Oil painting -> List of Painters ->Cassius Marcellus Coolidge

Cassius Marcellus Coolidge

Early Days: Cassius Marcellus Coolidge born in Philadelphia, New York to abolitionist Quaker farmers, Coolidge was known by the nickname "Cash" to friends and family. 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, common at midways and carnivals.

Career:

In 1903, Coolidge contracted with the advertising firm of Brown & Bigelow of St. Paul, Minnesota, to create sixteen oil paintings over several years, featuring anthropomorphized dogs engaging in various human activities. Nine of them depict dogs playing poker, a meme Coolidge is credited with inventing, and which inspired 1950s American illustrator Arthur Sarnoff who is also famous for paintings of dogs playing pool, poker and craps, along with various other later imitators.

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.