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eBay Forums: Help with 1929 magazine cover art - Art ...
Hello, I am asking on the art board but there are so many varied knowledgeable folks here that I thought I would try here, too.
I am hoping to identify the illustrator of a vintage magazine.
I have a rather rare silent film movie magazine from 1929.
It is Movie Novel Magazine, February, 1929, Volume 1, Number 2 published by Jacobsen Publishing in New York.
The magazine folded after 4 issues.
I know the publication is rare and I have had little luck finding any information on the publication.
I have had some collectors interested but I did not want to sell for the amount they offered.
I am assuming they know more than I do, but they did not share!
Anyway, what I really want to know about is the art on the cover.
The artist is not identified.
I also do not know how to describe the artistic technique.
Is this a serigraph?
I know it is Art Deco styling, but could this possibly be Erte?
If not, does anyone know who it could be?
I also have the first and the fourth issue of the magazine, but this is the one with neat Deco cover.
It just looks like it could be done by someone important.
I have looked all over the web.
There is not another copy available for sale or any other information.
I am hoping experts in the artistic Art Deco style can help me with more information on this cover.
Thank you.
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Is there no statement within the magazine to identify cover artist?
By the way this is quite scarce, as you know.
Does not make Clear ...
I mean, is not included in Clear ...
But then quite a few don't make Clear.
I see why you think Erte, but there is a flatness to the composition that suggests someone other than Erte.
Could have been an in-house artist.
I swear I have seen another artist giving a woman similar eyes, but cannot place it.
There is something that suggests a tip of the hat to Harry Clarke, but again flatness of style, etc.
- it is not Harry.
I see no film title "His Secret Life" for Adolphe Menjou.
I think "His Secret Life" may have been based on the silent film A Social Celebrity, where a small town barber goes to New York posing as a rich count.
The woman in the picture looks like she could be Louise Brooks, who was Menjou's love interest in the film.
Check out the photo of Louise Brooks on the following WIKI page - she certainly had plenty of IT :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Social_Celebrity
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Not Erte, but nice....
Some Harpers of the same time have Erte' covers...
And innards. He understood branding!
Can't find the covers darn...
Only some pages, this 1925...
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Hanging out in my half bath...as long as I am being of no help...
You have looked inside the magazine for cover credit?
Usually in front but sometimes at the back.
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Pk_nik - It holds Brush and comb...
All ciggi stuff out of here..
Though snuff still found now and then.
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Parakeetsforpeace, I know this doesn't help, but I spent about an hour, on and off, today looking for an artist like that.
I didn't find one, but I learned more about other artists than I ever wanted to know!
Good luck with that.
It should be worth a mint to someone.
We Must Do Better
1.) A President who agreed with Bush 90% of the time 2.) A First Lady who is an ex-drug addict 3.) A gun-totin', empty-headed barbie doll who likens herself to a Barracuda VP
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This won't help either, but that woman looks like an exaggerated version of some of the 1920s Vogue magazine cover art.
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You guys are just wonderful.
Thank you for all of the responses and the additional research.
It was really nice.
It does not give an artist.
Here is the interior cover page and the publishing info is at the bottom of the letter from Menjou to the publisher.
I think it should be worth quite a bit, too.
It may be just so scarce that no one knows about it though.
I have listed before when ebay would have a sale on auction listings or on a buy it now.
I thought maybe if I could identify the artist then more persons would see it.
I guess I am going to have to give up on that one.
I do appreciate the help, though.
I actually found 3 of the 4 issues from 1929 at a thrift shop.
This cover is wonderful art deco styling.
The 2 others also show the main actors but they do not look art deco to me at least.
I have Emil Jannings in the Sins of the Fathers and Joan Crawford in A Dream of Love.
I have had one collector try to buy the Jannings and another want to buy the Menjou, but I really think with the subject matter and the scarcity that they should be worth more than was offered.
I really have researched these publications for a couple of years now and there is just almost nothing.
A magazine data base has the Jannings issue mentioned but they do not even know that it had 4 issues.
The magazine seems to be intricately linked to the major studios of the time.
They each have a letter to the publisher from either the “star” or a studio head thanking him for his great novelization of their film.
They also have wonderful old advertisements in the back.
