Contributor David from Manhattan writes about an original 1970 New Yorker cartoon by the one and only Edward Koren:
This captionless drawing, fairly large at 17 ¼ x 23" (inside the matte) and framed, turned up at an Aston, PA Modern Design Auction by Uniques & Antiques on Dec. 12, 2017, estimated at $200-300, and where it sold for $175. The buyer must have been passing through Aston as the item was on eBay only a few days later and sold on Dec. 19th to me for $414.02 including shipping. On Dec. 28 it was in hand from Minnesota, via USPS. For the holiday season, that's pretty impressive. The hard part was sitting with it on the bus at 5:30 p.m. for an hour and a half. I haven't examined that many original Korens, so I wonder if all the collage work visible here is typical. I remember reading somewhere that a George Booth cartoon, as part of a traveling New Yorker exhibit, now and then shed a piece of art and had to be glued back. Despite the travel involved, and my own moves in deciding where it should hang, that hasn't happened. I've included some close ups of his "repair" work; the running dog (?) in two pieces seems the most extreme. Still, there's a lot going on here: children, parents, posters, furniture, and plenty of living room crapola. He could have started over, but he managed to keep his image of what it should look like alive in his head. Certainly the cartoon that appeared in the magazine on July 4, 1970 gives no hint of difficulties.
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| Edward Koren Original art The New Yorker, July 4, 1970, p. 35 |
By the way, the original auction description, after calling it "Comical Political Illustration," adds "Women's movement. Pen & ink illustration sketches in progress," the latter presumably a reference to Koren's collage work. Politically it has held up fairly well, and outlived the Playboy Clubs, though the image of bunny ears on the central poster may one day require some further information. For now though, Koren fans know where to find it: on the unnumbered pages of Do You Want to Talk About It? (1976).
David provides more of the eBay photos of the original art:
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The eBay photos are clearer than the Pennsylvania Modern Design Auction by Uniques & Antiques:
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| Edward Koren's signature |
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| Edward Koren Uniques & Antiques auction of December 12, 2017 |
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| Edward Koren Uniques & Antiques auction item description |
Here's how the cartoon first appeared in The New Yorker alongside the original art:
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| Edward Koren Original art The New Yorker, July 4, 1970, p. 35 |
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| A spot drawing by Raymond Davidson and a cartoon by Edward Koren, one of two of his from the issue |
Note: My thanks to David from Manhattan for this, his fifty-fourth contribution to Attempted Bloggery. Above, David inquires whether other art by Edward Koren has as many patches as this one. So I ask on his behalf, does anyone else have access to similarly patched Koren art for comparison?
Spot artist R. Davidson is better known as New Yorker cover artist Raymond Davidson. A signed, untrimmed proof of one of his covers has previously appeared on the blog here. Remember that one?
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| Raymond Davidson |
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