I've written several times about the appropriation art of Karl Haendel, who came to my attention because his subject matter is, at least occasionally, New Yorker cartoons. His selection of these cartoons baffles me—and then it doesn't. I do, after all, understand why an appropriation artist would want to appropriate something extraordinary and few things are more extraordinary to me than New Yorker cartoons. But what of his selection? Are they simply random, contemporary examples of cartoons, as they frequently seem to be? Is there some esthetic or perhaps autobiographic reason for his choices? And how does he decide which works to group together and when?
The untitled 2001 work which starts with the word Depressed? does little to answer these questions. It certainly doesn't appear to arise out of an esthetic imperative. The unadorned typography looks mind-numbing to have to replicate with a pencil. The size, at least, gives the drawing the presence of a statement piece.
The work was offered at auction earlier this month by Wright in Chicago, although it did not travel to the auction house from Los Angeles. It was given a presale estimate of $2,000 to $3,000, with bidding opening at $1,600. It did not find a buyer.
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| Karl Haendel Wright Editions & Works on Paper auction accessed before the August 8, 2023 sale |
Chances are you are not familiar with the work of New Yorker cartoonist David Stein. I certainly wasn't. His only cartoon may be found way at the back of the issue of April 19 and 26, 2004, the Spring Humor Issue. Ask yourself then why Haendel might choose to appropriate the work of Stein, thus:
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| New Yorker Cartoon Drawing #20 Karl Haendel |
To oversimplify a bit, the themes of this set may be depression, the chaotic artistic process, psychotherapy, and uncertainty. The Stein cartoon might have been chosen for its clever use of the psychiatrist and patient trope rather than for anything to do with this obscure New Yorker artist or the esthetics of the cartoon. The caption in this context possibly suggests some similarity between the painstaking slowness of the psychiatric process and of the artistic process, but I don't want to read more into this than is actually there. The set of four drawings is still available for sale.
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| https://www.art.salon/artist/karl-haendel |
So, once again, Karl Haendel's choice of New Yorker cartoon may not originate from any particular appreciation of the art form. Rather, he simply may be making a connection between depression and psychotherapy, just as his Depressed? drawing did.
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| "Are we there yet?" David Stein The New Yorker, April 19 & 26, 2004, p. 194 |
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| New Yorker Cartoon Drawing #20 Karl Haendel |
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| A cartoon by David Stein |
Note: Would you like to know what a New Yorker cartoonist really thinks of having his work appropriated by Karl Haendel? Then you'll want to read "Stop, Thief! My Work Gets Appropriated" by David Sipress here. Yes, the title kind of gives it away.
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