Resin on board painting by Cordray Simmons (American, 1888-1970), titled "Jack Rose Florist", signed lower left. Cordray Simmons was one of the many fine American scene painters working during the 1920s through the 1940s. He was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, where his parents were active in the arts: his father was a mural and scenic painter and his mother was a dancer. Simmons received his first formal training at the Evening Technical High School, where he also taught clay modeling, in 1905. Simmons took over his father's business as a scenic painter in 1909 and began spending summers at the Art Students League in New York. While at the League, Simmons studied under William Merritt Chase, F. Luis Mora, George Bellows, and later, Robert Henri and Kenneth Hayes Miller. Simmons had fully settled into life in New York City by 1925. He was elected a member of the Allied Artists of America, Inc. in 1926 and departed later that year for independent study in England, France and Germany. Upon his return in the spring of 1927, Simmons continued exhibiting in numerous galleries throughout the city. He opened an art supply store in Greenwich Village, where he met his colleague and future wife, Louise Osborne. His dabbling at the store, combined with a position as a technical artist at the Metropolitan Museum of Fine Art, led to the development and use of synthetic media. Although neither Simmons nor Osborne commercially capitalized on their findings, they laid the groundwork for the development of the most popular artist's medium of today: acrylics. [Art: 24 x 29 3/4 inches; Frame: 29 1/2 x 35 1/2 inches]. In good condition.

In good condition.