Ben Solowey’s Show Business
Spring 2006

It has been a good spring for Solowey admirers. Ben’s work has been on view in a number of museums and galleries. Close to the Solowey Studio, one can go to the Sabine Rose Gallery in Doylestown, Pennsylvania to see four still lifes in their colorful still life show on right now.

The Metropolitan Opera just unveiled the latest addition to their remarkable portrait collection on view at the Opera House at Lincoln Center, Ben’s stunning portrait of Lawrence Tibbett in the premiere of Peter Ibbetson in 1930. The drawing, autographed by the famed tenor, was seen last summer here at the studio as part of the Eleanor Landis Smahl collection. The Met also borrowed Ben’s drawing of Lucrezia Bori also from the Peter Ibbetson premiere (and also autographed in approval by the singer).

In my Irving Berlin exhibition several Solowey Theater Portraits were featured. The Broadway exhibition, in both San Francisco and New York, included Fannie Brice and Ruth Etting in the Ziegfeld Follies, and director R.H. Burnside. The playwright/director George S. Kaufman has a starring role, albeit as a full size reproduction, in the Hollywood exhibition currently at the James A. Michener Art Museum, as well as in the book Irving Berlin’s Show Business.

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