Art: Handy Man

Different from the explosive genius of John Marin (see above), was another exhibit of landscapes which opened quietly this week at Manhattan's Kleemann Galleries : the first one-man show in seven years for Max Kuehne. Artist Kuehne's canvases hang in many museums. Year after year his etchings and lithographs have been listed in the various print societies' Best-Prints-of-the-Year selections. He once sold 32 pictures at a crack to Archer M. Huntington. He is one of the few U. S. painters whose works are included in the great collection of irascible Albert C. Barnes, inventor of Argyrol. His pictures are generally as admired by the art world as they are unknown to the U. S. public. Yet the most important fact about Painter Max Kuehne is that he has paid his bills, kept off relief, put a son through college and furnished a comfortable Manhattan apartment because a dozen famed collectors and nearly as many museums consider him the best picture framer in the U. S.

To one who has been at different times a dentist's assistant, an electrical engineer, an errand boy, a stenographer, an insurance clerk and a job printer, mechanical dexterity came easy. Studying painting at various times with William Merritt Chase, Robert Henri and Kenneth Hayes Miller, Max Kuehne started making his own picture frames because he could not afford to buy any. It was not long before he was making many of the frames for the Barnes Foundation in Merion, Pa., the Whitney Museum in Manhattan. From frames he went in for furniture, later for lacquer screens.

To people admiring the Kuehne landscapes inside the Kuehne frames last week , Artist Kuehne suddenly exhibited a carved and gilded rooster, a portrait head, remarked: "I also do sculpture."