Frank Hanley: The Christmas Spirit

In case you missed it on the newsstands, here are a few pages of "The Christmas Spirit"-themed issue of Judge from December 13, 1930. The busy and festive three-color cover illustration is by Frank Hanley.

Frank Hanley, The Christmas Spirit
Judge, December 13, 1930

Carl Becker's art deco illustration for Powers Reproduction Corporation, photoengravers, demonstrates that when you're wearing fur you don't need much else.

Carl Becker ad for Powers Reproduction Corporation                    Lenz Bridge Contest                                    
Judge, December 13, 1930, inside front cover and page 1

Ed Graham, "Send up some cracked ice to Mrs. Blitz at the Ritz Towers—her daughter is throwing a début party!"
I. Klein, A Great Moment in the Life of a Chicagoan:  He is mistaken for Al Capone.
Chon Day, "I wonder where the boss put this guy's art work?"
E. Simms Campbell, "Listen—when are we ever going to get heat in our apartment?"
"I dunno—I'm only th' janitor."
Judge, December 13, 1930, pages 8-9

Bruce Bairnsfather, "Alright, leggo now Bert.  She's open!"                     
                                                             "Judging the Movies" by Pare Lorentz
Judge, December 13, 1930, pages 18-19

Jefferson Machamer
Judge, Junior's Christmas Lists
Judge, December 13, 1930, pages 24-25

"Everyone knows that heat purifies and so 20,679 physicians say that Luckies are less irritating to your throat."

Judge, December 13, 1930, back cover

Judge, December 13, 1930
eBay Listing Ended December 13, 2017

https://www.ebay.ca/itm/Vintage-JUDGE-Magazine-Dec-13-1930-FRANK-HANLEY-Cover-Art-THE-CHRISTMAS-SPIRT-/182899130347?

Judge, December 13, 1930
eBay Item Description

Note:  At press time, this copy of the magazine is still available on eBay.

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02406

Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi

Art is a commodity. I know I don't usually describe it that way here. Typically I'll look at a specific work of, say, illustration art and describe as best I can what attributes make it unique. Now if every work, low or high, is so unique, what value is there in suggesting that art is just another commodity? Well, rare and highly sought-after art by an undisputed genius is a valuable commodity indeed. I don't think there's a better way to understand how a painting like Leonardo's Salvator Mundi could sell for $450,000,000, now the world record price for a work of art. It's not that it's "the male Mona Lisa"—it isn't, although calling it that is great marketing. It's not that it's Leonardo's most compelling work; I'd argue that it falls on the opposite end of that spectrum. What it is, simply, is Leonardo's only painting in private hands. If you had the resources and wanted to own a Leonardo painting, this was your only chance.

It you didn't win the auction, you can console yourself that the work is not in the best condition, that the face of Jesus was overaggressively cleaned in the past and now appears somewhat ghostly and distant from the better-preserved hands or the clothing. You can tell yourself that the composition appears very static and overly symmetrical compared with other works by the artist.

But if you did win the auction, you can tell yourself that you own a Leonardo.

Leonardo da Vinci
Salvator Mundi

Leonardo da Vinci
Christie's New York, November 15, 2017

http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/paintings/leonardo-da-vinci-salvator-mundi-6110563-details.aspx?from=salesummery&intobjectid=6110563&sid=8174d46e-582f-45f6-b119-bb2e8d3c0814

Leonardo da Vinci
Salvator Mundi

Note:  Leonardo has never appeared on this blog before, but his reputation seems to be holding up just fine.


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02405

Robert Day: Treading Lightly

One might not necessarily expect to find an especially robust market for old magazine Christmas gift subscription forms, but the New Yorker at least had the good sense to illustrate such forms with gorgeous magazine covers from its archive. A subscription form offered and sold last year on eBay includes a Robert Day cover from 1935 illustrating a Christmas shopper who has good reason to tread lightly.

The New Yorker Christmas gift subscription form

Robert Day
eBay Listing Ended October 13, 2016

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-1930s-039-50s-THE-NEW-YORKER-Magazine-NYC-New-York-City-Signed-subscrip-Form-/272158516110?hash=item3f5de9638e%3Ag%3AfXcAAOSwmmxW3FzB&nma=true&si=YQGb25QThn5Fxe78BW8tTy6VzZY%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Robert Day
eBay Item Description

The original magazine cover by Robert Day:

Robert Day
The New Yorker, December 7, 1935

Note:  Robert Day doesn't get enough play here. Readers are encouraged to contribute scans or photos of original Day art or of seldom-seen published cartoons.


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02404

Barney Tobey: Santa Who?

Cartoonist Barney Tobey raises a crucial question of identity in this colorful 1950 cartoon from Collier's. Has this heroic Santa remained true to his role, or is he simply too dazed to remember reality? Tobey handles the Christmas crowd deftly. And just take a look at that hood ornament!

