July 09, 2017
Our team was thrilled recently, when a client brought us a truly stellar early twentieth century painting by artist Emanuel Glicen Romano. The work called the “Harp Player” was painted in 1919 and was suffering from nearly a century of wear. The varnish was heavily soiled and discolored so we enlisted the help of art restoration professional Julia Rivera. Julia brought the painting back to life, revealing it’s original colors and detail. After restoration, we re-stretched the canvas with interlocking stretcher bars and framed the work with a lovely splined, maple, closed corner floater frame with custom grey finish.
Restoration specialist Julia cleaning the painting
Emanuel Glicen Romano was an important early twentieth century artist. He was born Emanuel Glicenstein in Rome in 1897 and was raised internationally in Italy, Switzerland, Germany, England and Poland, eventually moving to the States with his father. Glicenstein senior had been a successful sculptor in Italy and the younger artist chose to change his name to Romano in order to try to discourage any criticism that he might be trying to benefit from his father’s reputation. After WWII Romano moved to Israel to set up a museum dedicated to his father’s work.
The cleaned painting being prepared for stretching
Romano worked for the Federal Art Project of the WPA and painted portraits of noteworthy individuals like William Carlos Williams and T.S. Elliott. A highly successful artist in his own right Emanuel Glicen Romano’s work can be found in the collections of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Fogg Museum and the Musée Nacional de France. He has recently been included in the collection of the Florida Holocaust Museum in St. Petersburg.
Emanuel Romano's "Harp Player" fully restored and framed
“Harp Player” is a great example of the Cubist style and displays real charm with a dog captivated by the musician’s playing. The collector of the piece explained that dogs are an important theme in some of the artist’s work. She also said “Harp Player” is one of his largest known paintings. It was an honor to be part of bringing this gem back to its original glory.
