Walter Simpson Parke (1909-1994)

An Untitled Midwest Landscape

Circa 1941.

The composition of rolling farm ground and outbuildings in the glow of a low sun is signed lower right and dated 42.

Depicted is a landscape that resembles the topography around Cedar Rapids, Iowa, home of the Regionalist painters Grant Wood and Marvin Cone.

This work on canvas is mounted to Masonite with remains of an illegible exhibition label back side.

Born in Little Rock, Arkansas, Walter Parke studied at the Chicago Art institute and the American Academy of Art. He assisted Ezra Winter (1886-1949) with murals for the library of Congress and the 1939 New York World's Fair before returning to Chicago where his art was accepted in group shows at the Union League Club of Chicago, and the Art Institute of Chicago, among other exhibitions. At one time, he was president of the Chicago Pallet and Chisel academy. After working with Ezra winter, we know that Parke spent some time in Memphis and Des Moines, but the years of his residency in those cities is undocumented. He was back working in Chicago by the early 1950s when an article about his commercial illustrations appeared in The Illustrator, Spring, 1951, pages 2-10. After his career in Chicago, he retired to Naperville, Illinois, and his death is noted in the Naperville Sun, April 24, 1994. He had contacts in Nashville, Indiana where the Brown County Art Guild sold his pictures during the late years of his life. The works by Walter Parke offered in this auction are all from a local estate and important in that they were produced early in the artist's career and confirm his awareness of regionalist painting from the 1930s and 1940s.

Board measures 24 x 30 with a framed size of 27.5 x 33 inches.

Provenance: The Robert W. Steinbach Trust and Steinbach Family Collection, Kansas City, Missouri.

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Very good original untouched condition. There are no issues of scratches, losses, repairs, in-painting or touch-up with the exception of small touches in some leaves as shown in online images.