Joseph Stella was an Italian born American whose repertoire spans many different themes, ideas and impulses with pictorial diversity - which becomes difficult to classify. However, his works are continuously reviewed with great admiration. Stella’s blockbuster hits of “Brooklyn Bridge” and “Tree of my Life” have been praised for his outstanding contribution to modernism, for which the artist was a great advocate and passionately loyal. It often proposes a problem for critics, who find it hard to get inside the brain of one of the outstanding artists of his generation.

Stella would often study Old Masters and have this ideal, romantic view of America within the industrial revolution, which is clear from his work. The present work ‘Rose and Angel’ c.1920, shows an angel which can be seen as a symbol incorporated by the Old Masters; while the rose significantly painted with bright vibrant colours, examples his positive nature and a colour palette he was comfortable with. It is most likely that this work was used as a study for larger works (as Stella would often paint in large format. ’Tree of my Life’ for example, is a whopping 84 x 76 inches), but by no means classes this work as insignificant. ‘Rose and Angel’ showcases a small delicate work by an artist full of vigour in the early 20th Century, observing nature, upholding his modern dreamlike states, with a gesture towards his passions.

The real joy of Stella, is trying to get into the mind of a man who had a fantastical language in his paintings, expressing a full spectrum of ideas in his works, showing great ambition as a revered artist of the early 20th Century.