Original Art from the Grand Age of American Illustration
Welcome to Grapefruit Moon Gallery. Here you will find an archived visual history of past sales. Pretty to look at, some are quite old; but when they're in here, consider them sold!
Pulp illustrator James Lunnon created this oil on canvas painting of Norma Shearer for the September 1935 issue of Movies Magazine. The hair and styling seem to date this to the mid 1930s-the height of Shearer’s renown as the Queen of MGM, a title bestowed upon her in 1927 when she married Irving Thalberg. Unusually […]
Artist: James Lunnon
From the estate of the American artist James Lunnon, this is an unsigned proposed Black Mask pulp cover painting which was slated for publication in May of 1940. The yellow left side field is a telling trait and was unique to the title – this format was used between January 1937 to April of 1940, […]
Artist: James Lunnon
Joseph Pignone created this haunting and just mesmerizing gouache illustration painting for the July 1934 cover of Radio-Craft magazine. In this visually commanding original cover illustration from the machine age era of science and industry and modernist design aesthetics, a blind flapper girl with short bobbed hair holds a radio device that was created to guide the blind. Includes a printers proof tear sheet of the published magazine.
Artist: Joseph Pignone
This endearing original 1967 oil on canvas painting by Gil Elvgren was created for the Brown & Bigelow calendar company and published under the title Ruffled Feathers. A spirited and colorful pin-up painting featuring a redheaded photographer in silk stockings and garters who runs into unexpected troubles as she attempts to capture the likeness of […]
Artist: Gil Elvgren
Futuristic, detailed, and very precise, we believe this science-fiction inspired imagination of cosmos exploration to have been created for cover use in the British magazine Understanding Science, a Sampson Low Publication.
Artist: Unknown British Illustrator
This original gouache painting by Harry Bennett was used as cover art for the Pyramid paperback publication of “Cry Shame” written by Gore Vidal under the pseudonym Katherine Everard. During his early career, Vidal published under several pseudonyms in order to evade the accusation that the rate of his publishing made it impossible for him to be a “serious” literary author. This is a singular opportunity to own an original piece of both illustration art and literary history, from the estate of Charles Martignette.
Artist: Harry Bennett
This original 1920s oil on board by Henry Soulen was likely an interior spot illustration which appeared in the Saturday Evening Post. The colorful, boldly painted, Orientalist scene shows a rickshaw and two figures in heated conversation in front of gates of what appears to be San Francisco’s Chinatown. Housed in a simple, original-to-the-painting wood […]
Artist: Henry Soulen
A pristine and important surviving Henry Clive illustration painting that appeared as the cover for the August 27, 1944 issue of The American Weekly, a Randolph Hearst publication. The magazine often commissioned Clive to create serialized images of enchantresses that shared a thematic thread. In this case – in the year 1944 the artist was […]
Artist: Henry Clive
Drying Nets – Mont Saint Pierre is an antique 1930s signed oil on canvas painting by the important American artist and illustrator John Clymer, signed lower right and titled on the back stretcher bar in the artist’s hand. The work is a fine American impressionist painting with dazzling impasto work, particularly on the nets being hoisted and […]
Artist: John Clymer
Two squared jaw toughs slug it out as a pretty redhead damsel in distress looks on in this classic pulp cover painting for sale at Grapefruit Moon Gallery.
Artist: Mel Phillips
