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G - ARTISTS

E. Gayac   1900-?
Spanish

Gayac was a painter and etcher highly influenced by the Symbolist Movement. Many of his images have strong erotic overtones. Even though numerous works by Gayac were used to illustrate postcards, little is known about this artist.

Mabel  Gear   1900-1997
British, b. Surrey

Gear became an animal painter after studying at the Colchester school of art. Her work was popular and she was well exhibited. Many of her pastels of dogs and cats were used to illustrate postcards, and many of these imbued with sentimentality were used for valentines.

Sergei Vasiliyevich Gerasimov   1885-1964
Russian, b. Mozhaysk

Gerasimov studied art in Moscow, first at the Stroganov Institute in 1901, then continuing at the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. He became a member of the Makovets Group strongly advocating the expression of a new realism through a deeper form of romanticism. While his work shifted in style from the influence of Western Modernism to Social Realism he never let go of the spiritual nature in his work. From his teaching at Vkhutemas in the 1920’s and later at the Surikov Institute, hie became very influential on younger Soviet artists. He served as Director of the Russian Artists Union but was removed from the post when his perspective clashed with that of Stalin. He continued to paint heroic narratives during World War Two, and had his directorship restored by Khrushchev in the postwar years. Gerasimov designed postcards in his early years that were influenced by Art Nouveau and folk art. Many of his Social Realist paintings were later reproduced on postcards by the State run press.

Henri Gerrese   1885-1959
French

Gerrese was a watercolor artist who illustrated a very large set of comic postcards depicting life in the French Navy prior to World War Two. He sometimes used the pseudonym Charles Millet Gerrese.

Alfred Gerstenbrand   1881-1977
Austrian, b. Vienna

After his studies at the Vienna Arts & Crafts School, Gerstenbrand began his career as a painter, printmaker, and illustrator. He was exhibiting with the Vienna Secession by 1908. He traveled extensively throughout his life, including trips to the United States. While he produced landscapes from his journeys he is best known for his portrayals of Viennese cafe society. A number of his images were used to illustrate postcards.

Georg Johan Gerstenhauer-Zimmerman   1858-1931
Dutch, b. Amsterdam

Gerstenhauer, who studied at the Academy in Amsterdam, became a painter and illustrator who worked in a fairly ordinary academic style. His romantic scenes of rural Dutch life were widely reproduced on postcards.

Remigius Geyling   1878-1974
Austrian, b. Vienna

Remi Geyling studied at the School of Applied Art in Vienna between 1898 and 1900, and then entered the Academy in Munich in 1902. Upon leaving the Academy in 1904 he began producing stained glass, a craft that his father had worked in, which was shown at the Vienna Secession. He designed many costumes for the Imperial Jubilee in 1908, and some of these were turned into postcards at the Wiener Werkstätte. While Geyling continued to work as a designer of glass and jewelry as well as in the graphic arts, his attention turned more toward the theatre. He had worked as a costume and stage designer since 1905, and at the Vienna Burgtheater as manager of decor and costumes between 1911 and 1946 except for the years interrupted by World War One. Between 1926 and 1946 he also taught at the School of Applied Art.

Charles Dana Gibson   1867-1944
American, b. Roxbury, Massachusetts

Gibson moved to Flushing, NY as a child, and he latter attended the Art Students League in New York City. He became an illustrator at a young age, contributing his first drawing to Life magazine in 1886. Though he was hired to the Life staff, he also produced work for Harper’s, Scribners, Collier’s and illustrated books. It was his portrayal of the new American woman in the form of the Gibson Girl, based on Evelyn Nesbit, which propelled him to stardom. These pen & ink drawings rendered in an open linear style not only influenced other illustrators, they had a profound influence on style and culture at a time when woman’s roles were being questioned. Gibson himself seems to have had more conservative views toward women than his work would indicate. Many of his drawings were placed on postcards, especially by the Detroit Publishing Company. After retiring in 1936, Gibson spent much of his time out on his own island in Maine’s Penobscot Bay.

Fritz Gilsi   1878-1961
Swiss, b. Zurich

Gilsi was a painter, printmaker, and illustrator who created very original work with bold compositions that incorporated strong symbolic and narrative elements. He designed numerous postcards and bookplates, and created satyrical cartoons for the magazine Nebelspalter. He was also a member of the graphic association Roller.

Edward St. John Gorey   11925-2000
American, b. Chicago, Illinois

Gorey briefly studied the Art Institute of Chicago before entering the Army in 1943. After being discharged he attended Harvard University where he earned a degree in French in 1950. Settling down in New York City he found work between 1953 and 1960 with Doubleday as a book illustrator. Many more of his darkly humorous illustrations would appear in the New Yorker magazine and the New York Times. Many of his own stories of literary nonsense were published as illustrated books such as The Doubtful Guest, The Hapless Child,The Gashlycrumb Tinies, The Willowdale Handcar and The Wuggly Ump. The drawings and prints he exhibited at New York’s Gotham Book Mart greatly enhance his cult following. Gorey’s long held love of the ballet also took him into set design, and after moving to Yarmouth Port on Cape Cod in 1980 he created his own puppet theater, Le Theatricule Stoique. While Gorey designed postcards during his lifetime including those celebrating National Postcard Week, many more of his illustrations have since been licensed out after his death for publication on cards by his estate.

Lillian Govey   1886-1974
British, b. London

Govey produced illustrations for children’s books such as The Rose Fairy, Picking Wild Flowers, Mushroom House, and The Adventures of Be-Wee the Gnome. Many of these pictures were adapted for print and postcard production.

