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- Written by: Ken Furtado
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When Quaintance lived in New York City, photographer Lon Hanagan (aka Lon of New York) introduced him to Joe Weider. Joe and his brother Ben were working-class Jews from Montreal who built a male fitness publishing empire based on the concept that anyone could have a fit and muscular body.
From Sept. 1946 to May 1948, George was the Art Editor of Your Physique and its Canadian cousin, Muscle Power, which had a Hollywood office. During that time, he created 11 cover portraits of celebrity bodybuilders and he wrote numerous articles on health, fitness, grooming and other topics.
Announcing George’s hiring in an editorial, Joe Weider wrote, “[T]he full-time services of George Quaintance, noted American artist, have been secured. Mr. Quaintance is responsible for the unexcelled covers, for the artistic layouts and for the superb organization of all materials, which you will find in this issue and all forthcoming issues of ‘Your Physique’.”
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- Written by: Ken Furtado
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On Nov. 26 I wrote about two figurines sold at a recent online auction. At first glance, they appeared to be Siesta and Narcissus. On closer inspection, however, they reminded me of what happens to my cookies when I use too much baking powder: they get a bloated and puffy look. I concluded that these were fakes.
To be fair to Live Auctioneers, the auction house, the figurines were not identified as being from the Quaintance Studio, and the names Siesta and Narcissus were not used in the description.
Now we have a different circumstance: two lots offered at auction online by the same auction house were not produced by the Quaintance studio, but this time the name of Quaintance was invoked. The auction was held Nov. 30.
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- Written by: Ken Furtado
Examples abound of paintings, photographs, or sculptures whose owners claimed they were from the Quaintance Studio, but they were not. Here's an odd variation on that: two sculptures that do not claim to be from the Quaintance Studio, but whose owner(s) might hope you think otherwise.
In September, this pair of figurines was offered at online auction as a single lot. Potential buyers familiar with the sculptures of George Quaintance may have thought they were looking at examples of Narcissus and Siesta. Yet the listing stated "Artist Unknown" and it did not name the individual pieces.
The auction house, Live Auctioneers, has handled enough works by Quaintance that it's unlikely they would overlook having two Quaintance pieces in their auction. Why, then, not identify the artist or the pieces?
Unless Quaintance was not the artist.
A careful examination of the images posted on the auction website could lead one to suspect — as did the writer who brought these to my attention — that they were clumsily executed forgeries, or to be more charitable, "homages" to Quaintance. The details of the sculptures are not sharp, and if you have examples, or photos, of Narcissus and Siesta for comparison, there are numerous discrepancies to note.
The lot description is brief. It refers to a repaired break below the left leg of Narcissus, but makes no mention of the substantial crack in the right shoulder of Siesta. The description in its entirety reads as follows:
[ART]. [Artist Unknown]. Pair of Small Plaster Statuettes. [N.p., n.d., ca. late 20th century]. Plaster statues of handsome men, one completely nude, the other just wearing pants. Sizes range from 9" high to 7 1/2" high. Some wear, soiling scuffing, statuette of nude man with a repaired break at the base near the figure's extended leg.
The estimate was $200-$400. Bidding opened at $100 and the winning bidder paid $550, not including tax, buyer premium or shipping. Maybe the buyer thought (s)he'd found a great bargain.
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A reader in France discovered these two videos on a site called Dailymotion, which appears to be very similar to the US site, Instagram. They were posted in 2013 by a fellow calling himself swimguynunu. I am not a user of Dailymotion, so I can’t provide any information about swimguy, and his videos offer no clues.
Swimguy has created two video montages of paintings by George Quaintance, and set them to music. Links are provided, if you want to check them out.
Cowboy Bathers (about 5 minutes)
Please send an email if you can add any info about swimguynunu, or if you are swimguy!
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In 2023, several Quaintance lithographs and an early oil painting appeared at auction.
The oil painting was offered in August: a signed canvas of a voluptuous, provocatively posed female nude, titled Summer's Day. The painting measures 24 by 24 inches and, according to the listing, is inscribed on the stretcher.
The January 1939 issue of the Chicago-based Picture and Gift Journal contained an article about Quaintance that claimed, "George Quaintance is the originator of the 'glamour nudes,' who have all it takes to knock 'em dead from San Diego to Bangor, from Miami to Seattle."
Today, Quaintance fans might wonder what he was talking about. The nudes for which Quaintance is remembered are male nudes, and if there was a body of work of female glamour nudes renowned from coast to coast in 1939, it is now largely forgotten.
Summer's Day sold at auction previously, in 2007, for $4,000. That listing gave the painting's date as 1940. The 2023 auction did not mention a date. The painting sold for $3,000, far below the pre-auction estimate of $4,000 to $6,000.
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Three books have been published about George Quaintance, not counting the 2014 ebook.
The first — although not chronologically — is a version of the biography I co-authored with John Waybright. In the end stages of John's life, in 2013, a friend of his paid to have about 20 paperback copies of our book privately printed. It was to be a birthday surprise for John. The finished book was about 6x9 inches, 142 pages, and had several glossy plates, some of which were in full color.
That friend's accomplice, however, acquired an early, uncorrected and incomplete version of the manuscript. John passed away before he saw it, or knew about it. (Thank goodness!) I have a copy and I hope that no one else does.
The second book, The Art of George Quaintance, appeared in three editions, all with different covers and slightly different contents.
In 1989, Volker Janssen of Janssen Verlag (Publishers) published The Art of George Quaintance in an edition of 1000 copies. It has a pale blue cover featuring Spartan Soldiers Bathing. The text is in German. At that time, Janssen owned several works by Quaintance, so he exhibited them at his gallery in Berlin. Hoping to sidestep any possible copyright issues with the Quaintance estate, he used that exhibition as a pretext for including photos in the book of every one of Quaintance's known paintings of the male physique era.
As Janssen explained in an email to me, "I had the opportunity to purchase some rare original Quaintance paintings and photographs, and as a result the first Quaintance exhibition finally took place in Berlin, in 1989. The first book of his work, The Art of George Quaintance, was published, and it became the catalogue for the show."