Ronald Searle: L'Apéritif

Yesterday in Monaco at L’Hôtel des Ventes de Monte-Carlo (HVMC), an ink and watercolor depiction of two cats seated at outdoor tables was sold at auction. The artist is Ronald Searle (1920-2011).

L'Apéritif (1974)
Ronald Searle

The cats, female and male, are seated at separate tables. The female cat is as yet unaware of the male cat's attention. On the right we see a rare instance in which Searle dressed one of his male cats in trousers and oxfords. The pants have no top and seem to be an organic part of the cat's crossed legs. The female cat is also endowed with recognizably human legs. They are shapely and end in high heels, not unlike the legs of Searle's Catahari or The Big Show. Most remarkably, though, Searle vividly endowed his cats with distinctive human personalities.

Catahari

Ronald Searle

https://www.flickr.com/photos/queenieandthedew/6580611779/in/photostream/

The Big Show
Ronald Searle

http://flickr.com/photos/queenieandthedew/6580591963

For those who couldn't be there in person, lots from the Monte Carlo sale were listed on the Invaluable website.

Ronald Searle
Invaluable listing accessed July 7, 2026

https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/ronald-searle-1920-2011-128-c-374b288f0a?objectID=205007728&algIndex=upcoming_lots_lotNumber_asc_prod&queryID=82d6a89f27f85dac7e0e706e280387eb

Bidding started at 1,000 Euros with an estimate of 1,000 to 1,500 Euros. The buyer's premium was 33%. There were other fees as well.

Ronald Searle
Invaluable item description

Searle's 1974 watercolor L'Apéritif was published as a postcard in 1977. Here's an example of both printed sides, as found on eBay:

L'Apéritif was later included in Ronald Searle's Big Fat Cat Book (1982). No home should be without a copy.

The present work is from the collection of Yanou Collart, the well-connected publicist and actress. Or, as the auction house writes even more intriguingly, "Femme d'amour et femme d'affaires." 

https://www.hvmc.com/news-detail/32/yanou-collart-femme-d-amour-et-femme

Any friend of Sean Connery's is a friend of mine.

The lot was sold for the opening bid of 1,000 Euros:

05295

Ronald Searle: Strength Through Joy

Strength through joy?

I suppose Ronald Searle did indeed give his drawing of a wicked St. Trinian's girl flipping over her teacher the title of Unarmed Combat—twice, it seems—and that certainly describes the action well enough. But that is not how it appeared in print.

The titles of Searle drawings were generally afterthoughts. In his classic collection Souls in Torment, as promising a name for a cartoon book as one could hope to find in 1953, the present work is one of three drawings under the alternative heading Strength Through Joy.

The term "unarmed combat" actually appears as part of a caption on the page opposite. Thus, grouping these three drawings under an Unarmed Combat heading would have detracted from the caption on the following page. At least, that's a conjecture of what went on, and why Searle abandoned his presumptive title for this drawing when it was published in a book even though it fit perfectly.

The signature appears to be later than 1953 by more than a decade. Searle must have signed it whenever the drawing eventually left his studio.

Ronald Searle's signature

In 1991, this piece was offered by London dealer Chris Beetles. Despite Beetles noting the publishing history, the title he listed is the one that Searle wrote on the work. After all, it is a better title. 

At auction, many a tempting work seems reasonably priced before the bidding gets underway.

Ronald Searle
Chiswick Auctions listing accessed March 21, 2026, ten days before the sale

https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/Ronald-Searle-C.B.E.-British,-1920-2011-Unarm-168-c-BEBFCC408C?utm_source=alerts&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=artistalerts&utm_content=378696&utm_term=378696

Ronald Searle
Chiswick Auctions item description

And yet it sells on March 31 at Chiswick Auctions for more than twice the high estimate.

Here it is on the printed page as one of a trio of Strength Through Joy drawings. On the opposite page is "Some little girl didn't hear me say 'unarmed combat'." The captioned cartoon shows an earlier version of Searle's signature.

https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-T3RcLoQuSZA/TrHj7rZjIFI/AAAAAAAAX7k/-SmvpXssYq0/s1600/Searle11.jpg

Image added July 5, 2026

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Annals of Censorship: Patrick Nagel's Tracy Vaccaro on Bluesky

Maybe censorship is too strong a word here. The Adult Content label is more of a bothersome extra step to prevent supposedly sensitive eyes from viewing supposedly sensitive content. The "sensitive content" remains viewable on the Bluesky social media site.

I saw and photographed a Patrick Nagel piece at a Heritage Auctions Manhattan preview of the Illustration Art sale last week and subsequently posted it:

Patrick Nagel's illustration on canvas of Tracy Vaccaro in a polka dot dress or wrap is certainly sexy and, I'll even grant, somewhat erotic—it has indisputable partial nudity. So is it adult content? To Bluesky, yes. I personally don't think it would cause harm to innocent minds.

