Born in Italian
Harlem in 1916, Ravielli started out as a portrait painter and worked in
advertising before becoming an author and freelance illustrator,
mastering a style known as scratchboard (or “scraperboard” to the
British). In 1957 Ben Hogan, known to be secretive about his
picture-perfect form, approached Ravielli to illustrate his legendary
swing for what would become one of the most important golf instruction
books ever: Ben Hogan’s Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf. After 60 years, it remains a best seller with one million copies sold.
Before long,
another golf legend sought to collaborate with Ravielli, none other than
the greatest amateur champion and most influential contributor in the
sport’s history: the great Bobby Jones, who created the world’s most
famous golf course and tournament. The Masters at Augusta National
remains synonymous with his name 84 years later. While Hogan’s career
legacy seemed to come to fruition with his "Five Lessons”—thanks in
large part to Ravielli—Jones spent decades designing courses and clubs,
producing instructional films in Hollywood, making innovative changes to
the Masters to improve tournament play, and practicing law.
In the
mid-1960’s, perhaps intrigued by the success of Hogan’s book, Jones
began working with Ravielli to publish his own teachings, inviting the
respected illustrator/author to Augusta to watch him practice. Ravielli
would observe and sketch Jones—another artist at work—and later they
would discuss what each image was trying to communicate. This process
would go on for several weeks as the two spent countless hours
one-on-one together on the course, at the range and in Jones’ private
home, all to capture the essence of Bobby’s innate vision and personal
wisdom that he so wanted to instill in aspiring golfers. Bobby Jones and
Anthony Ravielli developed a close relationship as golfer and artist,
so much so that Jones would not work with any other illustrator to
document the fundamental principles of his swing.
Presented in
this lot are Anthony Ravielli’s incredibly rare 1-of-1 original
illustrations commissioned in 1965 by Bobby Jones for his 1966 book Bobby Jones on Golf: The Classic Instructional by Golf’s Greatest Legend. This was the first of two instructional books by Jones and Ravielli, the other being The Basic Golf Swing in 1969. In many eyes, Bobby Jones on Golf became just as significant as Hogan’s Five Lessons in developing the game.
Included are two
sets of black and white pencil sketches done side-by-side on a 12” by
18.75” folded piece of vellum. The left side shows a close-up of Jones’
hands at impact with one smaller background image of his backswing just
prior to impact. The right side shows Jones’ full-body pose at impact
with bolder pencil strokes highlighting his forward leaning front left
leg, and a four-step collage of the backswing coming to impact. In
addition, there are two attached pages—stapled to their corresponding
illustrations—of Jones’ original typewritten text to his publisher along
with Jones’ handwritten corrections for the publisher that were
returned for publication. These notes share Jones’ original thoughts
along with his edited comments.
This
one-of-a-kind offering opens a window into the private world of golf’s
greatest contributor and the game’s most respected illustrator. These
sketches have never before been offered publicly. Our consignor, a
published golf author himself, obtained them from the the private
collection of the late Anthony Ravielli’s estate. They were cherished
pieces for the Ravielli family from the days when their father would
come home from Augusta and tell them the beautiful stories of his time
with Bobby Jones, who died in 1971. The preferred illustrator for Tom
Watson and Jack Nicklaus as well, Ravielli was the single most important
artist to ever document the swings of golfers from the 1950's until his
passing in 1997 at the age of 81.