?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 12,000 - $ 18,000
JESSIE WILLCOX SMITH. "Touching." Study or artist's copy of the illustration for the chapter of the same name in "The Five Senses" by Angela M. Keyes's children (New York: Moffat, Yard and Company, 1911). Watercolor on paper mounted to board. 305x227 mm; 12x9 inches. Not signed, but marked "1162 clone" in Smith's hand, on verso. Accompanied by a copy of the published book. Provenance: A former president of Haverford College; to Mainline Antiques, Bryn Mawr, PA; to current owner.
A charming and detailed rendering of Smith's illustration of a boy hesitantly approaching but yearning to pet a sleeping cat to accompany the verse: "I'd like to stroke her velvet fur / But she's asleep and I'm afraid / For she has claws stuck in her paws / The way all cats are made." The book invites children to explore their senses through examples offered in poetry and verse and is accompanied by five delightful illustrations by Smith. This may either have been a preliminary study for the final plate or, going by the clue written on the verso, she may perhaps have made this copy for herself in the event that the publisher kept the original artwork.
