The Last Drop

Details

CHARLES SCHREYVOGEL (1861-1912)
The Last Drop
inscribed 'Copyrighted 1903 by/Chas Schreyvogel' (on the base)—inscribed with foundry mark 'ROMAN BRONZE WORKS N-Y-' (along the base)—inscribed 'No 111' (beneath the base)
bronze with greenish brown patina
11 ¾ in. (29.8 cm.) high
Modeled in 1903.

Provenance

J.N. Bartfield Galleries, Inc., New York.
Acquired by the present owner from the above, 1986.

Literature

H. McCracken, Great Painters and Illustrators of the Old West, New York, 1952, p. 202.
E. Ainsworth, The Cowboy in Art, New York, 1968, pp. 48-49, another example illustrated.
J.D. Horan, The Life and Art of Charles Schreyvogel: Painter-Historian of the Indian-Fighting Army of the American West, New York, 1969, p. 27, pl. 39, another example illustrated.
P. Rossi, D. Hunt, The Art of the Old West, New York, 1971, p. 230, another example illustrated.
P.J. Broder, Bronzes of the American West, New York, 1974, pp. 203-04, 205, pls. 205-06, another example illustrated.
H. McCracken, The West of Buffalo Bill: Frontier Art, Indian Crafts, Memorabilia from the Buffalo Bill Historical Center, New York, 1974, p. 196.
Birmingham Museum of Art, Art of the American West, Birmingham, Alabama, 1983, p. 30.
W.C. Foxley, Frontier Spirit: Catalog of the Collection of the Museum of Western Art, exhibition catalogue, Denver, Colorado, 1983, p. 110, no. 76, another example illustrated.
G.A. Reynolds, American Bronze Sculpture: 1850 to the Present, Newark, New Jersey, 1984, p. 23.
Taft Museum of Art, Home on the Range: American Western Art from a Cincinnati Collection, exhibition catalogue, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1994, p. 71.
S. Campbell, The American West: People, Places, and Ideas, Corning, New York, 2001, n.p., pl. 62, another example illustrated.
L.D. Rosenfeld, A Century of American Sculpture: The Roman Bronze Works Foundry, New York, 2002, p. 138, another example illustrated.
T. Tolles, The American West in Bronze: 1850-1925, exhibition catalogue, New York, 2013, pp. 116-17, 120-22, 164, 185n14, fig. 146, 152, 153, no. 70, 71, other examples illustrated.

Exhibited

Wichita, Kansas, Wichita Art Museum, A Personal Gathering: Paintings and Sculpture from the Collection of William I. Koch, February 11-May 19, 1996, pp. 138-39, no. 64, illustrated.
Boston, Massachusetts, Museum of Fine Arts, Things I Love: The Many Collections of William I. Koch, August 31-November 13, 2005, pp. 98, 117, illustrated.

Conditions of sale

Brought to you by

Tylee Abbott Senior Vice President, Head of American Art

tabbott@christies.com +1 212 707 5925

Lot Essay

Charles Schreyvogel employed sculpture as a tool for modeling subjects for his paintings and ultimately modeled only two bronzes in his lifetime. For his 1899 oil The Last Drop (Tacoma Art Museum, Tacoma, Washington), the artist created a clay model to study the forms of the kneeling figure and horse and eventually began casting the model in 1903 in bronze. Retaining the same name as the painting for which it was initially created, the bronze The Last Drop resonated with audiences and became a highly popular statuette with more than 150 authorized casts, the present being cast number 111.

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