Kobelkoff, Nikolai | A limbless performer who could load a pistol and shot out the flame of a candle

Kobelkoff, Nikolai

Kobelkoff. Berlin: Lith. Adolph Friedländer, ca. 1895 (no. 560)

Color lithograph poster (33 3/8 x 25 5/8 in.; 837 x 650 mm). Some tears and creases into image a number of minor marginal chips. Laid down on linen.

A rare and handsome poster of Nikolai Kobelkoff (1851–1933), a Russian-born limbless showman. The poster shows Kobelkoff with some of the articles he employed to demonstrate his remarkable dexterity: needle and thread, a decanter and glass, pen and writing paper, dining utensils, candles, a pistol, and his famous pocket watch. Kobelkoff earned enough from his world tours to quit the stage and open an amusement park in Vienna with his wife, with whom he had eleven children.