Caroline Duriex New Orleans Drawing of Socrates Rare Tulane and LSU Professor

Age: 1975
Out of a New Orleans Estate Home
Size: 11″ by 14.5″ framed with work inside matt size of 7″ by 10″

Highly priized investment grade artwork original.
Drawing

See below for interesting words about her life and history from Wikipedia page.

Caroline Wogan Durieux (January 22, 1896 – November 26, 1989) was an American printmaker,
painter, and educator.
She was a Professor Emeritus at both Louisiana State University,
where she worked from 1943 to 1964 and at Newcomb College of Tulane University (1937-1942).
Carl Zigrosser, Keeper of Prints at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, wrote:
“Durieux is master of her instrument. It is like an epigram delivered in a deadpan
manner:the meaning sinks in casually; when all of a sudden the full impact dawns on one,
it haunts one for days. Her work has that
haunting quality because its roots are deep, its vision profound”.

Caroline Duriex
was born Caroline Spelman Wogan in New Orleans, Louisiana, on January 22, 1896; into a Creole family.
At the age of 4, she began drawing and received art lessons from Mary Williams Butler (1873-1937),
who was a local artist and a member of the faculty of art at Newcomb College at Tulane University.
She worked in watercolor from the age of six and at the age of 12 created a portfolio of ten watercolors
depicting New Orleans scenery. One of those watercolors, Church Pews is illustrated below.
Most of these early works are now in The Historic New Orleans Collection.
She continued at Newcomb College of Tulane University in the Art School headed by
Ellsworth Woodward. From her college days, she was interested in satire and the use of
humor in her imagery. Durieux earned a Bachelor’s in Design in 1916 and a Bachelor’s in Art
Education in 1917, and she pursued graduate studies at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
led by Henry Bainbridge McCarter.

She returned to Louisiana after graduate school and in April 1920 married
Pierre Van Grundard Durieux (1889-1949). Pierre worked in his family’s business importing
laces and dress goods from many Latin American countries.

New Orleans natives William Spratling and Caroline Durieux befriended, studied and
collaborated on numerous occasions with artists like Diego Rivera,
David Alfaro Siqueiros, Emilio Amero and Carlos Orozco Romero.

Caroline Durieux, John McCrady and Ralph Wickiser collaborated on a 1948 book, Mardi Gras Day,
published by Henry Holt. Each artist contributed 10 artworks as illustrations for the book.
The ten lithographs that Durieux contributed for this book are less satirical than much of her work.
When asked about this, Durieux said that Mardi Gras was inherently self-satirical and therefore
she decided to present it as is.

Durieux was a fixture at the Mardi Gras Day open house hosted by Lyle Saxon in the St. Charles Hotel.
Dressing in costume was a requisite for admission to the party and some of Durieux’s images
for the book were of attendees.

In 2018 the Hermes parade included a float titled Caroline Durieux that was inspired by Swine Maskers
one of the artist’s lithographs from the book. The other nine lithographs were: Carnival Ball,
Coach Dogs, Death Masker, Five Girls, Night Parade, Queen of the Carnival, Rex, Six o’clock,
TruckRiders.