George Price: Asking Directions at the 1964 World's Fair

A family stops to ask directions at the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair. The original art to this vintage George Price New Yorker cartoon was sold at Illustration House back in 2004. The iconic observation towers to the New York State Pavilion are visible in the background, the tallest structures. These towers still stand today, although their external elevators are long gone and the Pavilion is overall in a dilapidated state. Price's family, it is to be hoped, found their way to their destination long ago.

"Which way to the House of Good Taste, Mac?"
George Price
Original art
The New Yorker, July 11, 1964, page 31
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988

Blouin Art Sales Index

http://www.blouinartinfo.com/artist/196746/lots 

http://www.artnet.com/artists/george-price/people-asking-directions-at-1964-world-s-fair-5u5XnsZp5Zn6C9JkwNoVYQ2

http://www.findartinfo.com/search/listprices.asp?keyword=3078&name=George%20Price

"Which way to the House of Good Taste, Mac?"
George Price
Original art
The New Yorker, July 11, 1964, page 31
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988

https://archives.newyorker.com/?i=1964-07-11#folio=030

The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988.

Note:  According to Wikipedia, the New York State Pavilion at the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair was designed by architects Philip Johnson and Richard Foster with structural engineer Lev Zetlin.

Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:

George Price

Original New Yorker Cartoon Art

The New York World's Fair 1964-1965

Attempted Bloggery's Tasteful Index

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Nancy and Whitney Balliett's Copy of The World of George Price

The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective was published in 1988. In that year of publication George Price inscribed a copy to Nancy and Whitney Balliett. Whitney Balliett was the New Yorker's jazz critic.

Inscribed "To Nancy + Whitney Balliett
from Geo Price
                   '88"

Photo by David from Manhattan

The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988.

Photo by David from Manhattan

Note:  My thanks to long-time contributor David from Manhattan for sending these photographs. He reports buying this book for some nine or ten dollars.


Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:

George Price

David from Manhattan

Signed Books

Attempted Bloggery's Jazz-Infused Index

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The Quotable George Price

Let's start with a somewhat poetic work of original cartoon art from the New Yorker:

"Farewell, brave lover!  Come back either with your shield or upon it."
George Price
Original artwork for the New Yorker, October 17, 1970, page 36.
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988.

The reference is to the Greek historian Plutarch.

http://www.translatum.gr/forum/index.php?topic=925.0

According to Plutarch's Moralia, Spartan women would exhort their sons going off to war to come back either with their shields or on them, that is either victorious or dead. George Price's cartoon has a somewhat befuddled husband going off to work while his wife delivers the same exhortation as the Spartan women. Tone is important here; she seems to mean it encouragingly and she is fully cognizant that the rhetoric is overdone, particularly with reference to her underachieving husband.

Skinner's listing describes the woman as "frumpy" and the man as "Walter Mitty-ish." This seems to be beside the point. The confidence and the sense of play reside in the woman, however plain her dress. James Thurber's Walter Mitty was an inveterate daydreamer; this guy is just in over his head, both at work and at home. I don't see the telltale signs of a rich fantasy life, only of befuddlement.

Skinner follows its practice of noting the "light blue washes" while failing to identify their role in shading with Ben-Day. The writing on the back of the artwork even identifies the process of Ben-Day underneath the tape, right below the printer's instructions about which tones to use.

Printer's instructions for rendering Ben-Day in "B" and "C" tones

http://www.skinnerinc.com/auctions/2658B/lots/427

"Farewell, brave lover! Come back either with your shield or upon it."
George Price
The New Yorker, October 17, 1970, page 36

"Farewell, brave lover! Come back either
with your shield or upon it."
George Price
The New Yorker, October 17, 1970, page 36

This is certainly not the sole instance of a famous quotation appearing in a George Price cartoon. Here are two more examples from the same era:

"The tumult and the shouting dies;
The captains and the kings depart."
George Price
The New Yorker, June 27, 1970, page 32

"The tumult and the shouting dies;
The captains and the kings depart."
George Price
The New Yorker, June 27, 1970, page 32

The cleaning lady is somewhat incongruously quoting Rudyard Kipling's "Recessional."

http://quotes.dictionary.com/the_tumult_and_the_shouting_dies_the_captains

Here then is just one more:

"I heard a bit of good news today.
We shall pass this way but once."
George Price
The New Yorker, April 14, 1973, page 35

"I heard a bit of good news today.
We shall pass this way but once."
George Price
The New Yorker, April 14, 1973, page 35

The source of this one is well known to me. It was a favorite quotation of my fifth grade teacher, Mr. A. Nick Treglia of the Alice P. Willits Elementary School. These words, or a close variant thereof, were posted in the classroom from day one, an imposing frieze of gothic letters encircling the classroom. Mr. Treglia had absolute confidence that Stephen Grellet's sobering and inspiring Quaker message would resonate with his ten-year-olds.

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/131923-i-shall-pass-through-this-world-but-once-any-good

George Price's cartoon, with its hopelessness and squalor, brilliantly subverts the meaning of the very line it quotes. It just doesn't get better than this.

Who was responsible for these clever cartoon quotations? One would like to think it was Price himself, of course, but could he have come up with all three of these? These literary references might easily have come from a gagman, someone like Richard McCallister perhaps who was known to work closely with Price.

November 15, 2020 Update:  Michael Maslin's Ink Spill interview with cartoonist Edward Frascino, posted today on the occasion of the subject's 90th birthday, reveals that it was Frascino who came up with the idea for Price's classic "We shall pass this way but once" gag of April 14, 1973.


