That is Priceless by Steve Melcher for July 17, 2024

/// Fathers’ duties to sons sometimes vex,

but if done right, the duo connects.

Here, Dad tries to convince

son that looking at prints

is the best way to learn about sex.

That’s an amazing likeness. Did you lose your glasses again.

“It’s so sad, Father! That poor woman lost all her clothes! Do you think we could send her more?”

The (very) young apprentice artist’s first centerfold:

The lad, at the age of eight,/

Had engraved his first copper plate !

Said the master,”not bad -/

But a woman unclad ?”/

Said the lad “Dad – I just couldn’t wait!”

The original is at the Yale Center for British Art, which apparently is closed for renovations just at present. The work is not on display, they say, so I wouldn’t rush over there to see it. Their website, which is easily googled, does have a search function; the artist’s name brings up this painting among a few others. There’s a fair amount of detail about it, but not any historical or esthetic interpretation. They list five of their exhibitions that have included it; the titles of those exhibitions seems to show that they value it primarily as a document of 18th century attitudes or ideas about childhood and family. From the earliest exhibition, in 1965, it would appear that this work was part of the personal collection of Paul Mellon before passing to Yale. Interestingly, the bibliography tab mentions two sale catalogs, one from Christie’s in 1998, the other from Sotheby’s in 1960. One wonders if the Mellons acquired the work in the Sotheby’s sale, and one very much wonders why it’s in the Christie’s catalog.

“She needs bigger boobs.”

“Cuz that is one sick drawing of your granny wearing only a leather harness!”

Portrait of a Man and a Boy Looking at Prints: 

Paste (including the quote marks) 

"Category:John Hamilton Mortimer" Wikimedia 

(syntax supported by the Google, Bing, Yahoo, DuckDuckGo, Ecosia, Brave, and Yandex search engines) in the browser address bar (or search for it using one of those search engines) and choose the first Category: found and once there find the text string Prints, and click its link for info and links that point to more info about this roughly jumbo envelope size painting. 

Again, a larger strip image is shown by (Ctrl- or right-) clicking the image in Mr. Melcher’s MASTERPIECE #3357 (July 17, 2024) blog entry, accessible by the Check out the blog! box after the last comment, and using the dropdown menu (even larger, if you trim what’s after .png from the URL). I have added a comment there pointing to the blog entry with my comment and reply pointing to info about this artist I used to point to here. So far, 2 works by him have been used here, the December 14, 2022, strip being the prior.

I suddenly had a strange thought:/

Unexpected, and surely unsought:/

Could it possibly be/

That there’s nothing to see?/

That we came here for nudes – but there’s naught?

Papa, when you said you wanted to introduce me to prints, I thought you meant that guy who dresses in purple and sings about doves.

“Portrait of a Man and a Boy Looking at Prints”

Now see this print of dogs playing poker, son…and the velveteen Elvis, over here….

Someday son, you will start watching cat videos.

I wish someone would hurry up and invent a lightbulb…