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| Edward Koren's signature |
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Edward Koren eBay listing ended November 6, 2024 |
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| Edward Koren eBay item description |
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Showing posts with label ice skating. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ice skating. Show all posts
Saturday, December 7, 2024
Edward Koren: Skating
Skating is an original drawing by cartoonist Edward Koren dated May 1975. It shows a somewhat indistinct group of figures ice skating. The art was sold last month, on eBay.
Saturday, April 20, 2024
Peter Arno: Skating in Rockefeller Center
On April 17, Peter Arno's original 1944 New Yorker cartoon set at the skating rink of Rockefeller Center went on the auction block at Heritage. The Texas auction house, it should be noted, did not identify the drawing's date or its publication in The New Yorker. But the caption was right there. The drawing is unsigned but unmistakably Arno.
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"Why, it's Mrs. Courtney Richardson, Senior—she's heading this way!" Peter Arno Original art The New Yorker, February 12, 1944, p. 20 |
The rink at Rockefeller Center first opened on Christmas of 1936, roughly seven years before this drawing appeared. Its placement below street level makes it immediately recognizable then and now. Arno gives us the static observers above with a well-defined horizontal plane set apart from the strong verticals of Manhattan's buildings and the plaza. The stairs create a flow down to the area of action—no one is going up. The skaters have a flow of their own too as we see three of them making the turn and following the grooves on the ice.
The couple in the foreground on the left direct our attention to the right, their sharp noses—and skates—pointing to Mrs. Courtney Richardson, Senior. Her name and her figure are outsized and attract our attention. So do her dark clothes and her exaggerated angulation; her skates move perpendicular to the gentle curves on the ice that Arno has so carefully established. The sense of movement is achieved without the use of speed lines. The matter-of-fact caption does not prepare us for the madcap scene Arno creates.
Arno even took the time to paint the grain of the wood on the floorboards. Such details are largely or completely lost in publication.
The couple in the foreground on the left direct our attention to the right, their sharp noses—and skates—pointing to Mrs. Courtney Richardson, Senior. Her name and her figure are outsized and attract our attention. So do her dark clothes and her exaggerated angulation; her skates move perpendicular to the gentle curves on the ice that Arno has so carefully established. The sense of movement is achieved without the use of speed lines. The matter-of-fact caption does not prepare us for the madcap scene Arno creates.
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| "Why, it's Mrs. Courtney Richardson, Senior—she's heading this way!" Peter Arno Original art The New Yorker, February 12, 1944, p. 20 |
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| Peter Arno Heritage Auctions listing ended April 17, 2024 |
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| Peter Arno Heritage Auctions item description |
Some sleight-of-hand took place before publication. The New Yorker published the drawing with a linear border that looks for all the world like a part of Arno's original. His signature was added as well. Possibly the signature and border together were part of a single overlay. It's a small detail, but the back lining of Mrs. Richardson's coat, which Arno left white, has been shaded.
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"Why, it's Mrs. Courtney Richardson, Senior—she's heading this way!" Peter Arno The New Yorker, February 12, 1944, p. 20 |
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"Why, it's Mrs. Courtney Richardson, Senior—she's heading this way!" Peter Arno Original art The New Yorker, February 12, 1944, p. 20 |
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| Cartoons by Peter Arno and Garrett Price |
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By the way, is Garrett Price's 1944 Valentine's Day drawing of a woodpecker a spot or a cartoon? I'd call it a cartoon. But it is not listed in The Complete Cartoons of The New Yorker (2004), so the powers that be have a differing opinion. I might have to file an appeal.
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| Garrett Price The New Yorker, February 12, 1944, p. 21 |
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Wednesday, February 21, 2024
My Entries in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for Winter 2024
Moment magazine's Cartoon Caption Contest for the Winter 2024 issue depicts a figure skater who has just carved a star of David into the ice. My captions are shown below. The drawing is by Benjamin Schwartz.
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| "Well, I give you a 10." "It's very nice, but let's see you daven." "No way that was a triple Axel." "There's not a chance of making Google Earth." "Now let's drive away with the Zamboni." |
May 18, 2024 Update: The Finalists
August 3, 2024 Update: The Winner (which I voted for)
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Saturday, December 26, 2020
George Price: Sharpening the Skates
When was the last time you had the blades of your ice skates sharpened? Did your service have that personal touch? George Price shows how the professionals do it in this original New Yorker cartoon art from February 23, 1946.
Note: Have I mentioned that your original cartoon art by George Price can also appear on this blog if you send me a good scan or two? I didn't think so.
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| George Price Original art The New Yorker, February 23, 1946, page 38 |
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| George Price Original art The New Yorker, February 23, 1946, page 38 |
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| George Price's signature |
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| George Price eBay listing ended June 25, 2020 |
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| George Price eBay item description |
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Best offer accepted [End of eBay listing] |
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| George Price Original art The New Yorker, February 23, 1946, page 38 |
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| Cartoon by George Price and an advertisement for Yuban coffee |
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Thursday, December 27, 2018
eBay 101: Falling Upon a New Yorker Cartoon?