Professor – thanks.
I think the woman is supposed to be Kathryn Carver.
I got this synopsis off line:
Actors: Adolphe Menjou, Kathryn Carver, Eugene Pallette, Margaret Livingston
Look up "suave and sophisticated" in the dictionary, and one might very well find a picture of Adolphe Menjou.
In His Private Life, Menjou is cast as Georges St.
Germain, whose sexual peccadilloes are so frequent and plentiful that he is forced to bribe practically every civil servant in Paris to .
. . .
Timeorganization – so nice of you – much appreciated.
Any idea where I should put it, call it or what price I should put on it.
I thought maybe this one might be a good one for ebay’s new 30 day listing.
Thanks to pl nk, tapestries and parcey, too.
I just don’t know what to do with this one.
You all did rather verify what I felt about the publication, though.
It is a desirable scarce item.
I am just not sure what to do next?!
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Here are the covers for Volume 1 with Jannings and Volume 4 with Crawford, plus one of the advertisements within.
I do not know how to describe this type of illustration.
I am not certain what one would call this type of art.
These covers just do not look "Art deco" to me like the Menjou cover.
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They are Art Deco and very, very cool.
I just sold a magazine from the 1920's and did well with it hope you make lots of $$$$!
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I guess I have soaked up something over the years, I knew it wasn't Erte at first glance...
and I haven't seen anything by him for 30 years.
Nice...hope you do well with it.
WHO'S IN YOUR WALLET?
Using trillions of dollars of taxpayer money to purchase illusory short-term security, the government is actually ensuring even greater instability in the financial system in the long term.
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Colored half-tones taken from movie photostills.
The ad is just a cheap newsprint half-tone.
Great shot of Jannings.
Nils Asther probably didn't make the leap to talkies because of a squeaky voice or some such thing.
Imagine Asther with an Elmer Fudd/Bugs voice : "My darling!
My beloved! Leave this wretched existence!
Come away with me!
Away!"
Imagine Joan Crawford cracking up every time he spoke his lines.
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The second two covers do not seem art deco -- (well possibly a hint in the Crawford/Asther - but that is more like Hollywood glitz/kitsch.
The wonderful brooding Jannings shot owes more, at least in my mind, to German expressionism.
But that's just me.
Looks like it might have been an artist's rendition of a photo still.
Still cool. harrumph ...
Did I say that?
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Found this reference to the movie in the New York Times, November 12, 1928:
"The Alluring Blonde.
HIS PRIVATE LIFE, with Adolphe Menjou Kathryn Carver, Margaret Livingston, Eugene Pallette, Andre Cheron, Sybil Grove, Paul Guertzman, Alex Melesh and A.
Woloskin, based on a story by Ernest Vajda and Keene Thompson, directed by Frank Tuttle;
Will Mahoney in a Fox Movietone novelty;
Jesse Crawfords, organists;
Eddie Peabody in "Volcano," staged by Paul Oscard.
At the Paramount Theatre.
Adolphe Menjou and his blonde bride, Kathryn Carver, afford no little amusement by their portrayals at the Paramount Theatre in a bright, fluffy, Parisian affair, known as "His Private Life." This title, as is so often the case, gives one but little insight into the story, which happens to be chiefly concerned with the swift change wrought in George St.
Germain (Mr. Menjou) after he has fastened his gaze upon a dainty ankle.
Whose ankle it is really does not matter, but, only a few moments before, his philosophy was that women are all alike.
The ankle, or ankles, however, impel him to think that the owner possibly may be different, and so he forthwith hails a taxicab and follows the automobile conveying the ankles to their destination.
At a hotel he sees a pair of blue eyes, surrounded by flaxen hair, and he becomes afflicted with a desire to present a bouquet of flowers to this dazzling creature.
By that time Monsieur St.
Germain has conquered his cynicism and is extremely persistent in la chasse of the singularly graceful as well as charming girl.
Sometimes he is fearful that she has escaped, and therefore there is a title saying something about "All outward-bound blondes are being watched."
Then this frothy tale assumes an angle of frolicsome errors, with Monsieur St.
