. This photo was taken of my father in front of his gallery in Cologne where he sold Chagall, Arp and Braque. Two Chagalls he sold, "Birthday" and "Over Vitebsk", eventually were bought by the Museum of Modern Art in New York where they are still in the collection. The then mayor and later chancelor Konrad Adenauer attended one of the gallery's openings. For showing and selling modern art, my father got on the list of the rising Nazi party. He then left for Paris. Here is a link to "Birthday" on the MoMA website: http://www.moma.org/collection/provenance/provenance_object.php?object_id=79360

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

"The Asparagus", by Edouard Manet, Musee D'Orsay, 16.5"-21.5", oil on canvas, gift of Sam Salz. My father was a poor painter in Paris before he had a gallery in Germany and later became a famous art dealer in America. He was in awe of the paintings in the Louvre then and did not forget that later on when he had this Manet which was hanging in his bedroom. I used to laugh at it's simplicity when I was a child. His response was:"Don't laugh! It's a masterpiece!". He gave the painting to the Musee D'Orsay in 1959. Here is a link to the painting on the Musee D'Orsay's website:

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Two portraits of Sam Salz by Ensor and Vuillard.

"Portrait of Sam Salz", by James Ensor, 1929, opaque watercolor on paper, 10"-12", the Philadelphia Museum of Art. James Ensor was a Belgian painter who's paintings were sometimes of masks and sculls. They were often deliberate political commentaries and many times disturbing in their black humor. My father Sam Salz was one of Ensor's dealers and a good friend who set up some of his later still lifes with sea shells. Above is a portrait by Ensor which is now in the Philadelphia Museum of Art which owns paintings that were once in the collections of Louis Stern and Henry McIlhenny who both bought from Sam Salz. Ensor dedicated it to him: "For Salz, the ace of art past, present and future".


Wednesday, March 9, 2011


 "Portrait of Sam Salz" by Edouard Vuillard, 1939, pastel and gouache, 20"-13.5". Sam Salz was Vuillard's principal American dealer. He also knew and sold the paintings of Pierre Bonnard whom he visited at his studio in Le Cannet in the South of France. My father left Paris for America in the early thirties but returned to it in 1937. In 1939 he introduced Vuillard to the actor Edward G. Robinson. Both he and Robinson then had their portraits painted at different locations. My father's portrait was done in Vuillard's studio. He gave Vuillard an art book which is on the table to the right. This was in contrast to the Robinson family portrait done at the Plaza Athenee Hotel. My father first introduced Vuillard to Robinson as "A famous movie actor from America". Vuillard did not recognize him and added "I never go to the movies". Soon after, Hitler and the Nazis marched into Paris. Vuillard was stuck but my father and Robinson along with his wife and son made it out on time with their portraits. My father's father Moshe Salz and his two sisters were not so lucky. They were shot by the Nazis near their town of Radomysl, Poland in 1941. This painting is posted in commemoration of the thirty year anniversary of Sam Salz's death on March 22, 1981. My parents Sam and Marina Salz also donated a Vuillard painting ("Dinnertime") to the Museum of Modern Art in 1961. Here is a link to the painting: http://www.moma.org/collection/browse_results.php?criteria=O%3AAD%3AE%3A6194&page_number=2&template_id=1&sort_order=1

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

"Beginnings", 2004, oil/wood, 20"-13" by Marc Salz. Part the series “Other Languages”(2001-2005). This painting was reproduced in a review by the Philadelphia Inquirer for my 2004 one person show at the More Gallery.

Saturday, January 15, 2011

"Ocean"(for Tom Waits), 2003, oil/wood, 21"-22" from the series “Other Languages”(2001-2005).