Peter Arno's original artwork from the collection of David Webb Inc. co-founder and former president Antoinette Quilleret, or "Topsy," depicts seven showgirls standing backstage wearing revealing stage outfits and glittering costume jewelry. Together they gather around and admire the smallest but ultimately most meaningful piece of glittering jewelry in the whole chorus line. Whatever the claims of Topsy's heirs to the auction house—Ms. Quilleret passed away in 1996 at age 85 in Marbella, Spain—there is no evidence here that this piece was intended to bear any caption, let alone the very commercial "It's a David Webb diamond!" Still, this might have become family lore.
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| Peter Arno Preliminary art The New Yorker, May 1, 1954 |
Rather, the colorful artwork was clearly created as preliminary cover art for the New Yorker issue of May 1, 1954. Although not the final published version, it certainly could have been. It is a gorgeous piece, funny and sexy just as we expect from Arno—even a little bit poignant—and it seems all ready to go to press. What's more, Arno has nicely addressed the fundamental compositional problem of how to draw the viewer's attention to the crux of the gag, the relatively tiny engagement ring. Arno's very reasonable solution is to put the ring at the center of the composition and to group the showgirls all around it. Problem solved? Evidently not to the satisfaction of the relentlessly perfectionistic Arno (or perhaps of his editors). Before scrolling down past the auction results to the actual published cover, try to imagine how Arno might have gone about trying to make this wonderful composition even better.
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| Peter Arno Framed preliminary art The New Yorker, May 1, 1954 |
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| Peter Arno's signature |
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| Verso, Whatman board |
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| Peter Arno Clars Auction Gallery |
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| Peter Arno Preliminary art The New Yorker, May 1, 1954 |
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| Peter Arno The New Yorker, May 1, 1954 |
Right off, Arno has muted the colors in the finished art to shades of powder blue for both the setting and the costumes, he has eliminated the distracting sequins from the costumes, and he has also removed the distractions of the stage lighting and backstage signage by relocating the scene to the dressing room. By extending the showgirl's arm, he isolates the ring, suspending it in the relatively sedate right third of the cover. He has had to reposition all the women to the left side of the principal woman's outstretched hand and reduced the number of women to five, three of whom lean in toward the ring while the principal woman, in contrast, does not. The showgirls' gazes all point to the ring as they did in the preliminary art, but now their gaze is aligned and easier for our eye to follow; the curve of her arm and the V of the betrothed woman's fingers further lead us to the ring; the pinky of the woman on the right also points to the ring as does the vertical line of the vanity. So...has Arno improved the composition?
Note: I would like to hear from anyone with additional information about this piece or any related pieces that may be out there. Peter Arno sometimes made multiple versions of his New Yorker work prior to publication and these often remain unseen and unknown unless they come up for sale. I love to show all examples of original Arno art on this blog, and I think preliminary work gives us some special insights into his process that we can't get any other way. So if you have access to original art by Peter Arno, you might want to send me some high quality images and tell me what you know about the art. Then we can explore it together here on the blog.
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