Jul 16, 2020 - Sale 2541

Sale 2541 - Lot 103

Price Realized: $ 2,500
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500
GEORGE E. STUDDY.
"Nothing to Write Home About." Illustration featuring Bonzo the Dog for a series of postcards produced by Valentines & Sons (#1308 in the series), circa 1928. Subsequently produced for the international market with German captions by A.R. & Co. I.B./Inter-Art Co. cards. Mixed media, including watercolor and gouache over graphite on board. 370x244 mm; 14 1/2x9 1/2 inches, on 16 1/2x10 1/2-inch board. Signed "G. E. Studdy" in lower right image, captioned in graphite in lower margin and again in ink on matte. Taped to window matte and framed.

Provenance: Purchased from Demetry Books in 1985 by a private collector, NYC.

>George Studdy, the British comic strip artist, created the beloved character of Bonzo the Dog in 1922. First appearing in The Sketch magazine, the loveable pup quickly became a popular international icon, making appearances in other publications, such as The American Weekly magazine, in animated cartoons, and on mass-produced merchandise. This illustration was commissioned by Valentines & Sons for a series of Bonzo postcards that were created and sold after the character was dropped from The Sketch in the late 1920s. Reflecting Bonzo's global appeal, the postcard series was subsequently produced for the international market by A.R. & Co. I.B./Inter-Art Co. One printed example found of this postcard design with dual captions in German and English shows that the text on the foreign language cards are not necessarily direct translations of the original English.