Tony Clark, a collector of motoring art, found this painting of a 1927 Crossley (possibly a 18.50 or 20.9 Fabric Saloon). The size of the image had been reduced with white snowpake. Tony assumed it was recently applied to mask out the name of a magazine and possibly the artist's signature at the bottom. After carefully removing the snowpake, Tony was left with the picture above. No text, no signature and the conclusion that the snowpake, despite its bright white colour, was 1930s and had been deliberately used to reduce the image size to that shape. The picture has similarities to the work of the famous artists F.Gordon Crosby and F.T. Steerwood, but some of the detail is a bit week and for that reason it could be the work of a lesser known artist. However, it was quite common in the design studios that one of the top men would draw the car and a junior would paint in the background. So what are we looking at? Could it be the cover of a sales brochure rather than the front cover of a magazine? And who could be the artist? Any ideas?







(Images courtesy Tony Clark)

June 2, 2007