American Monotypes from the Baker/Pisano Collection | Page 39

Salvatore Guarino (American b. Italy, 1882–1969)
The Purple Robe, n.d.
Color monotype, 13 7/8 x 7 11/16 in.
Chazen Museum of Art, gift of D. Frederick Baker from the
Baker/Pisano Collection, 2014.6.8

Born in Italy, Guarino came to the United States as a young
man and began his study of art with, and sold his first painting
to, William Merritt Chase. Guarino joined the Salmagundi Club, a popular artist hangout in New York. Many of its
members made monotypes at various club gatherings, and it is
likely that Guarino first began making monotypes at the club.
The process so fascinated him that he began to specialize in
them. In 1917, he was given a solo exhibition of sixty of his
color monotypes at the Kraushaar Art Galleries in New York,
after which the exhibition traveled to the Newark Museum in
New Jersey. Two years later Kraushaar Galleries held another
exhibition of monotypes and paintings, clearly showing the
artist’s mastery of the process (confusingly, Kraushaar used the
term monotype interchangeably with monoprint, which today
is considered a related, but separate process). Like many of his
fellow artists, Guarino was influenced by the work of James
McNeill Whistler, which can be seen in the close color harmonies of Guarino’s The Purple Robe.
NOTES:
Dounce, Guarino: His Monoprints, 7–13.
Guarino, “Monoprints,” 49–51.

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