An eBay seller has recently listed a wash drawing with the intriguing title "Original NEW YORKER Cartoon Art 1930s." The initial Buy It Now price was a robust $2,000, albeit with a Make Offer option. The seller, toys24-7 based in Scottsdale, Arizona, has earned an eBay rating over 2700 of which 99.5% of the feedback is positive. That's impressive. So let's have a look.
The artwork, if we can call it that, depicts a girl slipping and falling in a puddle of water. The technique is sloppy and unprofessional. The grasp of anatomy is not even rudimentary. For example, both legs have an extra angulation at mid-thigh. This is more of an illustrated pratfall than a gag cartoon anyway. It is probably meant to be cute. There is no signature and no written caption, although there seems to be some deliberately-obliterated writing on the lower margin of the full sheet:
The verso, as by now one might expect, has no New Yorker markings and indeed no markings of any kind to indicate it was published anywhere. To anyone not trying to sell it, this is obviously the work of an amateur.
For those like toys24-7 who may never have seen a 1930s New Yorker cartoon, here's one example, and it even includes a puddle:
I confess—I chose a good one.
So what is this eBay seller really in possession of? It certainly never appeared in the New Yorker or in any other magazine for that matter. My best guess is that it's a wash drawing done by an amateur perhaps attempting to ape the style of Grace Drayton, famous for her Campbell Soup Kids. I don't have an example of her art depicting a fall into a puddle exactly, but here's a Campbell's Kid eager for some water sport.
A 1921 ad, on the other hand, shows how she handled the subject of ice skating. (Imagine, if you will, a leisure activity taking place on a big frozen puddle.)
But we know better, don't we? Of course we do.
December 30, 2018 Update: The asking prices continue to drop.
January 1, 2019 Update:
Note: After all these years of my writing this blog, one might think it's unfair of me to go after someone for knowing less about New Yorker cartoons than I do. Unfair or not, rest assured I have no intention of letting up.
Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:
eBay 101
Perry Barlow
Artist Unknown
Ice Skating
Advertising
Attempted Bloggery's Fallen Index
02781
The artwork, if we can call it that, depicts a girl slipping and falling in a puddle of water. The technique is sloppy and unprofessional. The grasp of anatomy is not even rudimentary. For example, both legs have an extra angulation at mid-thigh. This is more of an illustrated pratfall than a gag cartoon anyway. It is probably meant to be cute. There is no signature and no written caption, although there seems to be some deliberately-obliterated writing on the lower margin of the full sheet:
The verso, as by now one might expect, has no New Yorker markings and indeed no markings of any kind to indicate it was published anywhere. To anyone not trying to sell it, this is obviously the work of an amateur.
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| eBay Listing Retrieved December 19, 2018 |
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| eBay Item Description |
Now actively monitoring my browsing of the auction site, eBay soon wrote to tell me the item and one other similar drawing were discounted to $1,500.
But wait. Already these have been marked down to $1,250 each. Even the seller recognizes these are grossly overpriced. Alas, they will remain overpriced however much they are discounted after Christmas.
For those like toys24-7 who may never have seen a 1930s New Yorker cartoon, here's one example, and it even includes a puddle:
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| "Oh, don't be an ass, Herbert!" Perry Barlow The New Yorker, April 20, 1935, page 18 |
I confess—I chose a good one.
So what is this eBay seller really in possession of? It certainly never appeared in the New Yorker or in any other magazine for that matter. My best guess is that it's a wash drawing done by an amateur perhaps attempting to ape the style of Grace Drayton, famous for her Campbell Soup Kids. I don't have an example of her art depicting a fall into a puddle exactly, but here's a Campbell's Kid eager for some water sport.
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| Grace Drayton Campbell's Soup advertisement |
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| Grace Drayton Campbell's Soup advertisement, 1921 |
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| Grace Drayton Campbell's Soup advertisement, 1921 |
Look, sellers on eBay have the same weakness we all do. Without doing their homework, they want to believe every slapdash find of theirs is of great cultural significance and value. Naturally then at least some eBay sellers are a little too eager to conclude that whatever random drawing they have chanced upon must certainly be a lost masterpiece once published in the New Yorker.
But we know better, don't we? Of course we do.
December 30, 2018 Update: The asking prices continue to drop.
January 5, 2019 Update:
Note: After all these years of my writing this blog, one might think it's unfair of me to go after someone for knowing less about New Yorker cartoons than I do. Unfair or not, rest assured I have no intention of letting up.
Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:
eBay 101
Perry Barlow
Artist Unknown
Ice Skating
Advertising
Attempted Bloggery's Fallen Index
02781
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