Cleo—Though I loved all of these Wide-Eyed kitties, Cleo was my favorite. Something about him seemed to need me more than the others!
Ambrosia.
Tiger Lily.
Nefertiti.
M Y C O L L E C T I O N — These Wide-Eyed Kitty posters have a copyright/litho date of 1965. They hung in my bedroom from then until the early '70s when I switched bedrooms and became a bit more "adult." I replaced them with the Motor Trend "In Retrospect" posters featured in this blog a while ago. Interestingly, I've found almost nothing online about these posters, or the artist, "Gig" except for several of these prints for sale at eBay. They measure 10 1/4 x 14 inches each, and all feature vintage thumbtack holes in each corner, lol. I really like the details Gig painted into each one, whether it was a half-buried tea cup, a discarded sardine can or a brick tenement building.
These Kittens are adorable! No doubt the eyes are what got you - very reminiscent of the author of this blog!
ReplyDeleteYou are without a doubt your own worst critic!
ReplyDeletesee! I even suck at being a critic. hahahahahaha.
ReplyDeleteThose kitten eyes remind me of that artist Keane who would always paint the BIG eyes.
ReplyDeleteBoy the Humane Society should use those in their ads, I am about to run down to the shelter and bring home a cat.
Hard to pick a favorite.....maybe Ambrosia?
Maybe that makes you your own BEST critic!
ReplyDeleteThese are adorable -- when I was young I didn't like cats so they wouldn't have appealed to me then. Now that I'm a certified cat lover (all it takes is getting to know one), I love these drawings! They're not the usual things one sees in little boys' rooms (not that I've been in any for about 50 years) but then you're not the usual little boy!
Paul, NYC
Annie: the name "Keane" came up when I was googling for information about these prints. I thought the artist was named Gig Keane at one point, but I guess not. I thought these were famous in their day, but apparently only in my mind, lol.
ReplyDeletePaul: You got that right! I certainly wasn't a typical little boy, rofl.
Maybe it's one and the same. I remember child faces with the big eyes but she did lots of cats as well
ReplyDeletehttp://www.keane-eyes.com/
GN CASEY GN
ReplyDeleteGRANNY
SO sweet/sad. I had the little girl with huge eyes hanging in my room. Also, when I turned 13 instead of a bride doll (as was the tradition) I got a "little miss no name" doll. She was barefoot with a ragged dress of burlap. Wow, I was "unusual" even then!!! :)
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dollinfo.com/LMissNo.htm
wow. what a cool doll! I've never even heard of them. thanks for the link!
ReplyDeleteThere was a doll that I remember from the FAO Schwarz catalog when I was a child called Poor Pitiful Pearl. She wore a potato sack for a dress and a babushka. I was never that interested in dolls but I certainly wanted a doll house. The Schwarz catalog had a terrific one -- a two-story colonial with a slate-floored sunporch and a electric lights in every room. I got an AllState metal gas station for Christmas instead and was actually pretty happy with it. It's scale was similar to my Dinky Toys!
ReplyDeletePaul, NYC
The closest I had to a doll house or a toy gas station were HO scale houses and train set buildings. I had a lot of different dolls though, lol. Anne Francis died yesterday, and I had a Honey West doll, from her TV show in the '60s. It even had a little ocelot. I wish I had it today! Oddly enough, I googled her last night and found out she had a website, and then found out today she had died yesterday! Spooky!
ReplyDeleteI had a lot of Plasticville buildings and accessories to go with our Lionel train set (027 gauge -- three rails -- the middle one was the power pickup). They were similar in scale to my Dinky Toys too.
ReplyDeleteI was very sad to hear of Anne Francis' passing -- we had just watched Forbidden Planet the day before. I don't think I watched Honey West -- it probably conflicted with something else I liked -- in the days before DVR! How did we survive?
Paul, NYC
i remember these being advertised in comic books when I was a kid around 1963 through 1968 when I stopped reading comic books. In addition to the kitties there were big-eyed puppies and big eyed orphan children and more. All just as tacky and just as cloying. Two years ago I was lucky enough to find a copy of "Nefertiti" in good condition in the trunk of a car at the salvage yard where I worked.
ReplyDelete