Note 1) The following Silva biographical materials are taken from the Askart.com website:

“A landscape painter, William Silva was an important art world figure in Tennessee and also in California, where he moved in 1913 and for thirty-five years devoted himself to painting cypresses, eucalypti, dunes, and coasts. 

He was born in Savannah, Georgia, and studied at Catham Academy and engineering at the University of Virginia. He inherited the family chinaware business, which he ran successfully for thirty years until he began painting at age 50.

In 1887, he moved to Chattanooga, Tennessee, and there became known as “the finest artist at the turn of the century” (Gerdts “Art Across America” v. III). He painted in an Impressionist style and did many panoramic views of Chatatanooga as well as paintings of the pine forests near Savannah. Initially he pursued his chinaware business there but in 1894, began to take art instruction. 

Encouraged by his wife, he retired from his business in 1907 and enrolled at the Academy Julian in Paris as a student of Jean Paul Laurens. He also painted with American artist Chauncey Ryder. Recognition came quickly, and he had his first solo exhibition in 1909 in Paris at the Georges Petit Gallery.

That same year he returned to Chattanooga and a moment of great fame was the winning of the silver medal in 1910 at the Appalachian Exposition in Knoxville where he displayed seventy canvases. He then moved to Washington D.C. where he was active in the Society of Washington Artists until he moved to California in 1913. 

He built a studio off Carmelita Street in the sand dunes but continued to exhibit with the Southern States Art League and also maintained close ties with his birthplace, Savannah, where in 1917 a solo exhibition was held at the Telfair Academy. He was a member of numerous organizations including the California Art Club and the Salmagundi Club.

He died on February 10, 1948.

Source:
Edan Hughes, “Artists in California, 1786-1940 (Emphasis added).”

Note 2) This Silva painting is very sophisticated and esthetically appealing Impressionist work of art. It is an extremely delicate subtle and diaphanous view of Notre Dame Cathedral and the Seine in Paris on a very foggy day. This view was painted by Silva at sometime between 1907 and 1909, when he was enrolled at the Academy Julian in Paris as a student of Jean Paul Laurens in 1907. Silva achieved what Mr. Fastov believes is one of his best and most beautiful Impressionist views, when Silva was 48 and beginning his formal art career, having just retired from business, and had been engaged in painting, in effect, as a hobby. Even though Silva depicted foggy landscapes throughout his career (See “View of New Orleans from the West Bank” and “A Quiet Corner In The Garden Of Dreams,” immediately below), there is no Silva work in which he portrays as successfully the totally enveloping effect of an extremely thick fog with a very thin and delicate layering and glazing. Silva's total focus and subject was the fog, not the impressive Notre Dame Cathedral and the Seine River. It is a tour de force of artistic style, technique and skill in which Silva totally enshrouded these hallmarks of Paris in a deep, dense fog. 11:17 PMhe following two Silva paintings, one of which is much smaller than this auction offering and one which is slightly larger, both manifest a foggy misty impressionist quality that is very similar, but not as pervasive and as well painted as this auction offering, which suggests that a presale estimate of $19,000-$31,000 would be very appropriate, given the very fine, sophisticated, Impressionistic, Tonalistic seminal work by Silva, the overriding characteristic of which is his magnificent handling and depiction of fog, as it affects a classic Parisian art subject, Notre Dame and the Seine River.

Title/Subject: View Of New Orleans From The West Bank Signed. Oil on artist's board. 9 in. x 12 in. sold for $19,200 on 05/20/2006-05/21/2006 at New Orleans Auction Galleries, New Orleans, LA

Title/Subject: A Quiet Corner In The Garden Of Dreams Signed. Oil on canvas. 20 in. x 24 in. sold for $32,000 on 03/29/2008-03/30/2008 at Charlton Hall Galleries, Inc., West Columbia, SC

Note 3) The foregoing considerations, including the above biographical information and auction records, and the following auction records buttress the assertion that a presale estimate of $19,000-$31,000 is reasonable and justifiable.

Title/Subject: Georgia Coastline Signed. Oil on canvas. 30 in. x 25 in. sold for $21,000 on 06/14/2008-06/15/2008 at Charlton Hall Galleries, Inc., West Columbia, SC

Title/Subject: Reflections in a Charleston Garden Signed. Oil on canvas. 16 in. x 20 in. sold for $19,000 on 09/09/2006-09/10/2006 at Charlton Hall Galleries, Inc., West Columbia, SC