Reinhart, Stewart (1897-1970)

Born in Baltimore, MD, Reinhart studied art at the Maryland Institute and then moved to New York City at age 21. Reinhart’s use of dance and theater as subject matter for his painting appears to have grown out of lived experience, with a strong preference for the exotic. He designed costumes and a drop curtain for The Golden Doom, set just before the fall of Babylon; dressed himself as a “Persian Demi-God” to win the prize for costume at Baltimore’s “Bal de Arts”; and sketched out truly incredible ideas for two “Fancy Dress Costumes.” A New York Times art critic noted around this time, after seeing Reinhart’s work at the New York Water Color Club, “a closer intimacy than used to exist between the stage and the exhibition galleries” (New York Times 5 Nov. 1916: 67). Reinhart’s earlier paintings like “Dancing Slave” (1916), “Moment Musical” (1916), and “The Ballet” (1921) anticipate the NDG’s “Specter of the Roses”—which depicts a short ballet of that name wherein the famous dancer Vaslav Nijinsky (as the spirit of a rose) leaped through a window at its conclusion. Reinhart’s work appeared in venues like the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Art Institute of Chicago. In 1920 he was paired with Mark Tobey for an exhibition at St. Mark’s Hall. Gradually, Reinhart’s attention turned towards commissioned portraits. Starting in 1947 and until his retirement in 1963, he was director of art at the Friends Seminary day school, New York. 1 more image at FAP.

Works in the New Deal Collection at GVCA by Stewart Reinhart:

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Sprectre of the Roses
Sprectre of the Roses

This painting takes its name from Le Spectre de la rose, a short ballet created in 1911 by Jean-Louis Vaudoyer. In it, a young girl dreams of dancing with the spirit of a rose worn to her first ball. It was famous for the performance of legendary dancer Vaslav Nijinsky, who leaped through one of the two large windows pictured at the back of the stage. Reinhart’s painting carefully retains markers of its theatrical origins, from spotlights to the dancers’ costumes, from the production’s stage to instruments in the orchestra pit at front.

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