"No, no! I mean your real name!"
Barney Tobey
Collier's, December 22, 1950, page 42

Scan by Dick Buchanan

Note: This post would not be possible without the efforts of Dick Buchanan, who provided this blog with the new-to-the-net color cartoon seen here from the renowned Dick Buchanan Cartoon Clip Files. Take it from me: Dick operates a scanner like it's nobody's business. He also contributes regularly to Mike Lynch Cartoons, most recently a post entitled, "From the Dick Buchanan Files: Hank Ketcham Gag Cartoons 1944 – 1952." It's all Pre-Dennis!

Barney Tobey had quite a run on this blog once upon a time, and there is still plenty more work of his to show. Readers are encouraged to contribute scans or photographs of original Tobey art or of seldom-seen published cartoons.


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02403

John Updite and Edward Gorey: The Twelve Terrors of Christmas

A first edition of The Twelve Terrors of Christmas (1993) is signed by both author John Updike and illustrator Edward Gorey. These two talents are sorely missed.

The Twelve Terrors of Christmas
Limitation page signed by John Updike and Edward Gorey, copy 595/600

John Updike and Edward Gorey
AbeBooks Listing as of July 1, 2017

https://www.abebooks.com/Twelve-Terrors-Christmas-John-Updike-Gotham/22462971131/bd?cm_ven=nl&cm_cat=trg&cm_pla=want_CM&cm_ite=viewbook

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02402

Princeton Symphony Orchestra: Holiday Pops!

A holiday concert put on by the Princeton Symphony Orchestra and the Princeton High School Choir was a joyous place to be on Saturday night.

Tuning up

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02401

Blog Post No. 2400: Sizzling Platter Chatter

It is now time for us to take up the sizzling platter situation. Just imagining what might very well be the specialty of the house can make one’s mouth water. Yet New Yorker cartoonists very deliberately have avoided drawing sizzling platters for... well, decades. Three cartoons in the magazine's storied history specifically mention sizzling platters, but do we ever actually get to visualize the real deal? In 1937, cartoonist Barbara Shermund comes awfully close to drawing one, but there is so much steam there’s just nothing left to see. In other words, it's all sizzle and no platter.

Barbara Shermund
The New Yorker, March 13, 1937

Likewise, very early in 1949 cartoonist Robert Day does not delineate for us a sizzling platter either, only a couple discussing the fancy menu item. This time it's all talk and no sizzle.

Robert Day, The New Yorker, January 29, 1949

Thankfully, the subject finds its way to Peter Arno later in 1949, via gag writer Richard McCallister. In Arno's hands, the sizzling platter is no longer really a menu item at all; instead it's an unseen but potently-suggestive double entendre. Note how the provocatively-posed line of showgirls allows the viewer to imagine the comically-horrific incident described. And what a wonderful look of abject concern on the diner’s face! Yet there is paradoxically a complete absence of food anywhere in the drawing; there's not even a dish in sight. Now it's all innuendo and no platter.

Peter Arno, The New Yorker, May 7, 1949

Arno’s midcentury masterpiece put an understandable end to the small run of New Yorker cartoons on the subject of sizzling platters; there is simply no way to top it. So, do we ever actually get to see our talked-about sizzling platter? We certainly do, but it isn't to be found in the pages of The New Yorker. Rather, the long-awaited sizzling platter is finally depicted on the front cover dust jacket illustration for the collection Peter Arno's Sizzling Platter (1949). (You know a cartoon is iconic when it lends a published collection its title!) Arno's self-restraint has finally exhausted itself and it is only now that we get to feast our eyes on a hot sizzling platter...and the food doesn’t look so bad either.

Peter Arno's Sizzling Platter (1949)

www.abebooks.co.uk/

Note:  I am grateful to New Yorker cartoonist and Peter Arno biographer Michael Maslin for identifying Richard McCallister as the gag writer of the Arno cartoon. Mr. Maslin's 2016 biography, Peter Arno: The Mad, Mad World of the New Yorker's Greatest Cartoonist, is available on Amazon and elsewhere at a mad, mad discount no Arno fan should pass up. Incidentally, if any reader can identify the gag writer for the two other sizzling platter cartoons by Shermund and Day, or whether they indeed used a gag writer at all, please come forward and tell the epicurean world what we need to know.

Surely Peter Arno produced far more than his share of unsurpassed work throughout his career and Attempted Bloggery humbly begs to bring you more of it. I seek scans or photographs of original cartoon art by Arno as well as examples of rare and obscure published work from outside of the well-thumbed pages of The New Yorker. Please send me something that sizzles.


December 31, 2017 Update:  Peter Arno's original book cover illustration is in Harry's Bar, London. It's in the center on the back wall.

