Dale and Betty Maxey The story continues…. Post 1
Hello everyone, I hope you are all doing well.
One of the fab things about having a blog that’s now in it’s tenth year, is that people eventually get to see your postings, especially if they are concerning illustrators from the 1960’s who don’t often appear online. Such is the case with the aristic duo Dale and Betty Maxey who I have previously written about here, here and more recently here.
Firstly, I got an email from James Tate, who kindly contacted me to say that he had a publicity shot of Betty with his father and would I like a copy
… well of course I would and so here it is.
From left.. the first person is unidentified, then Chuck Kessler, Betty Maxey, James’s father Don Tate & Tom Hoyne. If anyone knows who the first person on the left might be then James would like to find out. Thanks again for sharing this lovely shot.
Secondly, just a couple of weeks ago, Jose messaged me. He has just recently inherited Dale and Betty’s old house and on visiting, he discovered that they had left a whole collection of original artwork that he wanted to share with me and ultimately find a buyer for. I was very excited when a rather huge zip file appeared, full of wonderful midcentury goodies from both Dale and Betty’s portfolios.
There’s so much that it not only took me a long time to assemble into a format to be able to show you, but I’ve also decided to split it up into a few posts so that you don’t get overwelmed all at once. If anyone has an idea what these paintings maybe worth or is interested in buying them, I can gladly put you in touch with Jose.
Let’s start with some of Betty’s paintings. There’s no information or dates with most of the images, so we can only assume they are studies for her work or personal paintings of friends etc that have never before been seen. How exciting …..
I particulalry like these first three. Partly because people rarely seem to draw their sitters smiling (as it’s hard to hold a smile for that long whilst posing for a portrait), and the beautiful ‘woman with cat’ painting, where the diagonal stripe across the paper shows all the detail and captures so much.
Betty was best known for her illustrations for children’s books like some of the Famous Five stories. She also painted portraits and did advertising work, creating images to accompany stories for magazine articles.
Perhaps some still life paintings, just for her own enjoyment. Obviously practising her figure drawing was essential and she made numerous studies to perfect her skills.
Everyday scenes were important too. Perhaps some of these helped her illustrate how versatile an artist she was to any potential employers.
Nature studies.
Location studies, perhaps drawn whilst on holiday and then made into limited edition prints.
Her models came in all sizes and age groups.
I wonder how many of these sitters were friends and people she knew.
She certainly captured the essence of a person in her sketches.
These were finished drawings for books, you can see Betty referencing on which page they should appear in the book.
Other projects.
Historical references and skies.
I’m pretty sure she must have had a cat.
All in a days work. Friends chatting on a sofa, a beautiful study of an outdoor scene and the profile of a busy gent at his desk. Mad Men era.
I hope you enjoyed looking through Betty’s delightful work as much as I did. More about her husband Dale Maxey in a few weeks too. If you know anyone who could tell me what these paintings might be worth, then I’d also be interested to know. craig@fishink.co.uk thank you.
fishinkblog.com 
Very nice!
Thank you for sharing.
Cheers Ivan
Gorgeous! Love the cat yawning especially.
Lol thanks Ele
Such wonderful variety of work. Ms. Maxey had so much skill and talent. Sort of makes me want to throw down my pencil in despair! (just kidding — I’ll get back to work now)
She is pretty talented, I hope she plenty of people around her in the sixties to tell her the same thing. Thanks for your comments.
Glad to see a new post from you. Lovely stuff – I always look forward to your posts as they invariably contain beautiful art and design. Thanks!…
Thank you Tony. Some great work in the link you sent too.
These remind me of my childhood — thanks for sharing and for making me smile.
My pleasure, thanks for letting me know you liked them so much.
This is wonderful news! Thank you. As a lifelong Betty Maxey fan as you know, I would love to see the zip file if possible and I am keenly interested in the possibility of purchasing work from Betty Maxey – regards Pete
Hi, do we know if they found a buyer for these works?
I believe they did Tim.
The Maxey’s were out to dinner when I was born in Chicago. One of her portraits, I just saw today, is of me when I visited them in London and Formentera in 1970. I was 17 and Betty took me to buy that dress in London. I would love to own it. Is there a way to find out? They had many cats over the years especially Siameses.
Hi Lynn. thank you for your messages. I’m sorry but those paintings were all sold a long time ago now and the details of the seller are no longer working so I’m afraid the link to them has gone. All I can offer is a digital copy of the orginal, if you can let me know an email for you and which image you are wanting, I will happily send you a copy. All the best Craig