Red Buttons

Maker Reginald Marsh (American, 1898 - 1954)

Collections

American Paintings Selections

ClassificationsPAINTINGS

Date1936

Mediumegg tempera on board

Dimensions23 1/2 x 15 1/2 in. (59.7 x 39.4 cm.)

SignedSigned in lower right of recto in blue paint: Reginald Marsh '36

InscribedSigned in lower right of recto in blue paint: Reginald Marsh '36

Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. Purchased with funds from Hannah and Russel Kully, Steve Martin, the Connie Perkins Endowment, Anne and Jim Rothenberg, and the Virginia Steele Scott Acquisition fund for American Art

Label TextGirls (Red Buttons) features two fashionably dressed young women inside a restaurant with a busy street visible through glass windows. Many of Marsh's best images are about seeing and being seen in New York City's public spaces. Here, one of the women looks at the viewer while the other glances to the right, outside the painting. The position of the women in a shallow space near the picture plane reinforces the sense that they are on display.
After graduating from Yale in 1920, Marsh became a newspaper and magazine illustrator. While studying with Kenneth Hayes Miller (whose Caller Waiting hangs on this wall) he began painting in egg tempera, which is made with powdered pigments, yolk, and water. The quick-drying medium allowed Miller to work with a speed and sureness that led to some of his finest painting.

Status

On view

Object number2009.1