Note:  There are more posts on the blog about George Price, though not quite so quotable as this one. Read them all here.

I don't know what made me think of this, but here is a link to  Attempted Bloggery's past football posts.

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George Price's Peccadillo

Skinner offered this original cartoon at two of its auctions last year, on June 1 and November 17, but failed to sell it despite a low presale estimate. It is a domestic scene by the incomparable George Price, with the drab kitchen setting enlivened by a flamboyant personal wardrobe. The auction house correctly lists this as a New Yorker cartoon; I'm happy to identify the issue, if not the peccadillo.

George Price, "Will you be right home after the peccadillo?"
Original artwork for the New Yorker, March 17, 1973, p. 32.
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988.

http://www.skinnerinc.com/auctions/2687B/lots/404

George Price, "Will you be right home after the peccadillo?"
The New Yorker, March 17, 1973, p. 32

George Price, "Will you be right home after the peccadillo?"
The New Yorker, March 17, 1973, p. 32

June 22, 2014 Update:  Sold!

http://www.skinnerinc.com/auctions/2730B/lots/374

Note:  A number of posts about George Price have been popping up all over the place, namely here.

Maybe you've heard this already, but the Super Bowl is coming up this Sunday, so be sure to make the most of your time. There are only a few days left to review my football posts here. I'm so glad I could help.

01031

George Price: The Best Revenge

Two drawings by George Price from the Mark Birley collection were sold at Sotheby's London last year. Neither is captioned, but they both make use of the written word.

The first depicts a man in his home surrounded by a clutter of tacky objects. He wears a T-shirt reading "Living Well is the Best Revenge." This is everything one could want in a Price drawing. It plays to all of his strengths. It was originally published in the New Yorker in 1982, but this was not known to Sotheby's.

The second bears a sign that reads "Carry Your Dog." Set on an escalator, it demonstrates the artist's extraordinary skill in drafting and perspective. It too had originally been published in the New Yorker but again Sotheby's missed this. Price's characteristic shading with Ben-Day would seem to have faded over the years. Both drawings also were collected in The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective (1988).

George Price, Living Well is the Best Revenge
Original artwork for the New Yorker, June 14, 1982, p. 43
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988

George Price, Carry Your Dog,
Original artwork for the New Yorker, May 24, 1947, p. 40
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988

http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2013/mark-birley-collection/lot.489.html

George Price, Living Well is the Best Revenge
The New Yorker, June 14, 1982, p. 43

George Price, Living Well is the Best Revenge
The New Yorker, June 14, 1982, p. 43

George Price, Carry Your Dog,
The New Yorker, May 24, 1947, p. 40

George Price, Carry Your Dog,
The New Yorker, May 24, 1947, p. 40

Note:  Read more on this blog about George Price here.

01028

Priceless George Price

I'm usually pretty forthcoming about reporting winning bids, at least when I know what they are. Generally, in the case of eBay, the information is readily available. In fact, I don't recall seeing a successful eBay sale before where the price went undisclosed. With the Make Offer feature on fixed-price items, the number of unaccepted offers is generally reported as well as the amount of any accepted offer, or so I thought. That's apparently no longer the case, or else I just haven't been paying attention.

This original art by George Price published in The New Yorker was offered on eBay with a fixed price of $5,000 and it sold for an undisclosed sum when a best offer was accepted. EBay is treating this as a private negotiation and private sale and therefore it does not possess transparency. We can speculate as to what the sale price might have been, I don't imagine we're likely ever to find out for certain.

In the 1988 article from The New York Times quoted  in the eBay listing, Price specifically warns against using the word priceless to describe his work. I'll have to remember that.

George Price, "Try to forgive me. I'm afraid I haven't been very
 good company for the past forty-six years."
Original artwork for The New Yorker, January 16, 1984, page 41.
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988.

George Price, "Try to forgive me. I'm afraid I haven't been very good company for the past forty-six years."
Original framed and matted artwork for The New Yorker, January 16, 1984, page 41.
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988.

George Price's signature

George Price, "Try to forgive me. I'm afraid I haven't been very good company for the past forty-six years."
The New Yorker, January 16, 1984, page 41

Nicholls Gallery 1984 Receipt

Best Offer Accepted April 12, 2013

George Price eBay Listing

George Price eBay Item Description

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Original-George-Price-New-Yorker-Cartoon-1984-/350760398603?_trksid=p2047675.l2557&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEWAX%3AIT&nma=true&si=VJo29%252F7WbHpl1SY9gWmnl4%252FkT80%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc

George Price, "Try to forgive me. I'm afraid I haven't been very good company for the past forty-six years."
The New Yorker, January 16, 1984, page 41

George Price, "Try to forgive me. I'm afraid I haven't been very
good company for the past forty-six years."
The New Yorker, January 16, 1984, page 41

George Price, "Try to forgive me. I'm afraid I haven't been very good company for the past forty-six years."
Original artwork for The New Yorker, January 16, 1984, page 41
The World of George Price:  A 55-Year Retrospective. New York:  Beaufort, 1988

Note:  Below I've created a new label price? to indicate those blog posts for which I do not have the final sale result. In an essentially private sale such as this one the price is unlikely ever to be known, but there are also some sales results which were made public at one time but which are nevertheless unknown to me today. 

May 20, 2013 Update:  In the comments section, RockyPassage reports the sale price as $3,200.

May 22, 2013 Update:  With the sale price miraculously discovered, I have removed the price? label from this blog post, but it is still present on many others throughout the blog. You can see all blog posts in which the price is unknown here.

 0728