?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 2,500 - $ 3,500
(CHAMPION STUDIO--WALTER KUNDZICZ)
A selection of approximately 40 color photographs from the pioneering physique studio. Includes Jim Stryker (4), Monte Hanson (5), Cherokee (4), Tuck Powell (an original envelope with 5 prints), Tom Wingate (an original envelope with 5 prints), Jim Hogan (3), and more, as well as a set of hardcore images featuring two models together (4). Chromogenic and silver prints (5), most of the images measuring approximately 117x79 mm; 4 5/8x3 1/8 inches, and the reverse, the sheets slightly larger, one silver print (of Jim Stryker) 244x194 mm; 9 5/8x7 5/8 inches, this larger print with Kundzicz's "A Reference Photo for: Artists & Physical Culturists" stamp, Stryker's model stamp, and a numeric stamp, on verso, the remaining with a combination of the A Reference Photo, Test Print, model name, and Connoisseur Set stamps, and notations including the model's name, and set numbers in ink, on verso. Circa 1958-64.
Under the name Champion Studio, Walter Kundzicz became one of the last great pioneers of physique photography when he entered the field in the late 1950s. Unlike the muscle-bound beefcake imagery of earlier the decade, Champion's handsome young models were a new breed. Not only did Kundzicz push legal boundaries with sexier props and more revealing imagery, his color photographs also pushed the established aesthetics, featuring sunny, youthful models in everyday settings, beautifully capturing a new era on the cusp of sexual revolution. These photographs became wildly popular with mail-order customers and collectors because they stood in stark contrast to most of the physique photography available at that time.
