Addams, Charles

Drawing board (19 3/4 x 16 1/8 in.; 501 x 409 mm). Watercolor, ink, and wash on white Whatman paper drawing board, signed by Addams in ink and dated ("11\16\57") in pencil, reverse of board with New Yorker Magazine stamps; some minor marginal toning and fingersoiling. Laid onto white matboard with hinged mat; some foxing.   

Drawing board (19 3/4 x 16 1/8 in.; 501 x 409 mm). Watercolor, ink, and wash on white Whatman paper drawing board, signed by Addams in ink and dated ("11\16\57") in pencil, reverse of board with New Yorker Magazine stamps; some minor marginal toning and fingersoiling. Laid onto white matboard with hinged mat; some foxing.
The lot is sold in the condition it is in at the time of sale. The condition report is provided to assist you with assessing the condition of the lot and is for guidance only. Any reference to condition in the condition report for the lot does not amount to a full description of condition. The images of the lot form part of the condition report for the lot provided by Sotheby's. Certain images of the lot provided online may not accurately reflect the actual condition of the lot. In particular, the online images may represent colours and shades which are different to the lot's actual colour and shades. The condition report for the lot may make reference to particular imperfections of the lot but you should note that the lot may have other faults not expressly referred to in the condition report for the lot or shown in the online images of the lot. The condition report may not refer to all faults, restoration, alteration or adaptation because Sotheby's is not a professional conservator or restorer but rather the condition report is a statement of opinion genuinely held by Sotheby's. For that reason, Sotheby's condition report is not an alternative to taking your own professional advice regarding the condition of the lot.

The present cartoon appeared in the New Yorker magazine on the 16th of November 1957 (pg. 58).  In addition to his contribution to the magazine, Charles Addams was perhaps best known for his darkly humorous and macabre characters, some of whom became known as The Addams Family. In a 2010 interview, Bob Mankoff, cartoon editor of the New Yorker, addressed the characteristically dark nature of Addams's work, as exemplified in the present cartoon: "I think his influence extends beyond the horror genre, to humor not as a comforting 'laughter is the best medicine' anodyne but as something deeply skeptical of the purported values of middle-class American life. By making us laugh at, and with, his fiendish protagonists, he makes us temporarily share their values, and doubt our own."