{"id":323009,"date":"2026-08-17T10:38:55","date_gmt":"2026-08-17T10:38:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/323009\/"},"modified":"2026-08-17T10:38:55","modified_gmt":"2026-08-17T10:38:55","slug":"in-the-dark-days-of-the-depression-a-jazz-age-artist-captures-a-luminous-magical-new-york","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/323009\/","title":{"rendered":"In the dark days of the Depression, a Jazz Age artist captures a luminous, magical New York"},"content":{"rendered":"

He\u2019s hardly a household name today. But Utah-born John Held, Jr. helped create the popular imagery of the 1920s. <\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

Held made Jazz Age icons out of bobbed-hair flappers, college guys in raccoon coats, sporty women wielding tennis rackets, and tuxedoed partygoers dangling cigarette holders from their lips.<\/p>\n

His gently satirical drawings depicting a carefree and exuberant era appeared on dozens of national magazine covers<\/a> as well as inside periodicals and newspapers. His distinct style of work even made it to the book jacket of F. Scott Fitzgerald\u2019s Tales of the Jazz Age. <\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

Then came the stock market crash. Held turned 40 in 1929, lost a lot of money, suffered a nervous breakdown, and found that his once-constant and highly lucrative artwork commissions had mostly dried up. <\/p>\n

He was now free to do what he came to New York in 1912 for<\/a>: to pursue the fine arts and become a watercolor painter. <\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

In the Depression of the 1930s, when the city\u2019s new skyscrapers might look to some like tall gray husks, Held depicted them as magical and luminous\u2014radiant under the lavender, pink, blueish-white skies of dawn and dusk. <\/p>\n

They\u2019re a radical departure from his work a decade earlier, which featured stylish youth drawn in exaggerated angular proportions that suggest motion and energy. His watercolors, on the other hand, depict no people at all.<\/p>\n

\"Watercolor<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cFrom 1934-1936, Held\u2019s view of the world turned more sober,\u201d states the art website Arthur<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe upper stories of a building on Sixth Avenue near Central Park afforded Held a high vantage point. From this perspective, the artist transforms the massive New York skyscrapers into flat patterns of right angles and colored shadows.\u201d<\/p>\n

The writer behind the website describes Held\u2019s work as wistful. I think wondrous might fit as well. <\/p>\n

Held spent the last years of his life on a farm in Belmar, New Jersey and died from cancer in 1958<\/a>. He returned to the city for good; he\u2019s buried in Woodlawn Cemetery.<\/p>\n

Tags: John Held Jr. Jazz Age Cartoonist<\/a>, John Held Jr. New York City<\/a>, John Held Jr. watercolors<\/a>, Manhattan Skyline 1930s Paintings<\/a>, New York artists in the 1920s<\/a>, New York Painters in the 1930s<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThis entry was posted on August 17, 2026 at 4:04 am and is filed under art<\/a>, Midtown<\/a>.\t\t\t\t\t\tYou can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0<\/a> feed.
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