Victor Potel's Paintings

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Thomas Reeder
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Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Thomas Reeder » Thu Oct 29, 2015 7:06 am

While digging through old periodicals in my ongoing search for any new snippet of info regarding Henry Lehrman, I came across several articles that talk about Victor Potel's painting abilities, and one piece in particular. The following is from Lee Shippey's "Lee Side 'o L.A.," Los Angeles Times, 04/24/1939, p.A4:

The Original Mack Sennetts
Humorists have said there must have been 1,000,000 passengers on the Mayflower, to judge by the number of people now claiming that their ancestors came over on it, and that there must have been at least 500,000 members of the original Floradora sextet. Often in Hollywood it seems that there must have been about that many comedians in the original Mack Sennett studio, which, in Movieland, compares with the Mayflower. For that reason a picture just painted by Victor Potel, who was a comic in the original Mack Sennett studio at Edendale, should be of great historic value. For Victor has painted some 68 persons into the picture, all of whom were prominent in the activities of the studio while he was there. In the picture are some of the stunts for which the studio was famous. Custard pies are being hurled, bathing beauties are being photographed and comic cops are performing.

How Good Is Your Memory?
It is interesting to study this picture of Potel’s, to see how some of those pictured have progressed while others have passed, or nearly passed, out of the picture world. Among those pictured are Raymond Griffith, Mal St. Clair, Eddie Sutherland, Harry Langdon, Charlie Chaplin, Henry Lehrman, Ed and Tom Kennedy, Slim Summerville, Polly Moran, Ben Turpin, Charlie Murray, Andy Clyde, Al St. John, Charles Heinie Conklin, Chester Conklin, Eddie Gibbon [sic], James Finlayson, Jack Richardson, Glen Cavender, Dot Farley, Ford Sterling, Vernon Dent, George O’Hara, Louise Fazenda, Douglas Girard, Gloria Swanson, Hank Mann, Dale Fuller, Billy Bevan, Phyllis Haver, Blanche Payson, George Gray, Ted Stanhope, Mary Ann Jackson, George Jeske, Johnnie Rand and Potel himself. Mack Sennett is shown, of course. And there are faces we thought we never could forget but which some of us have forgotten—Mabel Normand, Fatty Arbuckle, Fre Mace, Jack Cooper, Lige Cromley, Harry McCoy, Hugh Fay, Wayland Trask, George Binns, Kalla Pasha, Pat Kelly, Billy Armstrong, Harry Barber, Sid Smith and Al Cook.
If your face should be in that picture and isn’t, you’d better see Victor about it for there may be a time when it will be important in the history of the most remarkable industry in the world. Think what it would have meant if those who came over on the Mayflower had posed for a group photograph just after landing. This picture of Potel’s is so complete that it even shows Teddy, the Great Dane, and Pepper, the cat.


Another article - Lucie Neville's "In Hollywood," The Poughkeepsie Star-Enterprise, 06/03/1947 - goes on to say that the painting hung on the wall of director Preston Sturges' restauarant, "and all the people still living (except Chaplin), autographed the frame." Does anyone know if this painting still exists and, if so, has anyone actually seen it? Neville stated that the "faces are only an inch or so high but startlingly accurate."

Advance apologies if this topic has already appeared somewhere here or at another site.

Gary Johnson
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Re: Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Gary Johnson » Thu Oct 29, 2015 11:56 am

I like the tone of humanity this writer projects when he writes about, "those faces that we never thought we could forget but which some of us have already forgotten,,,," -- this being said in 1939. It must have been a melancholy time for many who saw an era end and their one-time idols discarded in one short decade.

Steve Rydzewski
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Re: Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Steve Rydzewski » Fri Oct 30, 2015 12:29 pm

WOW! Very interesting article, Tom.

I never knew about this Sennett painting. Might of made a great cover for Brent's book.
Maybe the painting is still with the Sturges family(?). Maybe with Potel's descendants?

But several years ago a very similar painting by Potel was up for sale at eBay.
It wasn't strictly comedians, but it too had signatures all along the frame.

I remember the painting didn't sell the first week, was relisted, and I lost track from there.


– SteveR

Ian Elliot
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Re: Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Ian Elliot » Sat Oct 31, 2015 8:14 pm

Called "A Day at Mack Sennett", it's on page 84 of this catalogue (disappointingly, a low res rendering)--

http://issuu.com/kenoauctions/docs/c1005_variousowner

--and appears to have sold for $7,500.

Thomas Reeder
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Re: Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Thomas Reeder » Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:08 am

Thanks so much for that post, Ian. Alas, it's too bad that the resolution is so poor. I can pick out a few familiar faces from the crowd, but any attempts to place Henry Lehrman in the painting are futile; too many mustaches!

Thomas Reeder
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Re: Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Thomas Reeder » Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:33 am

A friend helpfully pointed me in the direction of another painting by Potel, this one posted on eBay. This image is clearer and shows Potel at work on a portion of the painting:
[url]http://www.ebay.com/itm/1941-Press-Photo-Victor-Potel-Painter-/351439841427?hash=item51d3726893:g:ufkAAOSwYGFUy0FG
[/url]

Thomas Reeder
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Re: Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Thomas Reeder » Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:34 am

Hmm, that didn't work. Instead, go to eBay and enter "Victor Potel" and it will be the first item that pops up.

Ed Watz
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Re: Victor Potel's Paintings

Postby Ed Watz » Fri Nov 06, 2015 3:19 pm

In the eBay photo, Vic Potel is commemorating Gloria Swanson's 1925 return to Hollywood from Europe, when Paramount literally declared a studio holiday and many of the industry's celebrities came out to greet Gloria and her new husband, the Marquis Henry de La Falaise.
"Of course he smiled -- just like you and me." -- Harold Goodwin, on Buster Keaton (1976)


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