Dali Draws Harpo

Surrealist Salvador Dali made a pencil drawing of comedian Harpo Marx in February of 1937. Harpo did not get to keep the art, but he was rewarded with a signed print inscribed by the artist. The original is now in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Harpo's print, though, is available from Schubertiade Music.

Harpo Marx
Schubertiade listing accessed June 12, 2023

https://www.schubertiademusic.com/items/details/10076

Collectors who prefer to pay more can get the same item from AbeBooks with an extra commission:

Harpo Marx
AbeBooks listing accessed June 12, 2023

https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=31333167623&searchurl=kn%3DDisney%26sortby%3D1&cm_sp=snippet-_-srp2-_-image19

If you would rather pay less, get yourself a reliable time machine and go back to the Bonhams auction of November 25, 2013, where it sold for $4,000 including the premium.

https://www.bonhams.com/auction/21427/lot/17/an-inscribed-reproduction-portrait-of-harpo-marx-by-salvador-dali/

04348

Charles Addams: In the Library's Stacks

How many photographs does it take to sell an original New Yorker cartoon by the great Charles Addams? Two? Four? An eBay seller goes all in with twenty-four.

Charles Addams
Original art
The New Yorker, July 10, 1971, p. 21
Favorite Haunts (1976), p. 50

Charles Addams
Original art
The New Yorker, July 10, 1971, p. 21
Favorite Haunts (1976), p. 50

Charles Addams
Original art
The New Yorker, July 10, 1971, p. 21
Favorite Haunts (1976), p. 50

Charles Addams's signature

Ding

Ding

Ding

Charles Addams
eBay listing ended March 10, 2023

https://www.ebay.com/itm/115727486985?hash=item1af1e55009:g:DykAAOSwb0ZkCqxQ&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAABALwp4S6KkexxBRpgtmjDDmnolTbgo3hIT8iODt2aA9WSG9o5JAc8r5LfebvjNBDh9B5NRQtkJQwMcjfsZIap63VGarlehkmpcXU7e%2FskIOKRpmzQA8U%2FC7d27mqTyc6cFfGv5YFBPwN%2Be%2FOjjyK3XeGD0L65cZ8QlSDMONqf

OtokvijKhj17swHy1cn5JGBmM0qHGWWvQ8qhIw0BlquQ0%2FaR9q7U4DG8iUES1w7W5OeX0BqsivZ3XoPtJ44LpWKnb4rxx%2FXeUpFuGUchD0RoEbOwX9hcQsVnxeCwfq8Gwv90gYEvvxAIYkER4JYkSnZO6mUEgsNveM0y2Gota6YkZjM%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR-yX69XwYQ

Charles Addams
eBay item description

The buyer offered $4,200. Seller countered with $5,400.
Buyer countered with $4,800. Seller countered with $5,000.
Accepted.

Three recent sales of original New Yorker cartoon art by Charles Addams from eBay

Charles Addams
Original art
The New Yorker, July 10, 1971, p. 21
Favorite Haunts (1976), p. 50

A spot drawing by Henry Martin and a cartoon by Charles Addams

https://archives.newyorker.com/newyorker/1971-07-10/flipbook/020/

Favorite Haunts (1976, W. H. Allen British edition 1977), pp. 50-51

Spot drawing
Henry Martin

Note:  Another great New Yorker cartoonist, Edward Koren (1935-2023), passed away on Friday morning. Posts on Attempted Bloggery about his work may be seen here.

Happily, Charles Addams was quite prolific. Images of his original cartoon art, souvenir drawings, and published rarities would very likely make for fine future blog posts. There is no need to send twenty-four photos. Just saying.

Readers who have purchased New Yorker-related art through the eBay Make Offer option are encouraged to inform this blogger of the full details of negotiation. The public wants to know!

04291

Fear of the Surreal: Richard Taylor Preliminary New Yorker Cover Art

The website of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York, lists a watercolor by Richard Taylor. It is described as a New Yorker magazine cover from 1937. That is very nearly correct. As the handwritten magazine logo suggests, this is actually, in publishing parlance, a rough. Taylor projected a September 1937 publication date, but the finished art was actually to run on the cover of the January 9 issue for that year.

https://www.albrightknox.org/artworks/rca1939113-art-gallery-new-yorker-magazine-cover

The cover depicts a woman entering an art gallery and encountering powerful surrealist art. She reacts quite viscerally to the transgressive art on display, experiencing shock, or revulsion, or fear.

Taylor made some important changes between the rough and the finish. He had the disturbing art fill more space on the gallery wall, making the paintings seem more overwhelming to the diminutive woman. Also, Taylor added some benign figures to the foreground. Significantly, they are experiencing the grotesque art calmly, with no apparent squeamishness or sensitivity. Their emotional indifference to the distressing images they regard on the wall stands in contrast to the woman's strong gut reaction.

Richard Taylor
The New Yorker, January 9, 1939

Richard Taylor
Preliminary art
The New Yorker, January 9, 1939
The Albright-Know Art Gallery
Buffalo, New York

Note:  This is the first work of preliminary New Yorker art by Richard Taylor I have been able to show on the blog. Readers with other Taylor roughs or finishes are urged to share them here.

03766

Richard Taylor: Surrealistic Curves

Cartoonist Richard Taylor (1902-1970) frequently visited the subject of the female nude in art. An original illustration on that topic was sold on eBay in August and seems to be commenting on Surrealism itself.

Clearly, a painter is seen transforming a reclining female figure into an abstraction on canvas, but why is the model floating in the air in the first place? Why are there surrealistic elements like the geometric hedges and the one-legged chair? What of the incongruous objects: the watering can and, on the chair, the carrot and the fork? And is that an onion? The original subject of this illustration may have been creating art in a surreal world, or perhaps painting one's dreams. 

Richard Taylor's signature

There are no publisher's markings on the back.

Richard Taylor
eBay listing ended August 18, 2021

https://www.ebay.com/itm/393500032058?hash=item5b9e6dfc3a%3Ag%3AEcEAAOSwjcJhFAo%7E&nma=true&si=64J6TuENCQvl%252FEQuIbsoMEcDQlw%253D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Richard Taylor
eBay item description

Richard Taylor
eBay bid history
The winning bid is placed early, followed by six failed bids.

Note:  Was this Richard Taylor illustration ever published and, if so, where and when? If you know, do tell.

03765