I cringe as well at the low resolution of the Data books rendering of the Rebour drawings.
DR's art counts heavily on the weight and spacing of the strokes in his pen work.. When done poorly, the textures and effects he achieved in the real work are mottled and blotched.
This happens to a great degree in Patterson's drawing as well. Very sad....
I wonder if there might be a modest market for very high quality reproduction prints? Maybe a few key pieces from your collection, Brett? Count me in as a customer for same!
Dale Brown Greensboro, NC USA
-----Original Message----- From: Brett Horton <bretthorton@thehortoncollection.com> To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Sent: Mon, 6 Mar 2006 21:53:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: re: [CR]Rebour Original Drawing Availability
I have a small stash of Rebour's original drawings and original printing plates in my collection. I obtained them in a deal with a collector in France a few years back. He had acquired the bulk of what was theoretically left of the family archives years ago. I ended up with about 30%, another collector has about the same, and the original collector now has about 40% of what he started with. I've been meaning to put the ones I have up on my web site for the past 2-3 years but have just never quite got around to it.
For all of Rebour's prolific output, there does not appear to be that many pieces of available original art out there. In any given 5 year period I see perhaps 4-5 of his drawings surface at auction and virtually nothing appearing on the private market. (ie about one drawing per year) My understanding is most of what comes up for sale goes to Japan.
To the best of my knowledge, three other collectors and I have the majority of the known drawings. All told, I'm guessing between the four of us there are 300-400 drawings. Figure another 200 or so are out there scattered to the winds. And who knows? There might be hundreds more that are for now just sitting in boxes tucked away in some printers storage basement in France. Still, as a percent of original output, only a relatively small percentage of Rebour's drawings seem to survive.
Don't interpret this to mean the drawings are priceless. Far from it. While a nice Tour de France bike drawing will cost you $1000+, smaller drawings can be had for less than $200. Basically, expect to pay from $90-175 for most of the more common or simple drawings. Bigger drawings, or those of particularly trick or otherwise unusual items will bring more. And drawings of things like Campy and Herse components fetch even more. Of course, this is all on the premise you can find them. I have been passively looking, with no success, for Rebour's drawing of a Campy track cog drawing for 10+ years. If I ever find it, it will be purely by luck.
Rebour's actual artwork is really impressive. The magazines they were printed in don't do the original art justice. The second and third generation reprints, like the series of books from Japan, pretty much crucify the beauty of the originals.
Best of luck on the Rebour art quest.
Brett Horton San Francisco, CA
Brandon"monkeyman"Ives wrote: <snip> Of course in all the years I've been into this stuff I've never seen, or heard, of an original drawing being sold. Rebour made thousands of drawings over his career and was popular during the time so I don't see his originals just being destroyed after use in a ad or magazine. Does anyone have any ideas on the availability of original Rebour work?
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