Dogs Playing Poker, by Cassius Marcellus Coolidge, refers collectively to an 1894 painting, a 1903 series of sixteen oil paintings commissioned by Brown & Bigelow to advertise cigars, and a 1910 painting.[1] All eighteen paintings in the overall series feature anthropomorphized dogs, but the eleven in which dogs are seated around a card table have become well known in the United States as examples of kitsch art in home decoration.
Depictions and reenactments of the series have appeared in many films, television shows, theater productions, and other popular culture art forms. Critic Annette Ferrara has described Dogs Playing Poker as "indelibly burned into ... the American collective-schlock subconscious ... through incessant reproduction on all manner of pop ephemera".[2]
The first painting, Coolidge's 1894 Poker Game, sold for $658,000 at a 2015 auction.[3]
The majority of the paintings ascribed to the Dogs Playing Poker moniker consist of anthropomorphized versions of dogs sitting around a poker table playing poker. The dogs presented are usually larger breeds like collies, Great Danes, St. Bernards, and general mastiffs.[4] Humans do not appear in any of the paintings, and female dogs rarely appear.[4] [5] According to James McManus of The New York Times, the dogs are depicted as "upper-middle-class lawyers and businessmen", as they drink and smoke at the table.[5] The dogs sit on leather chairs in dimly lit rooms, adorned by a ceiling lamp.[4] Some of the paintings tell a story.[4] For example, in the painting A Bold Bluff, a St. Bernard is holding a two pair hand, and the other dogs are questioning whether to call his bluff.[4] In the painting Waterloo, the same dogs did not call the St. Bernard's bluff, and he uses both paws to grab his winnings.[4] Another painting in the series, titled A Friend in Need, depicts a bulldog slipping an ace under the table to the dog sitting next to him.[6] Common themes throughout the Dogs Playing Poker series are deception, mistrust, and confrontation.[4]
Not every painting within the series depicts dogs playing poker.[6] Some paintings depict dogs performing other human activities, such as playing baseball and football.[6] In the painting Riding a Goat, a blindfolded dog sits atop a goat for the amusement of a royal couple.[4]
The title of Coolidge's original 1894 painting is Poker Game.
The titles in the Brown & Bigelow series are:
These were followed in 1910 by a similar painting, Looks Like Four of a Kind. Other Coolidge paintings featuring anthropomorphized dogs include Kelly Pool, which shows dogs playing kelly pool.
Some of the compositions in the series are modeled on paintings of human card-players by such artists as Caravaggio, Georges de La Tour, and Paul Cézanne.
On February 15, 2005, the originals of A Bold Bluff and Waterloo were auctioned as a pair to an undisclosed buyer for US $590,400.[8] The previous top price for a Coolidge was $74,000.[9] In 2015, Poker Game sold for $658,000, currently the highest price paid for a Coolidge.