MORRIS KANTOR by Yasuo Kuniyoshi

Morris Kantor was a Russian-born American painter based in the New York City area. Born in Minsk in 1896, Kantor was brought to the United States as a child in 1906. He made his home in West Nyack, NY for much of his life, and died there in 1974. He produced a prolific and diverse body of work, much of it in the form of paintings, which is distinguished by its stylistic variety over his long career.
Perhaps his most widely recognized work is the iconic painting "Baseball At Night", which depicts an early night baseball game played under artificial electric light. Although he is best known for his paintings executed in a realistic manner, over the course of his life he also spent time working in styles such as Cubism and Futurism, and produced a number of abstract or non-figural works.
Kantor found employment in the Garment District upon his arrival in New York City, and was not able to begin formal art studies until 1916, when he began courses at the now-defunct Independent School of Art. Later in his career, Kantor himself was an instructor at the Cooper Union^[1] and also at the Art Students League of New York^[2] in the 1940s, and taught many pupils who later became famous artists in their own right, such as Knox Martin, Robert Rauschenberg and Susan Weil. He married fellow artist Martha Rhyther (1896-1981).
In addition to his downtown Manhattan studio adjacent to Union Square, he also maintained a studio on Cape Cod in Wellfleet, Massachusetts. Like many American artists, in the 1920s he also spent time working in Paris, where his circle included sculptor Isamu Noguchi among others. The 1930s found him in the position of supervisor of the Federal Art Project's Easel Painting Project in Rockland County, New York. In the 1940s some of his summers were spent in Monhegan, Maine. He was active in sketching and drawing through the 1970s, until shortly before his death.
Kantor's work is on display in many prominent museums, including the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Hirshhorn Museum.
 Baseball at Night

 

1934 Morris Kantor Born: Minsk, Russia 1896 Died: Nyack, New York 1974 oil on linen 37 x 47 1/4 in. (94.0 x 120.0 cm.) Smithsonian American Art Museum Gift of Mrs. Morris Kantor 1976.146.18

Yasuo Kuniyoshi (国吉 康雄, Kuniyoshi Yasuo^?, 1 September 1893 - 14 May 1953) was an American painter, photographer and printmaker born in Okayama, Japan. He migrated to America in 1906, a year later began studying at the Los Angeles School of Art and Design. In 1935 he was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship. He taught at the Art Students League of New York in New York City and in Woodstock, New York. He was known for his still-life paintings of common objects, female circus performers and nudes. He died in New York City.
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