It’s September, school has started (in the case of small Crownfolio, for the very first time) and the auction season is getting back into gear too. First in the queue are International Poster Auctions in New York, whose Auction of Rare Posters is on Sept 8th.
Most of what’s on offer consists of things that Americans like and I don’t (Barnum and Bailey Circus posters, Art Nouveau, that kind of thing) but there are a few British gems on offer.
Quite a few of these are pre-war London Transport posters like this Dora Batty, but there’s nothing wrong with that.
Dora Batty, 1933, est. $1,000-1,200
This Roy Meldrum is less often reproduced but also rather fine. It seems to have an odd familiarity to me, but I don’t know whether this is because it looks like a mixture of so many other images from that period, or simply that I used to own a postcard of it once upon a time.
Roy Meldrum, 1933, est. $1,700-2,000
There are also a couple of McKnight Kauffer classics up for grabs.
E. McKnight Kauffer, 1926, est. $1,700-2,000
E. McKnight Kauffer, 1931, est. $3,000-4,000
But my favourite is much later than any of these, as it dates from 1973 and is by David Gentleman.
David Gentleman, 1973, est. $700-1,000
Clearly prices rise as posters cross the Atlantic: this poster went for just £130 on eBay last month, much to the disappointment of at least one reader of this blog.
Elsewhere on eBay, it’s still a bit quiet. This Tom Purvis is out of focus, a bit battered and in the U.S., although that doesn’t seem to be deterring the bidders.
It is also my bounded duty to point out that Cyclamon has yet another of these small but perfectly formed Eckersley GPO posters for sale on a Buy It Now for £35.
I don’t think he’s printing them.
7 Comments
hurray
I just bought the Eckersley. Thank you for keeping me up to date on ebay. Though whether my wife agrees….
Glad to be of service! It is very small, though, it would be very hard to take exception to it, surely.
Apropos McKnight Kauffer – readers of your blog might be interested in this upcoming exhibition at the Estorick Gallery – in fact the first major exhibition of his work since the V&A memorial exhibition in 1955. The Estorick is also running a series of talks on Saturdays beginning on Saturday 24 Sept at 3pm.
http://www.estorickcollection.com/exhibitions/
http://www.estorickcollection.com/events.php
Excellent – thanks for that. I’ll try and go down next month, but if anyone does get there before then, I’d love to hear about it.
Re. the Gentleman Victorian London poster, thanks for the mention of my saddened post on The One That Got Away. The sight of a copy (unsigned, as well) at five times as much just makes me wish I had hazarded the housekeeping & bidded harder! I’ve been trying to establish what the US copy went for, without success. Does anyone out there have access to the hammer prices? I would love to know …
I can’t seem to find them at the moment, and they’ve just fallen off Invaluable. I’ll try a bit harder and see what I can do.
Thanks for looking … I was just curious, but not to worry. The answer would probably make my eyes water, anyway!