During these years Sage's art gained a solid reputation among art critics, though she found it difficult to emerge from the shadow of the better-known Tanguy. Her work was regularly included in national exhibits, won prizes, and was sold to major art museums. In 1943, Sage's work was included in Peggy Guggenheim's show "Exhibition by 31 Women" at the Art of This Century gallery in New York. She had several solo shows at the galleries of Julien Levy and, beginning in 1950, Catherine Viviano in New York. "In the Third Sleep" won the Watson F. Blair Purchase Prize from the Art Institute of Chicago in October 1945, Sage's first major public recognition. In 1951, "All Soundings Are Referred to High Water" won first prize in oils at the Eastern States Exposition of Connecticut Contemporary Art, and "Nests of Lightning" won first honorable mention in the 22nd Corcoran Biennial Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting. Sage and Tanguy had a large joint exhibition at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut—their first and almost only exhibition together—in August and September 1954.