Leon Dolice arrived in this country from his native Vienna, Austria in 1920 at the age of 28. He had spent his early years traveling the capital cities of Europe studying the works of the Old Masters. His first view of New York was probably very much like these scenes of the East River harbor -- four 1922 views of the old Fulton Fish Market:
Fulton Number I,
Fulton Number II
Fulton Number III
Fulton Number IV

New York's harbor, fishing boats and docks would be the subjects of many of his prints, linocuts, pastels and paintings for the rest of his life, as he chronicled the street scenes, people and landmarks of New York City.

Like many artists, he soon gravitated to the streets of New York's Greenwich Village, where he befriended other artists of the period such as Herb Roth and George Luks, who were heavily influenced by the German Expressionist movement and who were part of what was to become the New York Ashcan School.

He created many scenes of Greenwich Village locations, such as his 1932 Washington Square Park , and another version of Washington Square in 1935, as well as the Washington Arch standing alone in 1922.

During his first twenty years in this country, Dolice created hundreds of etchings of landmarks in Manhattan. One of his personal committments as an artist was to preserve the memory of architecture that was fast disappearing from the city's skyline, such as Stanford White's second Madison Square Garden, which was demolished in 1925.

Lexington Avenue looking south from around 56th Street shows how peaceful even midtown Manhattan was on a Sunday afternoon back in 1940.

The Empire State Building dominates a 1935 view of the West Side, and the Municipal Building is shown from across City Hall Park in a 1930 etching. Dolice often spent afternoons in Central Park or closer to home in Madison Square Park doing studies for his many etchings and paintings.