Harry's Bar in London by Mark Birley

Image added May 7, 2020

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/294563631848250049/

The Attempted Bloggery Centennial Posts
Blog Post No. 100
Blog Post No. 200:  A Shaggy Dog Story

Blog Post No. 300:  From the Libraries of Searle, Koren, Booth, and Saxon

Blog Post No. 400: The Attempted Bloggery Quiz

Blog Post No. 500:  The Second Attempted Bloggery Quiz

Blog Post No. 600:  What I Do When I'm Not Blogging

Blog Post No. 700:  The Many Hazards of Blogging

Blog Post No. 800:  Think Locally, Blog Globally

Blog Post No. 900:  The Blog I Was Meant to Write

Blog Post No. 1000: Happy New Year, Lurkers and All!

Blog Post No. 1100:  The Power of Google

Blog Post No. 1200:  The Ukrainian Situation

Blog Post No. 1300:  Plus-Sizing the Readership

Blog Post No. 1400:  New Goals for an Old Blogger

Blog Post No. 1500:  The Wisdom of Warren Buffett 

Blog Post No. 1600:  "The Big Bang Theory's" Homage to Charles Addams

Blog Post No. 1700:  The New Yorker Apocrypha

Blog Post No. 1800:  The Wrong Bag

Blog Post No. 1900:  Think Good Thoughts About George Booth at 90

Blog Post No. 2000:  Charles Addams and the Birth of a Rare Book Collector
Blog Post No. 2100:  Eustace Tilley in Leotards
Blog Post No. 2200:  Peter Arno Drawings from the Estate of Frank Modell
Blog Post No. 2300:  Peter Arno—Not for Attribution 

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02400

Dr. Seuss: A Signed Grinch

University Archives of Westport just sold a later edition copy of How the Grinch Stole Christmas! This copy is signed and dedicated by Dr. Seuss, who himself was no Grinch.

Dr. Seuss
eBay Listing Ended December 6, 2017

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Dr-Seuss-signed-amp-inscribed-copy-of-034-How-The-Grinch-Stole-Christmas-034-Lot-67-/232573838539?hash=item36267b24cb%3Ag%3AkRkAAOSwC-taGFRF&nma=true&si=YQGb25QThn5Fxe78BW8tTy6VzZY%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Dr. Seuss
eBay Item Description

Dr. Seuss
eBay Bid History
One bidder goes up against unseen auction house bidders, apparently

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02399

Dorothy McKay: Christmas Spirits

The repeal of Prohibition took effect on December 5, 1933 with the ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment to the Constitution. The timing led to an unusual Life magazine Christmas cover by Dorothy McKay. It's not that "Brother Tupper"—nice alliteration—is drinking again already; he never stopped. It's just that his obviously red "nose is legal again," a very satisfactory resolution for the clergyman who has no problem with him being under the influence even while entertaining the children as Santa Claus. The other priest seems to be harboring second thoughts, as he very well should.

There's a lot wrong with the underlying assumptions and stereotypes of this magazine cover, but how was it received by its Depression-era audience? Was the repeal of the Volstead Act deemed a great boon or, more realistically, a mixed blessing? Was an inebriated Santa Claus really the way Life wanted to celebrate this historic crossroads?

"I'm glad brother Tupper's nose is legal again."
Dorothy McKay
Life, December 1933

Scan by Dick Buchanan

Note: A Yuletide thank-you to Dick Buchanan for providing the old blog with the magazine cover seen here from the celebrated Dick Buchanan Cartoon Clip Files. Dick contributes regularly to Mike Lynch Cartoons, most recently a post entitled, "From the Dick Buchanan Files: Holiday and Winter Cartoons 1948 - 1960." Cheers!


Dorothy McKay was a leading cartoonist of her day. Readers are encouraged to contribute scans or photographs of original McKay art or of obscure published cartoons.


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02398

Richard Decker: The Card That Says Everything

In a cartoon published in Life magazine's December 1933 issue, Richard Decker presents us with a woman who is engaged in the quintessential Christmas season activity of shopping for the perfect card. She wants to find one that will very specifically do the work of two, a get-well card and a Christmas card.

Aside from that, note the disorderly way the individual cards are displayed on the countertop, the way they are organized by price—ten or fifteen cents—rather than by intended recipient, and the presence of a dedicated saleswoman at the table. It all seems rather chaotic and labor-intensive compared with a modern card rack. But it must have been helpful to have a salesperson with whom to discuss the perplexing card choices one faced.

"I want a card for an aunt who is ill at Christmas."
Richard Decker
Life, December 1933, page 42

Scan by Dick Buchanan

Note:  Thanks to Dick Buchanan for providing Attempted Bloggery with a scan of this forgotten cartoon from deep inside the festive Dick Buchanan Cartoon Clip Files. Dick regularly contributes to Mike Lynch Cartoons, most recently a post entitled, "From the Dick Buchanan Files: Holiday and Winter Cartoons 1948 - 1960." 'Tis the season.

Richard Decker doesn't get enough play here on the old blog. Readers are encouraged to contribute scans or photos of original Decker art or of rare published cartoons.

Get Well Soon and Merry Christmas to all.


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02397