Germain placed more than once in a compromising situation with Yvette Bergere, wife of Henri Bergere;
And one suspects that Yvette rather enjoys the fuss and furor, especially when she is being carried around the room by Monsieur St.
Germain with a newspaper concealing her face from her somewhat perturbed husband.
This film is filled with absurdities, but they are amusing absurdities, concocted by Ernest Vajda and Keene Thompson.
The people strike one as a good-looking let, even though they are often only sufficiently intelligent to suit the events.
One also feels a certain amount of sympathy for Monsieur St.
Germain in his pursuit of Eleanor Trent, the blonde, impersonated by Miss Carver.
Frank Tuttle, who perpetrated that singularly disappointing picture.
"Varsity," here atones partly for that infliction by some genuinely well-directed stretches.
Sometimes he gives a little too much showing to just arms and hands that add nothing to the picture, but when he deals with his characters he succeeds at least in giving them plenty to do.
There is a real French atmosphere about this picture in the actions of the participants and also in the outside scenes and those indoors.
Mr.
Menjou affects at first a rather blase specimen of humanity, and quite cunningly he reveals a new interest and new life in Monsieur St.
Germain's expression and demeanor.
In fact, it is not long before this an is audacious.
Miss Carver is alluring as the elusive Miss Trent.
Margaret Livingston is excellent as the none-too passive brunette, Yvette.
Eugene Pallette serves this story well as the unimaginative Monsieur Bergere, over whose eyes the wool is so easily pulled."
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From the Nov. 26, 1928 Time Magazine:
"His Private Life.
Faced with the problem of creating another vehicle for the graceful and faintly pensive urbanity of Adolphe Menjou, Ernest Vajda and Director Frank Tuttle got together on a story, or rather that story about the Parisian who is so tired of women that he is expressing his weariness in an epigrammatic speech when—what do you think?—a beautiful pair of legs goes by.
The pursuit, tailored with a good deal of deft comic detail, leads in and out of bedrooms and round and round a jealous husband until, at Kathryn Carver's request, a waiter removes a pot of flowers to expose, on the other side of the table, the lovelorn face of Mr.
Menjou. At this point you are conscious that you have been fairly well entertained though by no means as well as in some other Menjou-Vajda stories."
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Oh, the "ankle" review is great!
I had just checked on a movie data base that had a much less detailed synopsis.
I hope it is okay to use part of this NYT review in my listing.
The only specific response I got on the art board stated that the cover looked similar to Pierre-Félix Fix-Masseau.
When I looked on line all I could find was a train poster and a rose painting plus sculptures.
I just did not see it.
Thank you again for all of your responses.
Even though I could not identify the artists, it was helpful to know that I was not the only one that thought these volumes were rather special.
Since they really are scarce, maybe I can actually say that word that is never uttered on the bookseller board, "rare?"!
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I was trying to add an additional comment and ebay would not allow me.
Maybe it was too long?
I will try later.
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Okay, those sentences worked - I will try my additional response again
However, as is often stated here, something rare/scarce may not translate to high dollars if there is little interest.
I am afraid to do auction because I do not think that persons possibly interested would even know that these volumes exist.
It could be that I have a idealized idea of their worth, too.
If you were using the new ebay 30 day listing, what price would you put on them?
I have listed them before, but only when ebay had a listing fee sale because I was listing fee averse.
Maybe I put them in the wrong categories?
I did lobby cards, posters and press kits.
Anyway, I only had the 2 collectors and I thought they were worth more than was offered.
If there anyone has an idea on a better category or title or other info, it would be great.
If not, I thank you again for the help and feedback.
P.S.
Thanks for the feedback on the other covers, also.
I had not seen star photographs changed this way.
I thought they were originally photos, but I just was not sure because they did look so different.
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Hi Parakeet,
Without the name of the artist you'll never realize top dollar for it.
Either keep the magazine and keep researching, or figure you'll take what you get for it.
I'd put it in the magazine category, end it on Dec.
6th, use the words "art deco silent film movie magazine 1929".
I'd also type up the contents and add a few more pictures.
Good luck!
We Must Do Better
1.) A President who agreed with Bush 90% of the time 2.) A First Lady who is an ex-drug addict 3.) A gun-totin', empty-headed barbie doll who likens herself to a Barracuda VP
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