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Dog lovers:
Please add this to your Quick Ref/Clip files, if you think you'll need to
deal with this (in)famous legend again. This is a summary of all the replies
that were sent directly to me, and they gave me such a laugh, I had to share
them with you.
Cheers
Cathy Donaldson
library director
Art Institute of Seattle
YOU KNOW YOU'VE SEEN IT SOMEWHERE...
The poster of four dogs at a card table playing poker. But.Who did it? When?
Where can you get a copy?
Dr Samuel Johnson (18th Century English curmudgeon) apparently remarked: "I
would rather see a portrait of a dog that I know than all the allegorical
paintings they can show me in the world." Apparently a 19th century American
painter of the poker dogs felt the same way.
The painter is C M (Cassius Marcellus) Coolidge 1844-1934, a druggist and
sign painter, bank founder and newspaperman, who lived in Antwerp, NY and
Rochester, NY. Coolidge's first customers for these paintings (done either
in 1873 or 1910, I've received a variety of dates) were cigar companies, who
printed copies for giveaways. Coolidge eventually signed a contract with a
printer Brown & Bigelow, to turn out thousands of dog painting copies for
advertising posters, calendars and prints.
"Dogs Playing Poker" are a series, not a single piece of art. There are at
least 8 different poker scenes, with titles like "A Friend in Need," "Poker
Sympathy," "His Station and Four Aces" and "Bold Bluff."
It's a humorous reworking of Renaissance artist George De La Tour's 1647
social commentary painting "The Cheat with the Ace of Diamonds." De La Tour'
s other painting "The Cheat with the Ace of Clubs" is also mimicked by the
dogs.
In the USA, these dogs grace on the walls of bachelor pads, dentists'
waiting rooms, and local sports bars. The La Tour version hangs in the
Louvre, in Paris.
The dogs are discussed in Arthur Flower's The Art of Gambling Through the
Ages (2000), in Curtis Brown's Star-Spangled Kitsch (1975), and in Antiques
and Collecting Magazine, March 1997, p. 26.
It was used as the base for the forged "Monet" in the movie The Thomas Crown
Affair. The dogs were seen under a microscope after the police thought they'
d recovered the real Monet.
The dogs were the art on the sofa wall in the TV series "Rosanne."
ESPN once recreated the scene using real dogs in a commercial for its
football coverage.
It was a question on the TV show Jeopardy (the respondent was wrong, saying
the artist's name was Polk.)
If you search in eBay on "dogs playing poker," you'll find all sorts of
posters, tapestries, magnets, etc. to bid on. You could also check a recent
Wireless catalog or contact Haddad's Fine Arts, Inc. (Anaheim, CA)
These websites provide information, and sometimes thumbnails:
www.santacruzpl.org/readyref/files/dogpkr.html
www.homearts.com/depts/home/kfkove09.htm
www.iit.edu/tildejohneri1/
www.retroactive.com/Postcards/coolidge.html
www.tulsalibrary.org/reference/funkyfile.htm
www.barewalls.com/
www.members.home.net/giese1/friend.html
www.desperate.com/tinsigns/nostalg/dogs.html
Phew!
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