Old Details Competitions - A Collector's Obsession

I have mentioned elsewhere, I think, that my interest in the Details Competition began around 1995. My wife, who studied and achieved a History and Theory of Art degree, first took an interest in the Competition. She won a competition in the mid 90's. This sparked my interest and the Christmas Competitions sealed it. Thereafter, I tried to keep copies of each competition. I had varying success, as sometimes I was abroad and the Review never left the shores of the UK. A kiosk proprietor in Paris showed complete incomprehension when I asked him about it. In the end, I showed him a copy and he said that he had never seen it.

Consequently, I had to try to make arrangements with friends and family to buy the paper for me and to send a photo of the competition to me when we were away. This led to gaps in the collection. On other occasions, I made a trip to the local library in Devon if I had been away on a Sunday and took a photo of the competition once I could locate the Review section. On one notable occasion, I found that the whole page had been torn out, thus frustrating my plan. To get hold of a copy, I had to visit a library in Plymouth, breaking a rail journey to do so.

All this is leading up to a question to any regular readers of this Blog, to know if they, too, have collected old competitions?

In my collections, which I have recently made digital in a somewhat amateurish and time consuming way, I have only one competition before Competition number 515. After that date, I have many gaps, specifically:

518, 520, 521, 524, 527, 530, 534, 536, 537, 541, 542, 543, 545, 546, 548, 549, 561, 579, 586, 589, 595, 596, 611, 615, 616, 617,651, 652, 703, 704,  752,  802, 836, 837, 839, 850, 867, 887, 893, 904, 906, 916, 937, 943, 944, 955, 965, 987, 988, 989, 1005, 1006, 1041, 1042, 1047, 1057, 1058, 1059, 1066, 1067, 1068, 1070, 1090, 1097, 1098, 1108, 1109, 1110, 1111, 1119, 1120, 1121, 1122, 1123, 1140, 1247.

This list has been amended. Thanks to Chris for sending me some of the missing numbers.

If anyone has any of these copies, I'd be happy to receive them, and indeed to supply any of the others that I have which make up the rest of the collection.

Details 1285 Deja Vu

The detail in this week's Competition has appeared previously. Those with longish memories will remember it, no doubt. However, it is a different crop from the one published the first time round.

To my knowledge, Tom Lubbock deliberately re-presented the same painting and artist only in his Christmas Competitions. This seemed to be a kind of recognition of the regular contributors, a reward for their long service and perhaps to give them a slight edge over the once a year competitors who were more interested in a crate of champagne than European paintings. A Details Competition is for Life, not just for Christmas.

I say "deliberately re-presented" the same picture and artist, as he once or twice made an error by doing so in the weekly competition towards the end of his life.

The painting was by John Byam Liston Shaw, titled The Boer War "Last Summer things were Greener". Details 1014.

On another point, you may be interested in Tom Lubbock's website where you can find links to his articles. There are plenty there to keep you company, although the hosting website that is referenced,

http://journalisted.com/tom-lubbock?allarticles=yes

is no longer funded. I found that a small percentage of the links to some of Tom Lubbock's articles do not work. Nearly all are from the Independent's archive.

You can also find Tom Lubbock's collages on the site.

http://tomlubbock.com/journalism.html

Spectacular Answers

Here are the answers to Jenny's Christmas Spectacular Details Quiz. Many thanks for providing the entertainment.

JANUARY SPECTACULAR!

1 Grant Wood, American Gothic.  Art Institute of Chicago.
2 Stanley Spencer,  Portrait of Louis Behrend.  New Walk Museum, Leicester.
3 Dora Carrington,  Lytton Strachey.  National Portrait Gallery,  London.
4 Jean-Baptiste Simeon Chardin,  Self Portrait.  Louvre, Paris.  A pastel.
5 Georges de la Tour,  St Jerome Reading.   Royal Collection, London.
6 Jean Dubuffet, Portrait of André Dhôtel. Centre Pompidou, Paris.
7 El Greco,  A Cardinal.  Metropolitan Museum, New York.
8 Gino Severini,  Self Portrait.  Private collection.
9 Nicolaes Maes,  The Account Keeper. St Louis Art Museum, Missouri.
10 Henri Matisse, Self Portrait.  Musée Matisse, Le Cateau-Cambresis.
11 Mary Cassatt,  Mrs Cassatt Reading to her Grandchildren.  Private collection, New York.
12 Pablo Picasso,  Jaime Sabartes.   Museu Picasso, Barcelona.
13 Jusepe de Ribera,  A Knight of the Order of Santiago.  Meadows Museum, Dallas.
14 Rembrandt van Rijn,  Rembrandt’s Mother.  Wilton House, Wiltshire.
15. Pierre Bonnard, Self Portrait,  Musée Bonnard, Le Cannet, near Cannes.
16 Joshua Reynolds,  Self Portrait.  Kenwood Gallery, London. But he and his studio churned out this image several times, so not 100% sure, but I do not think it is the Dulwich one.
17 Stanley Spencer, Self Portrait with Patricia Preece.  Fitzwilliam, Cambridge.
18 Titian,  Portrait of the Doctor Andreas Vesalius. Pitti Palace, Florence.
19  Tommaso da Modena,  Cardinal Nicholas of Rouen.  One of the Forty Illustrious Members of the Dominican Order, Chapterhouse of the Dominicans, Treviso.
20 Vuillard,  Portrait of Philippe Berthelot.   Private collection.
21 Roger Fry,  Self Portrait.  Private collection.
22 Lucian Freud,  Portrait of David Hockney.  Private collection.
23 John Singer Sargent,  Vernon Lee/ Violet Paget.  Tate Gallery, London.
24 Quentin Metsys,  The Moneylenders.  Museo de Bellas Artes, Bilbao.

Patrick's 112 Fingers Identified!

Patrick has supplied a set of answers to his Competition which identify all the paintings. Many thanks to Patrick for providing the answers.