D R E W • F R I E D M A N

Thursday, February 21, 2013

The Lost Drawings of George Wachsteter Auction

David Brinkley by
George Wachsteter

On March 24, the Thomaston Place Auction Galleries in Thomaston Maine will host a one-day auction featuring "The Lost Drawings of George Wachsteter", a mind-boggling collection of original art spanning four decades from the estate of Wachsteter, at one time one of the most celebrated caricaturists of the mid-twentieth century, now all but virtually forgotten:

http://www.artfact.com/auction-catalog/one-day-auction-the-lost-drawings-of-g.-wachsteter-l9uonikmkg

Thanks to the efforts of a few longtime admirers of his incredible art, among them Leonard Maltin, Mike Lynch, yours truly and the caricaturist Zach Trenholm, who made a pilgrimage to Elmhurst Queens to visit the aging and forgotten Wachsteter in his final years, George Wachsteter's work will receive the attention and inevitable revival it so richly deserves, (and hopefully an anthology). This is my blog tribute to Wachsteter from 2012:
http://drewfriedman.blogspot.com/2012/03/lost-art-of-george-wachsteter.html

I'm showing just a sampling here (in no particular order) of some of the original Wachsteter caricatures and illustrations that will to be auctioned on the 24th. Full descriptions, including names, dates, and publications, as well as rough art and printed covers can be found on the auction catalog site:
http://auctions.thomastonauction.com/asp/searchresults.asp?st=D&sale_no=302&ps=25&pg=28&view=view1#103000

The majority of work represented in the auction was created for the weekly cover of the New York Journal-American Pictorial TV section. When the Journal- American ceased publication in the late sixties and Wachsteters vision faltered, his career virtually came to a halt.

Looking at his work, you might assume that George Wachsterer was perhaps greatly influenced by the legendary Al Hirschfeld, who Wachsteter frequently alternated with at the New York Times in the forties, but consider that they were each contemporaries and both quite celebrated in their day. They were also both clearly influenced by the great caricaturist Miguel Covarrubias. Enjoy!

My thanks to Martin Gostanian