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Directory: Fine Art: Paintings: Oil: Pre 1990: Item # 1440476

Please refer to our stock # 748 when inquiring.

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L'Enfant Gallery
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1442 Wisconsin Ave, N.W.
Washington, DC 20007
202-625-2873

Guest Book

Oil on canvas measuring 8x12” and framed in it’s original frame. Artist Robert Watson (1923-2004) has explored a surreal, mysterious world inhabited by lonely figures. According to a 1997 San Francisco article in Today’s New Herald “his paintings hang in museums and galleries worldwide and grace numerous private collections - including that of Paramount Pictures, in the estates of Clark Gable and Ed Sullivan, and in collections belonging to the late Duchess of Windsor and Vincent Price.” Ray Bradbury was a great admirer of Watson’s work and, in 1958, the second edition of THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES was published with dust jacket art by Mr. Watson. Unfortunately, instead of the blue background in the original art, the publisher changed the color. In 1995, a limited edition print of Watson's painting, in the correct blue color, was issued. The Washington Post, in 1995, describe the book launch of this limited edition print, which was held at Peter Colasante’s gallery (The Calvert Gallery which morphed into L’Enfant Gallery when it moved to Georgetwon). “Ray Bradbury lives in a world of metaphor and poetry and fable, so it's perfectly natural that he considers a dust jacket more than something to keep the dirt off. It is, he says, a "second, evanescent skin." For 37 years, Bradbury has been bugged by a blemished jacket on his most famous book, "The Martian Chronicles." Artist Robert Watson caught the ambivalence of the stories with his depiction of a solitary figure contemplating a ruined pillar. Everything was shrouded in blue, which evokes the ancient Martian civilization that the Earthmen arrive to exploit casually, unthinkingly, uncaringly. So what does the publisher do? Prints the cover in red. After all, Mars is the Red Planet, isn't it? That edition of the book was long out of print, the vivid jacket tucked away in the memory of thousands of boys, when Bradbury and Watson decided to memorialize the original painting. A limited-edition print was made, and the duo has been hawking it around the country. This month, they touched down at the Calvert Gallery at the Omni Shoreham Hotel.