Attempted Bloggery

Saturday, November 18, 2023

Maurice Sendak: Wild Rumpus Stage Design, Glyndebourne

A Maurice Sendak set design offered yesterday at Heritage is based on his classic children's book Where the Wild Things Are. "Let the wild rumpus start!," as it is called, was created for the Glyndebourne Touring Opera's production. These are the Sendak characters collectors wants to see and own in his original work, although here they are looser and less detailed than they appear in his book illustrations.

Maurice Sendak
Heritage Auctions listing accessed November 5, 2023, eleven days before the auction

https://fineart.ha.com/itm/mainstream-illustration/maurice-sendak-american-1928-2012-let-the-wild-rumpus-start-where-the-wild-things-are-glyndebourne-touring-opera/a/8145-67035.s?ic4=GalleryView-Thumbnail-071515

Bidding opened at $35,000, half the low estimate of $70,000. The piece was not sold at auction, but was made available for purchase at a fixed price of $87,500 after the sale. This cost is derived from the low estimate of $70,000 plus the 25% buyer's premium. Thus the reserve must have been set at the low estimate, the highest reserve permissible.

Note: Readers waiting for my express permission to submit scans and photographs of original Maurice Sendak art to this blog may now consider themselves enabled to do so.

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Friday, November 17, 2023

Decorating the 2023 Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree

The Norway Spruce arrived in Rockefeller Center early on November 11 and was lifted into place by crane. It is now surrounded by extensive scaffolding and its decoration is surely underway. The tree lighting ceremony will be aired on November 29. Here's how the plaza looked to me today.

Prometheus, 1934
Paul Manship

Saks Fifth Avenue facade decorations

St. Patrick's Cathedral

Atlas, installed 1937
Lee Lawrie and Rene Paul Chambellan

Cartier

The Plaza Hotel

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Russell Patterson: Stage Design for Saturnalia?

Russell Patterson (1893-1977) was a cartoonist and illustrator who specialized in rendering the independent-minded and attractive women of the Jazz Age. He was famous for creating the Patterson Girl of the 1920s which did much to define the flapper. He also worked on set designs for Broadway. Patterson's "Suggestion for Production," apparently an unrealized one, is dominated by the ringed planet Saturn amidst stars and clouds. His scenic design incorporates dancers and their costumes as well. The original art was sold on Tuesday by Weiss Auctions.

The presale estimate was $200 to $400.

Even so, the stage design sold for an anemic $120 plus the 18% premium. All bidding was from the floor.

Russel Patterson
Weiss Auctions

https://weissauctions.nextlot.com/auctions/1497215/lots/22686896

Note: It occurs to me that I don't have much original art by Russell Patterson on the blog and that this scenic design is anything but a typical example of it. Enterprising Patterson collectors are invited to help me out by submitting scans or photos of his artwork for potential inclusion in future posts.

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Thursday, November 16, 2023

John Ruge: The Art of Deception

Two cartoons by John Ruge were sold together at Weiss Auctions yesterday. Their publication history is unknown.

The first of these shows a pandhandler approaching a fashionable woman for a handout.

"Say, mister, could you spare a dollar or two to help pay for my eye examination?"
John Ruge

The second shows Bigfoot as we've never seen him—and from the looks of it we never will.

John Ruge

The estimate for the lot was $150 to $300. No online bids were received before the sale.

John Ruge
Weiss Auctions listing accessed November 11, 2023

https://weissauctions.nextlot.com/auctions/1497215/lots/22686882

Eighteen floor bids took the hammer price to $230. The buyer's premium is an additional 18%.

Note: I am intrigued by these two cartoons from the hand of John Ruge. Were they published? If so, where? If you know, don't be shy like Bigfoot.

Ruge has been credited with originating Peter Arno's classic 1941 cartoon with the caption "Well, back to the old drawing board." His original rough might very well be lost, or it might be hanging in someone's den. More than eighty years after the fact, I'm asking if anyone has seen the drawing, in a den or otherwise, as Ruge first envisioned it.

