A stag at Sharkey's

Bellows, George, 1882-1925 · 1917

The "Stag at Sharkey's" was the first lithograph to attract general public attraction. Many of the early pictures of prize-fights were impressions of nights at this "Club." (Bellows) / First appeared as a painting in 1907, with two variations on the theme following later. This lithograph was made...using the paintings as studies and adding new features and alterations. All proofs from the stone run very much alike. -GB This powerful large scale lithograph is one of the most important American prints of the first half of the twentieth century. The combination of the brute strength of the fighters and the lust of the spectators made it one of the first Bellows prints to attract general attention. The setting is Tom Sharkey's Club, not far from the artist's first studio in New York City's Lincoln Arcade Building. Sharkey, a retired fighter, operated a saloon where he staged frequent bouts in the back room. Since prize fights were illegal as a public sporting event in New York, Sharkey's operated as a private club calling tickets to the fights "dues"--and thus legitimizing the bouts. In the oil painting of the same name, the ropes enclosed the tumultuous fighters. In the lithograph the ropes almost disappear and the viewer identifies with the anonymous fighters as well as with the crowd. (Mason)