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Lot Essay
Ide Collar, also known as Advertisement for the George P. Ide Company was Outerbridge's first commercial assignment. Perhaps it was the slightly surreal proportions of the odd-size collar to the checker board it rested on or the familiar patterned motif that inspired Marcel Duchamp, upon seeing the advertisement, to tear it from the July 1922 issue of Vanity Fair in which it first appeared. Duchamp the Dada chief and chess fiend immediately declared it a "ready-made". He would still have it pinned to his wall three years later when Outerbridge finally made his acquaintance in Paris (c.f. Howe and Hawkins, p. 11).
It is curious to consider the influences available to Outerbridge during his journey to Paris in 1925. There he met many of the most significant figures of the period including Man Ray, Duchamp, Brancusi, Picabia, Picasso, Braque and Dali. And it is not certain if he met or saw the work of Eugène Atget, but the interest of the Surrealists in his work, such as Avenue des Gobelins (formerly in the collection of the Dadaist poet Tristan Tzara) offered here in lot 17, can be suggested as a possible correlary for Ide Collar as well as his Self-Portrait of 1927 seen in lot 16. This fascination in the everyday - whether a man's collar or a display mannequin - must have resonated strongly with both the Parisian avant-garde and Outerbridge.
Approximately nine prints of this image, in either platinum or silver are known to exist, including those in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Ford Motor Company Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and five private collections. In April 1996, Christie's sold a platinum example for the Laguna Art Museum, Laguna, California, formerly in the Estate of Paul Outerbridge, Jr.
It is curious to consider the influences available to Outerbridge during his journey to Paris in 1925. There he met many of the most significant figures of the period including Man Ray, Duchamp, Brancusi, Picabia, Picasso, Braque and Dali. And it is not certain if he met or saw the work of Eugène Atget, but the interest of the Surrealists in his work, such as Avenue des Gobelins (formerly in the collection of the Dadaist poet Tristan Tzara) offered here in lot 17, can be suggested as a possible correlary for Ide Collar as well as his Self-Portrait of 1927 seen in lot 16. This fascination in the everyday - whether a man's collar or a display mannequin - must have resonated strongly with both the Parisian avant-garde and Outerbridge.
Approximately nine prints of this image, in either platinum or silver are known to exist, including those in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Ford Motor Company Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and five private collections. In April 1996, Christie's sold a platinum example for the Laguna Art Museum, Laguna, California, formerly in the Estate of Paul Outerbridge, Jr.