1941 PHILIP PIECK. Rare New York Modernist Painting - Soccer at Madison Square Garden.

An exceptional exhibited painting by New York modernist, Philip Pieck (1881-1956), depicting a nighttime soccer match, popular during the 1930's and 40's in New York City. 

During the 1940-1941 season, soccer in New York was embedded in the nascent American Soccer League. Most of the teams of the period were ethnically affiliated. The New York Americans and the Brooklyn Hispano were the top professional clubs,  populated largely by Cuban and Caribbean immigrants to the city. There were also the Kearney Scots [Scottish, of course], the New York Hakoah [Jewish],The  Brookhattan [Dutch], the Newark Portuguese, The Philadelphia Hungarians, Negro League competitors, and more. The New York teams, premier in the broader league, played at venues like Starlight Park in the Bronx and even Madison Square Garden, which hosted rather surreal indoor nighttime matches. We suspect this painting to depict a match played at the latter.

A superb snapshot of the city life of the era and rare early American "foot ball" painting.

Philip Pieck was a fascinating New York artist. Bon in Holland, he emigrated to New York City, training as both an artist and a Catholic missionary. He served in the latter capacity in the Philippines for more than 30 years. Significant exhibitions of his works of New York City and city life were mounted at Contemporary Arts Inc in New York in both 1946, to commemorate his return to the Philippines at the War's end, and in 1956 to commemorate his death. The exhibitions were positively reviewed, including by the New Yorker. He was described as something of a folk modernist painter, and was compared positively to Raphael. 

Always an artist, the body of works from his early life in Holland and later life in the Philippines appear to have been largely lost. His New York City scenes, executed between 1941 and 1945, while home on furlough during the War, are sought. A New York work from the same period sold at Wright Auctions for $3,780 with commissions. The present work bears two exhibition notations, likely from the 1946 and the 1956 shows. 

The work is in oil on canvas board, measures 12 x 16 inches and is in an overall very good state. There is pressure imposed dent and crack to substrate and painting at lower left side of painting, barely visible. Else, superb.