A Gorey/Bellairs Discovery

Sometimes treasures are hidden in plain sight and it only takes the curiosity of an astute observer to properly identify them. Such was the case with a piece of original artwork by Edward Gorey that is on display at the F. Brooke Whiting Museum in Cumberland, Maryland.

F. Brooke Whiting (Dec. 5, 1918 - July 27, 1998) earned a Master's degree in Library Science in 1957 and served for thirty-two years as Curator of Rare Books and Literary Manuscripts for UCLA. Mr. Whiting maintained his family home in Cumberland and was a long time member of the Allegany County Historical Society. Together with his partner Wesley Griswold, Mr. Whiting traveled the world collecting remarkable furniture and objects of interest. Mr. Whiting eventually donated his home and collections to the Historical Society along with an endowment to maintain the house as a museum.

Amongst his many interests, Brooke Whiting collected original illustration art, and his collection includes pieces by such notable artists as Maurice Sendak and Tasha Tudor. On display in the house is a piece by Edward Gorey that caught the attention of museum volunteer Bill Dunlap, an artist and illustrator in his own right. 

The art was labeled: Edward Gorey, Front and Back Cover, The Curse of the Blue Figurine by John Bellairs. 

Intrigued to learn more about the artwork, Bill Dunlap did an online search and found that the art on display did not match the published cover for the book listed but rather looked like the cover for Mr. Bellairs The Lamp from the Warlock's Tomb.

The image was similar, but not an exact match for the published cover. The people and building on the left hand side had were in different positions and there were elements missing that appear on the published cover. Finding references to the Bellairs series on my Goreyana blog, Mr. Dunlap contacted me to see if I could shed any light on the curious differences. After a brief examination of the image, it was obvious that the museum owned a rare preliminary painting for the finished cover. 

Edward Gorey often created expressively detailed preliminary sketches for color book cover illustrations. This allowed him to quickly work out the general layout and details of an image. Mr. Gorey produced 22 cover designs for the Bellairs series, the last of which he completed just before he died in April 2000. Of these 22 cover designs, this is the third full color preliminary art to come to my attention. The other two are color sketches for The Spell of the Sorcerer's Skull, 1984 and The Revenge of the Wizard's Ghost, 1985 (this piece is in my collection).

Comparing these preliminary works, the Lamp From the Warlock's Tomb art is the most highly finished of the three sketches and it is easy to see how it could be mistaken for the final artwork. It is always exciting to learn of a piece of a previously unknown original art by Edward Gorey, especially one that was not intended for publication. 

To learn more about the F. Brooke Whiting House and Museum, visit their website: http://thewhitinghouse.org

Images for this posting courtesy of the Albany County Historical Society, Swann Auction Galleries, and by Irwin Terry.

Goreyana 15th Anniversary & 1064 Watercolor Paintings

Goreyana's Crystal Anniversary

This week at Goreyana, we celebrate 15 years of all things Edward Gorey. I began the Goreyana blog on October 5, 2008 as a way to honor the extraordinary talent and genius of Edward Gorey. The Gotham Book Mart had closed in 2007 and at that time there were very few venues to learn about Mr. Gorey's body of work. Feeling isolated as a collector, I envisioned this blog as a place to share information, stories, and hopefully to spark conversations between fans and collectors. Today, Gorey's ongoing popularity has led to numerous blogs, articles, Facebook groups, exhibitions, and themed events dedicated to reveling in the works of Edward Gorey. I would like to thank everyone who has read my posts over the years. I truly enjoy all the interactions and enjoyment that my blog has inspired. Thank you! 

Now, let us begin our 16th year with blog post #724!

1064 Watercolor Paintings

Over the years Edward Gorey produced five different limited edition publications that were hand colored: The Lavender Leotard 1973, Dogear Wryde Postcards: Interpretive Series 1979 (1980), The Eclectic Abecedarium 1983, Q.R.V. 1989, and The Dripping Faucet 1989. The Interpretive Series is the most elaborately painted of these titles. I have set 29 in my personal collection.

A recent stroll through eBay turned up three separate sale listings for the deluxe edition of Edward Gorey's Dogear Wryde Postcards: Interpretive Series. Published in 1979 (but not completed until spring 1980), the deluxe edition consists of 50 numbered and 26 lettered sets. Each of the 13 postcards and their accompanying printed envelopes have been extensively hand decorated by Edward Gorey using watercolor paints. This totals out to 1064 individual watercolor paintings. The appearance of multiple sets brought up the question, "How did Edward Gorey paint these cards and are there major differences in the execution of the painting from one set to to the next?".

Photographs of Edward Gorey's home show an environment that is overflowing with books, art, objet d'art, furniture, and cats. The casual viewer might think that the artist lived in world of clutter and chaos, but first impressions can be deceiving. Edward Gorey was actually a very organized person with an obsessive dedication to his work, and his combination of talent and organizational skills were put to the test with the Interpretive Series. The painting of these postcard sets was a task that he set for himself and he rose to the challenge spectacularly.

Comparing images side by side from sets that have been come on the market over the years from booksellers, auction houses and online auction sites, we find that there are no major differences between the sets even though they are all individually hand painted. Beginning with the decorated envelope that houses each set, and making allowances for differences in scans, color correction and photography, the paintings are shockingly similar. I purchased my set at The Gotham Book mart in the spring of 1980 just after they had arrived and remember them all standing together in an open topped box in the small back room at the store. In typical bookstore fashion, the front of each envelope had been labeled lightly in pencil by Andreas Brown stating the number or letter of the set enclosed.

Indolence is the only card in the set that features a capitol letter "I" in a horizontal orientation, so it tends to be featured most often in seller's listings. All the cards of Indolence pictured above are virtually the same, with the colors and shadows of each painted card being obviously hand painted but remarkably consistent. Even the free form shadow under the figure has the same shape and color tone.

In order for Edward Gorey to paint the cards with so little variation from one to the next, he had to have lined up all the cards and painted them production line fashion rather than painting a complete set of 13 cards and moving on to the next set. Concentrating on one image at a time would be the only way to achieve the consistency between the cards. Watercolor can be a tricky medium to master due to the fact that the application of a second color can change what was previously painted.

The cards had printed images that were painted coloring book fashion. Beginning with one color, he would have started with the "I" of every card because it needed to be as smoothly painted as possible. He then would have filled in the creature's body color before beginning the shadows, layering the colors until each was completed. In the two Insouciance cards shown above, you can see how the shadowing on the stomach of the set 42 card started to bleed slightly because the paint being applied was slightly too wet and began reacting with the previously painted body color. This is why the larger areas of infill color would be painted first and the shadows second.

Edward Gorey would not attempt to repeat the elaborate painting style in the three future deluxe hand colored books he would produce. The painting in these publications is still quite colorful but attempts at shading were abandoned. This is why the Dogear Wryde Postcards: Interpretive Series deluxe hand painted postcard sets will always be a jewel in the crown of any collection of the works of Edward Gorey.

Image of Edward Gorey's home from Kevin McDermott's book, Elephant House, Pomegranate 2003.