Cassius Marcellus Coolidge (September 18, 1844–January 13, 1934) was an American artist, best known for a series of nine paintings of anthropomorphised dogs.
Born in Antwerp, New York to abolitionist Quaker farmers, Coolidge was known to friends and family as "Cash." While he had no formal training as an artist his natural aptitude for drawing led him to create cartoons for his local newspaper when in his twenties. He is credited with creating Co...
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Cassius Marcellus Coolidge (September 18, 1844–January 13, 1934) was an American artist, best known for a series of nine paintings of anthropomorphised dogs.
Born in Antwerp, New York to abolitionist Quaker farmers, Coolidge was known to friends and family as "Cash." While he had no formal training as an artist his natural aptitude for drawing led him to create cartoons for his local newspaper when in his twenties. He is credited with creating Comic Foregrounds, life-size cutouts into which one's head was placed so as to be photographed as an amusing character.
In 1900, Coolidge contracted with the advertising firm of Brown & Bigelow of St. Paul, Minnesota, to create sixteen oil paintings of dogs in various human poses.
Nine of them depict dogs playing poker. On February 15, 2005, two of these much imitated paintings, A Bold Bluff and Waterloo, went on the auction block expecting to fetch between $30,000 and $50,000 but surprisingly sold for $590,400 at Doyle New York. The auction set...
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