Google, to be sure, certainly has given me no pushback over my posts here on Blogger over these past fifteen years. From each of my blog posts, I go on to create content for a number of social media sites. On X, a post of mine may represent some of the tamer content these days. Pinterest, when the site censors me, eliminates the posts it consider objectionable entirely. That hasn't happened there for the Nagel, at least not yet. Facebook, Instagram, Threads, Tumblr, and Mastodon have pretty much left me to do as I please. The same for Counter Social, which I have avoided using for technical reasons. It is Bluesky that places a warning label on some of my more risque content but does not delete it. That is what the site did here, almost immediately after I posted the Nagel, no doubt via bot.

Clicking on the label leads to the big reveal:

The Adult Content label's wording "Does not include nudity" confuses me a bit. I assume it is chiefly the nudity that makes this Adult Content.

Here it is, the same post, now labeled on Bluesky as "Sexually Suggestive" and, again, "Does not include nudity."

Bluesky allowed me to appeal the Sexually Suggestive label, which I did as a matter of course.

My appeal consisted of just two words. I don't consider artistic nudity to be automatically adult content. But then, it isn't my app.

Is this a contradiction? How did the image change from "Sexually Suggestive" to "Non-sexual?" Did the labels change with my appeal?

Apparently, they did. Artistic nudes are classified as "non-sexual" on the site. That's not strictly correct either but, hey, it's Bluesky's playground.

The Bluesky post in question may be seen here. 

But, wait! No sooner did my appeal get heard than the process started over with my Bluesky post of Ronald Searle's City Bird which was on the blog Wednesday of this week.

https://bsky.app/profile/docnad.bsky.social/post/3mjni5faauk24

So here we go again . . . 

Note:

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05247

Ronald Searle: City Bird

City Bird is a 1969 lithograph by the English caricaturist Ronald Searle. He created a number of prints in this period with pointed observations set off by imposing cityscapes. This example, sold by Heritage Auctions on April 9, is no. 64/99. There are also ten numbered artist's proofs. The colors are black, gold, and red according to the 1971 Munich exhibition catalogue of Galerie Wolfgang Gurlitt where it is listed as no. 46. It is numbered 132 by Editions Empreinte.

As is typical with Searle, the closer you look, the more you see. At 65 x 50 cm, it's quite an imposing image. 

I saw an example of this print at a downtown Manhattan gallery in the late 1970s. I think the price was $200 but i could be wrong. The gallerist condescended to inform me that Searle was "a major illustrator," which, as you might surmise, I already knew. But I had no intention of buying this one at any price.

I can't really say I've changed my opinion with the passage of time although I have grown more tolerant of Searle's grotesqueries as the world itself has gotten more repugnant. Still, the figure attracts and repulses me at the same time. To me, she looks like a prostitute—which, to be fair, is legal in France. 

The estimate was $200-$300. Bidding started at $1 with no reserve. Eighteen days before the sale, no bids had yet been placed.

Ronald Searle
Heritage Auctions listing accessed March 21, 2026, 18 days before the sale

https://fineart.ha.com/itm/prints-and-multiples/ronald-william-fordham-searle-british-1920-2011-city-bird-1969-lithograph-in-colors-on-wove-paper-25-3-4-x-19-3-4/a/13238-28088.s?type=wantlistid-562622!creatorid-cewl!linkclicked-lotlink!emailid-03212026-080247.395PM-1315592-562622!itemid-13238_28003!wlem#13238-28003

Ronald Searle
Heritage Auctions item description

Last week, the print was sold for a bid of just $1, which comes out to $50 with Heritage's minimum buyer's premium. I hate to see such little interest in a Searle lithograph, many of which are quite wonderful, but this one clearly isn't for everybody. Not even me.

Gurlitt catalogue

05245

Ronald Searle's Complete Published Works?

Somebody did a very thorough job collecting the published books of Ronald Searle. Forum Auctions, which offered the set yesterday, called the approximately two hundred volumes "The Complete Works of Ronald Searle" to which I might add only "or very nearly" out of an abundance of caution.

But rather than quibble, let's pause to admire the condition of all these books in their lovely dust jackets, the inclusion of some different editions—English, American, French, German—and the books by various authors whom Searle illustrated.

In addition, at least three of the books were personally inscribed by Searle. The most impressive of these, no doubt, is David Arkell's copy of Ronald Searle's Big Fat Cat Book (1982) inscribed in October of that year to his long-time journalist friend with a classic Searle cat.

The London auction house's presale estimate was 6,000-8,000 GBP, with bidding starting at 5,000 GBP.

Ronald Searle
Forum Auctions listing accessed March 13, 2026

khttps://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/Searle-Ronald-.-Collection-of-the-Complete-Work-305-c-E975213429?utm_term=ronald%20searle&utm_source=alerts&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=keywordalerts&utm_content=430028&utm_term=430028

Ronald Searle

Forum Auctions item description

Alas, no sale.

April 12, 2026 Update:  These books failed to sell at auction and were subsequently listed on AbeBooks by Picture This Gallery of Sunningdale, UK, with additional images. On the one hand, the asking price is considerably greater than the high estimate at auction. On the other hand, there is no buyer's premium to contend with. It remains an extraordinary collection.

Ronald Searle
AbeBooks listing accessed April 12, 2026

https://www.abebooks.com/signed-first-edition/Complete-Collection-works-Ronald-Searle-almost/32419760686/bd

Ronald Searle
AbeBooks item description

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