Our regular price for this authentic Cuban drawing by Enrique Lacoste is $169.
We are delighted to offer PHIL NIEKRO / BASEBALL HALL OF FAME, a hand-signed original drawing by award-winning Cuban caricaturist Enrique Lacoste (b. 1952).
Lacoste -- a long-time Major League Baseball fan who lives in Havana, Cuba -- has created a series of original drawings of selected Baseball Hall of Fame inductees. The Cuban Poster Gallery is thrilled to have acquired a large collection of Lacoste's colorful, whimsical -- and well-executed -- Hall of Fame drawings.
Just like in the United States, baseball is Cuba's national pastime, although it is also a national passion on the Caribbean's largest island, which produced 30 players on the 2019 Major League Baseball team rosters. We are confident the drawings in Lacoste's Hall of Fame series will become treasured acquisitions for baseball fans and historians. We invite you to see all of these drawings here in the Cuban Poster Gallery's eBay Store.
The drawing in this listing salutes PHIL NIEKRO (1939-2020), a five-time All Star pitcher and five-time Gold Glove winner for the Atlanta (and Milwaukee) Braves and three other MLB teams: the New York Yankees, Toronto Blue Jays and Cleveland Indians. A two-time National League wins leader, PHIL NIEKRO was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1997.
This original drawing, which measures approximately 13 by 17 inches (33 by 43 cm), is signed and dated by Lacoste, who also added the city and country -- La Habana, Cuba -- where it was created. This drawing shows PHIL NIEKRO in his Atlanta Braves uniform.
The drawings of Enrique Lacoste are well known in Cuba; his celebrated graphics have appeared in many Cuban magazines, newspapers and books over the past three decades. The largely self-taught Afro Cuban artist also has written and illustrated books about Latin American historical figures. If you like Lacoste's work, we invite you to search our eBay Store under the heading Original Cuban Drawings, where you will also find drawings of the classic American cars on the streets of Cuba, as well as cartoons and caricatures of Cuban and world political and cultural figures--from Fidel Castro to the Rolling Stones (who performed in Havana in 2016) to Donald Trump.
Overall condition of the Baseball Hall of Fame drawing in this listing is good. As with many handmade Cuban graphics, small imperfections can be expected. Please see the multiple photos we have posted with this listing. And always buy with 100 percent confidence; any artwork purchased from the Cuban Poster Gallery on eBay can be returned within 30 days.
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TITLE: Phil Niekro, Atlanta Braves, Baseball Hall of Fame
DESIGNER: Enrique Lacoste (b. 1952)
MEDIUM: Drawing on paper, using permanent markers
SIZE: approximately 13 by 17 inches (33 by 43 cm)
YEAR: 2021
SIGNED: Yes, by the artist's hand
ORIGIN: Havana, Cuba
A few words about collecting the Cuban silk-screen movie posters that we also offer in our eBay Store:
For six decades, the Cuban Film Institute has been designing silk-screened posters for most every movie shown on the island, whether the films originated in Cuba, the United States, Brazil, Japan or Italy. In the midst of the Cold War 1960s and 1970s, many of the subtitled foreign films shown in Cuba came from the island nation's communist allies in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, Vietnam and even North Korea.
Unlike in the United States, where movie posters are often dominated by images of Hollywood stars, the Cubans assign a graphic artist to design an original piece of artwork for each film. These posters are widely recognized in graphic design circles as stylish works of art, handmade one color at a time and often under difficult circumstances (at various times, paint and even paper have been in short supply on the island.)
Cuba's silk-screen movie posters are nothing less than museum pieces. Examples of Cuban poster art can be found in the permanent collections of museums across the globe from the Victoria & Albert in London to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, as well as in prestigious institutions such as the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles.
Adding to their collectability, Cuba's movie posters are produced in relatively small numbers. Typically, a few hundred copies are made for each film, although the runs have been as low as 50. Responding to demand from collectors, the Cuban Film Institute has re-screened some of its more popular posters. That's why some posters created in the 1960s and 1970s began reappearing on the Caribbean island in the 1990s and 2000s.
Further adding to their collectability, many of Cuba's vintage posters are imperiled. Although a few hundred copies may have been screened originally, relatively few have survived, due to the island's wet and humid climate, insect infestation, inadequate storage facilities in Havana and improper handling in Cuba and elsewhere. To us, these survivors are rare beauties, even those with obvious flaws. We are proud to have rescued hundreds of posters from almost certain extinction by storing them in an air conditioned, acid-free environment.
We at the Cuban Poster Gallery offer both 1st and 2nd Edition posters to our customers on eBay and in our Washington D.C. gallery. We consider both to be collectible, and (in response to a question we often get) all of these posters were legally imported because the U.S. government exempts artwork from its economic embargo against Cuba. While the pricier originals are favored by some collectors, the 2nd Edition re-screens are also collectible because they were made in the same Havana workshop as the originals. Note that we never sell unauthorized reproductions that have been cranked out in print shops in the U.S. and Europe.
To our eBay customers, we pledge to accurately describe the posters we list and price them fairly based on condition and scarcity. Have a question? Please don't hesitate to contact us.
To view more distinctive Cuban graphics, we invite you to visit the Cuban Poster Gallery's eBay Store: http://stores.ebay.com/cubanpostergallery