Reginald Marsh

Reginald Marsh 1898-1954, American painter and illustrator, b. Paris. Both his parents were artists. After their return to the United States, he studied at Yale (B.A., 1920). He worked as an illustrator for Vanity Fair, Harper's Bazaar, and the New York Daily News, and later he was a scene designer. He then studied under John Sloan and K. H. Miller at the Art Students League. From 1925 to 1939 he made two trips to Europe and sketched for The New Yorker. His lively recordings of Manhattan street life in many media were popular. Why Not Use the L? (1930; Whitney Mus., New York City) is typical. Marsh painted two celebrated murals in the Post Office Building, Washington, D.C.

Bibliography: See study by L. Goodrich (1972).

Marsh, Reginald (b Paris, 14 Mar. 1898; d Dorset, Vt., 30 July 1954). American painter. Until 1930 he worked mainly as a newspaper illustrator, but he took up painting seriously after a study trip to Paris in 1925–6, and in the 1930s he became well known for his paintings depicting shabby and tawdry aspects of life in New York. His favourite subjects included Coney Island, the amusement arcades of Times Square, and the cheap and grubby street life of the Bowery district (Tattoo and Haircut, 1932, Art Inst. of Chicago). He was also capable of bitter satire against the smug complacency of the wealthy, but in general his work shows a love of depicting teeming life through ugly yet colourful subjects rather than a desire for social protest. His aim was to represent contemporary subjects in the manner of the Old Masters and he worked mainly in tempera, also experimenting with other venerable techniques. He came from a wealthy family and to some extent his work expressed a rejection of the affluent and genteel circumstances in which he grew up.