Posted 2 years ago
carmenisacat
(83 items)
OK, so. This little piece turned up at a thrift store here in Cochise County. I usually pass over anything by DeGrazia. I grew up in the same town that he lived for a number of years after he married the daughter of the owner of the local theater chain. When I was a kid, my mother was, how to put it, obsessed by his work. As small town people are...we really enjoy being the center of attention once in a while. Anyway, I examined this with my loupe at the store and did not find any evidence that it is a print. The paper which appears to be mounted on board of some type is fibrous and the colors appear to be transparent. I'm 99.9% positive it is not a print. So I contacted his gallery and inquired about the little gem. I was told that it was a print and so I asked about the title because I'm already doubting the expert who deals with Ted's archive. He tells me it is Boy With a Rooster. I am like "huh"? There's no rooster. So I email him back and ask, "Did you look at the images I sent?" I had accidently omitted them from my first and sent in a second email. So 5 or 10 minutes later he says he made a mistake and it was definitely not the Rooster piece which has been reproduced thousands of times. So then after another 15 minutes or so I receive another email saying it is a print because it has dots (again, there are simply no patterned dots whatsoever) and the name of the piece is Begger Boy. Spelled like that. So I begin searching. I've looked and looked to find even one print of Begger or Beggar Boy and have come up with none. If mine is a print then it appears to be the only one out there in a SEA of DeGrazia reproductions. So that is why I am here....has anyone here ever seen this in person or as a reproduction? If you have, please let me know. I plan to go to the museum after the holiday to show the director of Ted's museum in person but I think at this point I trust the people here at CW more hahaha.
That’s a shame and I feel for you. I’d just keep digging and inquiring with various places. At some point you’ll find your answer!
The more we research the more we learn. Great piece though!
Thank you for your encouragement. :)
So, recently purchased a lot of Degrazia prints online, which have not arrived yet. But my research of one of the prints "Beggar Boy" (the reason I bought the lot) lead me to your post, as it contains the only image of "Beggar Boy" on the whole internet, at least that I could find. My print, which is definitely a print, I found cited in a random online PDF. file of Catalog of Copyright Entries, which states: "Col . reproduction of
water color . 7 x 5 in . ( 1 1 0)
Dated : '50. © Artistic Picture
Publishing Cc . , inc . , New York ;
4 May 51 ; H1976.
So, again, don't have the print in-hand yet, but mine looks to be a very early 1950s print, as the original piece is dated 1950 and the copyright from the citation is 1951. Now, and I am reaching a bit here, my research of other A.P.P. prints for sale online found some prints by said company from the 1940s for sale that were listed as "hand-colored reproduction" which is a whole other process that I will have to look into.
Nevertheless, "Beggar Boy" looks to be a rare, hard-to-find image (my lot also included "Boy & Egg" which looks to be another bit of research).
Hope yours turns out to be the original watercolor...
W