J.J. Granville   1803-1847
French, b. Nancy

Jean Ignace Isidor Gerard was an illustrator who worked under the name Granville, taken from his grandparents theatrical name. After some tutelage from his father, Gerard moved to Paris in 1824 where he began producing caricatures for magazines, and eventually illustrations for books. While he never actually illustrated a postcard, he was a very influential and popular artist whose images remained in demand for decades after his death. It was only natural that these pictures found their way onto many postcards foe which they were so well suited.

Franz Grassel   1861-1948
German, b. Oberasbach

Grassel studied at the Academies in Karlsruhe and Munich. He worked in a loose but academic style, and had a proclivity for ducks, which appear in nearly all his paintings. Many of his images were placed on postcards.

Eugene Grasset   1845-1917
Swiss, b. Lausanne

Grasset moved to Zurich in 1861 to study architecture, but on his return to Lausanne he took up painting and sculpture. After the fall of the Commune in 1871 he moved to Paris where he become an important designer of fabric, furniture, tapestries, jewelry, ceramics, and stained glass. In 1877 he primarily worked in graphic arts designing posters, postage stamps, and postcards. His style was influenced by Egyptian, Japanese, and Medieval art, and as a botonist he had a flare for floral design. Grasset’s publication of Histoire des quatre fils Aymon was one of the first books illustrated with Art Nouveu. His illustrations also appeared on many book and magazine covers, which brought him wide recognition; and his work for Harper’s, Century, and Frank Leslie’s Illustrated News influenced American design. He career in teaching, which began in 1890 would also prove very influential back in France. He would exhibit with the Salon de la Rose Croix in 1892, and later at the Libre Esthetique in Brussels. Most of Grasset’s postcards are based on his pioneering work with color lithographic posters, which should not be confused with the many contemporary postcard reproductions of his posters.

Catherine (Kate) Greenaway   1846-1901
British, b. Hoxton

Kate was the daughter of engraver John Greenaway. After studying at London’s Royal Collage of Art she began working for Marcus Ward in 1867 designing trade cards, valentines, and Christmas cards. Her illustrations in watercolor were translated into color wood engravings by Marcus Ward in 1879 for her first book, Under the Window. She became a member of the Royal Institute of Painting in Watercolor in 1889. To the modern eye the clothing worn by her illustrated children might seem of period, but they were actually fanciful designs made up by Greenaway. In turn her illustrations would come to influence children’s fashions during the 1880’s and 90’s. While her work was popular her career ended just as postcards were coming into vogue and only a small amount of her work adorns them. While Greenaway had a happy childhood by her own admission, her adult life seems to have been troubled. Some have attributed the subtle melancholy in her work to this.

Giovanni Guerzoni   1876-1948
Italian, b. Modina

Guerzoni moved to Argentina in 1889 but returned to Italy to begin studies at the Bologna Academy in 1894. He would work from his Milan studio between 1897 and 1920 from where he created paintings and illustrations. Many of his watercolor and gouache depictions of landscape, women and romantic themes were placed on postcards.

Theodor Otto Michael Guggenberger   1866-1929
Bavarian

Guggenberger worked as a landscape painter, illustrator, and stage designer. Though his paintings were done in a Romantic Academic style, there is also a nervous expressiveness to be found in his compositions. This trait was carried over into his design work for postcards. He is also well known for designs of lithographic toy theaters for Ferdinand Schreiber.

Albert Guillaume   1873-1942
French, b. Paris

Albert was the son of Architect Edmond Guillaume. Though he briefly studied at the Academy in Paris he was largely self taught. His paintings were done in a rather academic style, but his graphic work was much more stylized. He drew a number of satirical cartoons for Gil Blas, Le Rive, l’Assiette au Beuvre, and le Figaro Illustre. He also worked as a book illustrator and designed much chromolithographic work such as posters and portfolios of prints. By the 1890’s be was already designing postcards. Many of these reproduce images of the same glamourous Parisian life that he captured in his paintings. He also designed a great many military cards, a theme that he continued through World War One.

Archibald Gunn   1863-1930
British, b. Taunton

Archibald, better known as Archie, began studying art in London with his father who was a painter and member of the Royal Academy. Gunn started his career as a portrait painter and costume designer but he would do much work in graphics from etchings to advertising especially in the form of theatrical posters. In 1889 he moved to New York City primarily providing illustrations for newspapers and magazines such as Truth and World. He would go on to place his images on everything from calendars to chocolate boxes. Gunn also designed a good number of postcards that mostly depicted women, but these took on military themes during the First World War. While he continued to work out of his studio in Garden City, Long Island in the postwar years, his style never changed much, as he avoided modernist trends that he disdained.

Bessie Collins Pease Gutmann   1876-1960
American, b. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Bessie studied at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women, the Chase School of Art, the New York Art School (Parsons), and the Art Student’s League. In 1903 she began working for the art publisher Gutmann & Gutmann, and three years later she married one of the partners, Hellmuth Gutmann. She had two studios in New Jersey; one at South Orange and another at Island Heights. She was a prolific illustrator producing a variety of work in oils and watercolor, but mostly with pastels. Her illustrations were used in many classic children’s books including Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and they also appeared on numerous magazine covers. Most of her themes revolved around children, which were often modeled on her own three, Alice, Lucille, and John. There are at least 65 different postcards carrying her illustrations that were produced between 1909 and 1913. Most of these cards were published in sets by Reinthal & Newman. By the 1940’s demand for her work was in decline, and she was forced to stop working completely in 1947 because of failing eyesight.