As a young man, Anton Otto Fischer studied with famed illustrator Howard Pyle, founder of the Brandywine School of Artists. Pyle felt that great American art would likely grow from hardworking commercial illustrators, so his students were taught a strong work ethic, excellent draftsmanship and technical skills and the ability to tell a story through their art. Pyle's students, like Fischer, would go on to become some of the greatest American artists of the period, and as he predicted, to create great works of art which were also illustrations for books and magazines.
This brilliant work was likely one of the pieces Fischer originally produced for a magazine illustration and it shows all the hallmarks of a great Brandywine work: bold color and lively brushwork throughout; a luminous afternoon sky heavy with warm tones and purples; and a dramatic narrative composition. Three small sailing ships, each filled with burly pirates, approach a Spanish Galleon from the stern. The pirate Captain has ordered the men to pull in their sails and row hard to close the final lengths in order to board and attack. The large Galleon, ornate and surely loaded with treasure, is at full sail, attempting to outrun the invaders.
Pirates were a favored subject of both Pyle and famous fellow Brandywine students N.C. Wyeth and Frank Schoonover, and this painting shows a clear connection, particularly to Wyeth's pirate works, in color and composition. So distinct is the Brandywine image of pirates that it is these artists who have created our modern idea of what a Pirate looked like. With few surviving examples or drawings of actual pirate clothing, these artists created a swashbuckling style which, while likely unrealistic for a life at sea, influenced every movie pirate from Errol Flynn's Captain Blood to Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow.
Fischer kept his family going throughout the Great Depression with his talents as an illustrator, and some of his greatest works were done in this period. His illustrations were so prized that Fischer continued creating works for books and magazines even after the economy recovered, and in the 1920's and 30's created more than 400 for the Saturday Evening Post alone.
The sea was in Fischer's blood, even as a young man. At age 15, he came to America as a deck hand on a German vessel, jumping ship to sail on American ships for three years. Later in life, the skills he refined over a lifetime as an artist and his personal experience at sea, led to his commission as the U.S. Coast Guard artist laureate during WWII.
This outstanding work is the best of Fischer distilled- a man who knew the romance of the sea and ships and knew how to bring the best of seagoing adventure to life.
