Earlier today in Bruges, an auction lot consisting principally of items by Benoît van Innis reflected the somewhat haphazard way collectors accumulate the work of illustrators they admire. The sale by Auctions Van de Wiele of Bruges included two signed and numbered prints, two books, a folder, and two New Yorker magazine covers, one by van Innis and the other of a cat by Gürbüz Doğan Ekşioğlu.
That Evening They Had Decided Not to Talk About Contemporary Art Silkscreen, 1990, #54/100 Benoît van Innis
Untitled Etching, 1994, #13/15 Benoît van Innis
Benoît van Innis Auctions Van de Wiele sale accessed October 6, 2024—twelve days before the sale
Bidding opened at $20,000 with an estimate of $40,000 to $60,000. The day prior to yesterday's auction, no bids had been placed.
But as always the iconic drawing received a lot of publicity. It was on the cover of the Heritage catalogue:
Not surprisingly, it was the most viewed lot from the Illustration Art sale on the website.
When the hammer dropped yesterday, the bidding had reached $140,000 plus a $35,000 buyer's premium. That's a higher realized price by far than any work of original New Yorker art yet documented on this blog. My guess—and it's just a guess—is that the competing bidders were, for the most part, not the usual cartoon and illustration collectors, but tech millionaires competing to claim a cultural touchstone of the internet age.
In 1993, the internet was always capitalized.
"On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog." Peter Steiner The New Yorker, July 5, 1993, p. 61
"On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog." Peter Steiner Original art The New Yorker, July 5, 1993, p. 61
A spot drawing by Benoît van Innis and a cartoon by Peter Steiner
Heritage arranged a discussion of the cartoon with the artist and Bob Mankoff,The New Yorker's former cartoon editor (who was not the one to buy the cartoon for the magazine—that was Lee Lorenz) but had much to do with licensing it.
Yes, this cartoon has its own Wikipedia page! Here's an audio version of it recorded four years ago preserving the content as it then appeared:
Meanwhile, that other drawing in the magazine's spread, of an unlaced shoe, is quite forgotten by history. I doubt that many remember this or any spot drawing for that matter . . .
Shoe spot Benoît van Innis
Note: There was also a redraw by Peter Steiner of his classic cartoon available from Curated Cartoons for $1,500. It sold within an hour of the Heritage lot. You can see that this redraw is pretty close, but it's by no means identical to the published version. See the treatment of the windows across the street, for example.
Note: We don't get to see all that much of the work of Benoît van Innis here in America and that's a shame. Readers may contribute scans or photos of original van Innis art or of rarely-seen published illustrations. Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:
Brr! They may be ankle-deep in snow, but at least they've got something close at hand to keep them warm. Five well-dressed individuals who seem not to think they would be better off indoors are illustrated by Benoît van Innis. The title is Absolut Winter and this was created, of course, for the Absolut Vodka advertising campaign twenty-four winters ago.
Absolut Winter.Benoît van Innis,The New Yorker, December 14, 1992, back cover
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