Dog lovers and poker players alike seem to love the Dogs Player Poker series of paintings. These card-playing pooches have become real pop culture symbols through the years and reprints of the original paintings can be found in home game rooms, basements, man caves, and numerous other locations.
These paintings tend to bring a smile to the face of those checking them out. The dogs may be a bit of kitschy fun, but have quite a unique history and place in the art world.
History of the Paintings
These poker dogs were the work of Cassius Marcellus Coolidge. The artist from Antwerp, New York, was contracted by the advertising firm Brown & Bigelow in 1903 to help advertise cigars and he produced them through 1910. Coolidge had previously also painted poker dogs for cigar boxes as well, beginning those in 1894.
Nine of the 1903 paintings feature dogs at a poker table, complete with human clothes, cigars, and poker cards and chips. Some of the other paintings feature dogs testifying in court, reading mail, ballroom dancing, playing baseball, smoking, drinking, and in other scenarios. But it was the poker paintings that really resonated and became the most popular works in the set.
Americans love dogs, so adding these canines in human interactions and settings seems a good idea. The paintings just seemed to connect with people.
“Coolidge’s images are undeniably adorable, and they don’t take themselves too seriously,” art critic Jacksn Arn writes of the works. “Perhaps most importantly, they’re weird without being alienating– something that can be said about many masterpieces of commercial art, from Mr. Clean to Dos Equis’s Most Interesting Man in the World.”
Pop Culture Impact
In the century-plus since their release, the Dogs Playing Poker have grown in popularity. They can be seen on mugs, T-shirts, mouse pads, and pretty much any type of item one might imagine. That’s quite a lasting impact.
These popular paintings have also been found in other areas of pop culture. In the 1980s sitcom Cheers, bartender Sam Malone expresses his love for the paintings and says that he notices something new every time he sees one of them.
Maybe surprisingly to some, those original paintings have also been sought after by collectors. Coolidge’s first painting from 1894, known as “Poker Game,” sold at auction in 2015 for $658,000. In February 2008, a pair of the originals – “Only a Pair of Deuces” and “A Breach of Promise Suit” – sold for $193,000 in the 10th Annual Dogs in Art Auction as part of the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.
Two others – “A Bold Bluff” and “Waterloo” – were sold in 2005 for $590,000. They weren’t expected to fetch more than $60,000. Others might be worth even more.
“It’s Coolidge’s ‘A Friend in Need’ that became the most popular of the lot,” the art site My Modern Met notes.The title comes from the fact that the bulldog in the foreground is seen secretly slipping an ace to his partner, while his competitors give side-glances around the table. Perhaps it’s this sly, yet playful depiction of deceit applied to man’s best, most loyal friend that makes the painting so amusing. Although the original has never been up for sale, it’s thought to be worth millions of dollars.”
By Sean Chaffin