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Wednesday, November 15, 2023

Arnie Levin: That Time of Year

It's that time of year again, isn't it? Arnie Levin's June 15, 1981 New Yorker cartoon does something truly extraordinary.

"What do you think accounts for the holiday atmosphere?"
Arnie Levin
Original art
The New Yorker, June 15, 1981, page 61

Levin's original art came to auction in 2017 with a very reasonable estimate from Swann Galleries of $400 to $600. And yet when the sale was all over the hammer price was just $225, or $293 with the buyer's premium. To paraphrase the under-appreciated cartoonist, what do you think accounts for this?

Arnie Levin
Swann Galleries, Sale 2465, Lot 295
December 14, 2017
Hammer Price

https://catalogue.swanngalleries.com/asp/fullcatalogue.asp?salelot=2465+++++295+&refno=++739690&image=1#j2lot

"What do you think accounts for the holiday atmosphere?"
Arnie Levin
The New Yorker, June 15, 1981, page 61

"What do you think accounts for the holiday atmosphere?"
Arnie Levin
Original art
The New Yorker, June 15, 1981, page 61

An ad for International Gold Corp., Ltd., and a cartoon by Arnie Levin

https://archives.newyorker.com/newyorker/1981-06-15/flipbook/062/

Note: I'd be only too pleased to post images of other Arnie Levin original cartoon art on this blog.

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Tuesday, November 14, 2023

The CartoonStock Cartoon Caption Contest No. 173

I'm not entirely sure what's going on in the CartoonStock Caption Contest #173, but in many ways it looks like just another day at the office. There's a man sitting at a laptop in his cubicle talking to a female coworker while in the background the imposing landscape burns as if consumed by the fires of hell. The rules of the monthly cash prize contest are the same: five dollars buys up to three entries. Real cash prizes are $500 for first place and $100 for each of five runners up. As of this writing, I've put $90 into the first eighteen pay-to-play contests and this nineteenth one brings my total cash outlay up to $95. After two previous runner-up entries, I've collected $200, so I'm still doing very well. In fact, so few contestants enter that the odds are generally quite favorable for all. My three entries are shown below. The cool cartoonist is Drew Panckeri.

"Even so, it beats telemarketing."
"Before I get up, are you wearing anything today?"
"What I really can't take is that calendar."

November 23, 2023 Update: The Winner

The Judges Deliberate

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Monday, November 13, 2023

My Entry in The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest #874

It's autumn so naturally aliens are raking the leaves. It's The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest #874 from the issue of November 13, 2023. My caption is shown below. Clearly I'm not too proud. The drawing is by P. C. Vey.

"Please! There are some things we just won't clean up."

November 23, 2023 Update: The Finalists

December 3, 2023 Update: I voted for the caption from Los Angeles.

December 4, 2023 Update: The Winner

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Sunday, November 12, 2023

Blog Post No. 4500: Peter Arno's Whoops Sisters Dancing with Twins

Peter Arno's drawing in ink and wash of his Whoops Sisters is new to me. The pair are dancing in a nightclub where they exhibit identical hand gestures and identical taste in men. They both are speaking here, suggesting a typical saucy dialogue which no doubt includes the word "Whoops." It's hard to guess what other thoughts they may be sharing, although their intended captions, possibly, could be hidden under that soiled matte. The work was sold at auction last year.

Peter Arno's signature

Peter Arno
Merrill's Auctioneers & Appraisers

https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/ink-watercolor-gauche-by-peter-arno-1904-1968-334-c-f054700b37

Note: Whoops! I'm not sure if I've mentioned it this week, but I do love to post original art by the great Peter Arno. Collectors who would like to have their own Arno pieces displayed here on the blog for all to see are encouraged to send scans or photos.

Was this Whoops Sisters piece ever published? It might have been, but I haven't found it. Perhaps some enterprising reader may recognize it.

My thanks to Michael Maslin, Peter Arno's biographer and a celebrated New Yorker cartoonist in his own right, for allowing me to sound him out on this previously unknown wash drawing. An indispensable excerpt from his Arno book concerning the phenomenal rise of the Whoops Sisters may be found here.