William Franklin Draper (American, 1912-2003). "Christmas Tree at Rockefeller Center" oil on board, 1940s. A wonderful painting of the famous Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center in New York City by award winning American artist William Draper. Every year in mid November an impressively tall Christmas tree is erected in Rockefeller Center in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. On the Wednesday following Thanksgiving, the tree is lit in a public ceremony. This tradition originated over eight decades ago, and visiting the tree is a quintessential holiday experience for many New Yorkers as well as visitors to the Big Apple. In this composition, Draper shows us the famous tree lit up at night, with additional spotlights casting a glow on its branches. Countless spectators are below, standing beside the famous fountains with the legendary ice rink before them. All is delineated in Draper's signature style with loose expressionistic brushwork and wonderful impasto passages. Size: 19.875" W x 15.75" H (50.5 cm x 40 cm)

William Draper's career spanned seven decades and his subjects included a portrait of John F. Kennedy that hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington D.C. based upon an oil sketch for which the president sat in 1962. Draper was actually the only artist who painted JFK from life. Draper showed at Knoedler, the Graham Gallery, Portraits, Inc., the Far Gallery, The Findlay Galleries (New York, NY) and the Robert C. Vose Galleries (Boston, MA). His work has been included in shows at the National Portrait Gallery and the Corcoran Gallery of Art (Washington, D.C.), The National Academy of Design (New York, NY), The Boston Museum of Fine Arts, (Boston, MA) the Fogg Art Museum, (one of the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, MA), the National Gallery, (London), Salon de la Marine (Paris) and in museums in Australia. He also taught at the Art Students League of New York, and received a lifetime achievement award from the Portrait Society of America in 1999.

More on the artist's background: William Franklin Draper was born in Hopedale, Massachusetts on December 24, 1912. A child prodigy, he studied classical piano at Harvard University. He later changed his focus to fine art and studied with Charles Webster Hawthorne and Henry Hensche in Provincetown, Rhode Island. Draper also attended the National Academy of Design in New York and the Cape Cod School of Art in Massachusetts. Then he traveled to Spain and studied with Harry Zimmerman, moved on to France and attended the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere. In 1937, he moved to Boston to study sculpture with George Demetrius and also studied with Jon Corbino in beautiful Rockport, Massachusetts. In 1942, Draper joined the Navy and served as a combat artist when stationed on the Aleutian Islands and in the South Pacific. He observed and painted battle scenes on Bougainville, Guam, Saipan, and other locations, as well as genre scenes of soldiers who were not engaged in combat but rather at work and at play. National Geographic magazine reproduced 25 of his war images in four issues in 1944. In 1945, the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. organized a group exhibition of works by five official war artists, including Draper. That same year the Metropolitan Museum of Art included Draper in an exhibition entitled, ''The War Against Japan.'' Draper was also featured in a PBS television show about combat artists entitled, "They Drew Fire" in May of 2000. After the war, Draper opened a studio on Park Avenue in New York City and continued to not only paint, but also play classical and jazz piano.

Provenance: TThe William F. Draper Collection, New York City, USA, acquired via descent from the late William Franklin Draper

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#153515

Draper Estate stamp on the verso. Minor age wear with slight scuffs to the peripheries and toning to verso, but otherwise excellent.