Original Painting Of Stanley Holloway For A 1946 Churchman Cigarette Card + 2 Signed Letters Holloway, Stanley

Wonderful, Original Painting of Stanley Holloway, painted in 1946 for an unproduced Churchman cigarette card. Comes with two original signed letters from Stanley Holloway concerning the cigarette card. As far as I know, the illustration was created by the artist working on a large sepia photo, which then was sprayed with colour and overpainted. This was then pasted to a thin sheet of steel so that it was ready for the printing process, which never actually took place. Measures approximately 5.25 x 10 inches (13.5 x 25.5 cms). Provenance: This has been held in the Mardon, Son & Hall archive in Bristol since it was produced in 1946. Famous for dealing with the art and printing of the tobacco trade, the business flourished after being set up in the Victorian era and was able to employ the best artists available. The detail and quality of their work is incredible. A team of artists would work for several months producing up to fifty hand painted pieces centred around a certain theme. They would then present it to the client, often Wills Tobacco company who would authorise the reproduction, or sometimes not, as was the case with this series.