Foreword: For my mind, saloon art can cover a wide swath of artistic endeavors, from painting designed FOR saloons to paintings OF saloon scenes. Below are the works of three artists in three different generations that relate to drinking establishments, each with a distinct character and purpose.
Picture an artist, who during his lifetime could command more than $60,000 Artist A.D.M. Cooper, Artist John Sloan, McSorley’s New York Saloon, British Artist Ian Mitchell, saloon art(equivalent to $1.2 million today) for a single piece of artwork, using his talent to cage drinks from saloon owners across the West in return for painting pictures of scantily clad women, art meant for display behind the bar. That would be Ashley David Middleton (A.D.M.) Cooper (1856-1924), the late 19th Century unsurpassed “Rembrandt” of the saloon nude, shown right.
Despite his aristocratic background and acceptance by California society, Cooper was inclined to “walk on the wild side.” Edan Hughes, the author of a book on California artists wrote that of the 16,000 painters he had chronicled, “...None was as colorful as Ashley David Middleton Cooper. That man knew how to live. He was a true Bohemian, and he loved to have a good time. He knew how to party. And paint. And then party some more. He had a zest for life unmatched in the artistic annals of California.”
With his definite affinity for alcohol, Cooper is said to have paid many bar bills as he roamed the West by paintings of unclothed women. Those pictures came in all sizes and shapes, with one constant: bare breasts. Saloon owners welcomed them as a known attraction for their almost entirely male clientele. Shown above is perhaps Cooper’s most famous nude paintings, known as “The Kansas City Girl.” It was exhibited throughout the United States, reputedly gathering crowds wherever it went, and was accounted a sensation at the Trans-Mississippi Exposition of 1898, held in Omaha, Nebraska.
Two among dozens of Cooper’s erotic paintings are shown above. At right is an artwork he entitled “San Francisco Girl.” Why it bears that specific distinction is puzzling. Her settling is an exotic one with velvet curtains, a leopard skin rug, and scattered flowers. At left, Cooper reached back to Greek mythology for his nude. She is a nymph, the personification of the creative and fostering activities of nature, most often identified with the life-giving outflow of springs. True to form, this figure is garlanded with water lilies.
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In 1975, during three months working in New York City, I ventured over to McSorley’s Old Ale House for lunch, having read Joseph Mitchell’s well-known book on the saloon. At the time I was aware of the several paintings of the famous watering hole by New York artist, John French Sloan.
Sloan (1871-1951) is best known for his urban genre scenes and ability to capture the essence of neighborhood life in Gotham City. Sloan, shown here, has been called the premier artist of the “Ashcan School” who painted the inexhaustible energy and life of New York City during the first decades of the twentieth century. As shown above and in paintings below, McSorley’s not only was his regular drinking establishment but a favorite scene to paint. Above is Sloan’s “McSorley’s Bar, 1912.”
In a painting called “McSorley’s Cats,” Sloan captured John McSorley, the founder of the saloon at 15 East Seventh Street, in scene with the owner’s rat-catching pet cats. Shown right, McSorley had arrived in America in 1851 at the age of 18. The date on which he started his saloon is in dispute. McSorley gave it as 1854 but others date it to 1865. As shown below, Sloan also could capture quiet moments as in “McSorley’s Back Room.”
Sloan and other Ashcan School painters opened the saloon as an appropriate subject for artists to portray as symbolic of the life in the big city. Their successors would not stop there, turning their attention westward and the cowboy saloon romanticized by the motion pictures.
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In choosing a contemporary artist to round out this trio, I selected the work of Ian Mitchell, only to discover that there are three artistic Ian Mitchells, two British and one American, who are painting today with roughly similar colorful styles. Of them I have chosen the Welsh Ian Mitchell, shown here, as the creator of the three Western saloon paintings shown here.
Mitchell can pitch his art in a traditional mode, as demonstrated by the painting right that shows a traditional Western sheriff tossing down a beverage while a 19th Century dressed bartender and waitress observe. But look more closely. The sheriff is drinking from a can. The earliest beer cans date from about 1935, soft drinks followed shortly after. Mitchell is having a “time warp” joke.
The Mitchell painting above is unambiguously in a current Western setting. The artist has captured in vivid colors five contemporary figures, replete with large hats, fringed jackets and blue jeans. We have joined a group of friends apparently having a beer (only one bottle visible) of a late afternoon at their favorite drinking establishment. Gone are the guns, the badge, the barkeep and the waitress. This is a scene that daily is replicated in bars across the West.
A final picture from Mitchell entitled “The Yellow Rose” captures the exterior of a saloon that is timeless, despite the artist’s efforts to give it an antique look by adding a hay rack and liquor barrels arranged outside. The very neatness and order of the building’s exterior tell a different story. While “The Yellow Rose” may owe its origins to the Wild West era, the painting appears to replicate a saloon that might be found in a town trying to attract tourists by restoring or replicating its original buildings. My guess is that Mitchell intends this ambiguity.
Each of the three artists shown above have approached their saloon art from a different perspective but each within the sensibilities of his own time. This suggests to me that drinking establishments will be the subject of artistic interest for a long time to come.
Note: Longer posts may be found on this website on both A.D.M. Cooper (April 19, 2019) and on John Sloan and McSorley’s (January 13, 2023).
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