A rare surviving cover painting by J.W. Scott, created for the September 8th, 1934 issue of the Street & Smith Publishing pulp magazine Western Stories. A copy of the magazine is included in the sale. A gritty old west scene of a group of cowboys including the Calico Kid reloading and preparing to fire above a rugged desert pass. The work is executed with an impasto technique that brings a tension and urgent intensity to the Americana Western genre imagery.

Illustration Magazine recently devoted a large portion of issue #14 on the life and works of John Walter Scott, who worked during the 1930s creating numerous and stylistically diverse pulp covers, the verso canvas notes this was a cover for a “Sept 8 Western, we recently bought a title of the published pulp which is included in the sale.

This untouched Golden Age of Illustration cover work shows the artist’s New York address on the verso as well as print usage notations. The frame is original to the painting and a very handsome wide profile rugged example that looks fabulous with this large and rare pulp cover illustration.