Playboy Magazine

Playboy Art Sale Brings In $2.9 Million

The sale of part of Playboy's substantial art archive took place Wednesday night at Christie's New York on December 8 in an auction titled "The Year of the Rabbit." The 125-piece offering including Dali watercolor of a reclining nude that hung in Hugh Hefner's bedroom as well as 80 photographs, many of which appeared in the magazine and more than a dozen contemporary works and 24 cartoons.

The expected top lot was an oil painting of of a scarlet-lipstick mouth by pop artist Tom Wesselmann. "Mouth No. 8" sold for nearly $1.9 million against estimates of $2 million to $3 million. The Dali watercolor sold for more than $266,000 beating estimates of $100,000 to $150,000. The sale brought in a total of $2,903,437 (including buyer's premium). Herb Ritts photographs of Stephanie Seymour, Cindy Crawford and Elle MacPherson also sold well. A Herb Davidson portrait of Hef himself sold for $6,000 against the estimate of $5,000 - $7,000.

This is the second time Christie's has sold items from Playboy. Playboy celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2003 with an auction of memorabilia and ephemera from Playboy's collection. The art represents just a small amount of the Playboy Art Collection which has an archive of 5,000 contemporary artworks and more than 20 million photographs.

Tags: herb ritts, hugh hefner playboy activist and rebel, playboy, Playboy Magazine, playboy mansion, Salvador Dal, tom wesselmann

Holiday Gift Idea: The Playboy Digital Archive

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Gadgets

The era of holding on to Dad's old stack of Playboy magazines is over. Now instead of storing piles of magazines, you can have the entire archive in a pocket-sized 250GB hard drive from Bondi Digital Publishing (the same company that developed the Complete New Yorker DVD set).

The hard drive includes every issue of Playboy magazine from 1953 to 2010, over 650 issues and more than 100,000 pages covering a span of 56 years. The hard drive is a USB bus-powered portable device that allows users to search, view, explore and organize the entire archive of digital editions, no power cord necessary. The aluminum hard drive measures 3" x 5" and includes 200GBs of extra room on the drive to store other documents. It sells for $299.95.

Tags: gifts for Dad, gifts for guys, gifts for men, holiday gift guide, holiday gifts, playboy archive, Playboy Magazine

Playboy Art To Be Sold At Christie's

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

Playboy is selling off part of its art collection in an auction through Christie's New York on December 8 in an auction titled "The Year of the Rabbit." The 125-piece offering will include a Dali watercolor of a reclining nude that hung in Hugh Hefner's bedroom. The sale features 80 photographs, many of which appeared in the magazine and more than a dozen contemporary works and 24 cartoons.

Among the offerings (shown in the gallery below) are a photograph of comedian Dan Aykroyd in a conehead costume with Pamela Anderson, an early Brigitte Bardot photo, an oil painting of of a scarlet-lipstick mouth by pop artist Tom Wesselmann and a 1970 portrait of Hefner in his signature smoking jacket and pipe. Wesselmann's "Mouth No. 8" is estimated at $2 million to $3 million.

The art represents just a small amount of the Playboy Art Collection which has an archive of 5,000 contemporary artworks and more than 20 million photographs. The auction also features centerfolds of women whose careers were made by Playboy including Anna Nicole Smith, Jenny McCarthy and Pamela Anderson.

Gallery: Playboy Art Up For Auction

1996 cover photograph of Playmate of the Year Stacy Sanchez

1967 oil painting by Tom Wesselmann titled

993 Stephen Wayda photograph of Pamela Anderson and Dan Ackroyd

A a photograph of Brigette Bardot that appeared on the March 1958 cover of Playboy magazine

Tags: christies, hugh hefner, marilyn monroe, pamela anderson, playboy art, playboy art collection, Playboy Magazine

Camacho Cigars to be Featured at Playboy ESPY Party

by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

If you're heading to the ESPY Awards pre-party at the Playboy Mansion tomorrow night, be ready to clip and light a Camacho. The cigar company has been selected as the official cigar of the event. So, while you're hobnobbing with the wealthy and beautiful – athletes and other celebrities will be there – pick up a Camacho Select, Triple Maduro (a great, full-bodied smoke), Diploma or 10th Anniversary.

"Camacho Cigars is proud to be a part of the pre-ESPY festivities," said Dylan Austin, marketing director of Camacho Cigars. "The Playboy Mansion is an iconic location that every man dreams of visiting at least once in his life. This only adds to our excitement in being involved in this illustrious event."

The night will include dancing, entertainment, a few poker games and just about everything else you'd expect from a party at the Playboy Mansion. If there's a better way to smoke a Camacho, my imagination can't come up with it.

Tags: award, award show, award shows, awards, awards show, awards shows, AwardShow, AwardShows, AwardsShow, AwardsShows, camacho, camachoselect, cigar, cigars, espn, espy, espyawards, espys, playboy, playboy magazine, playboy mansion, PlayboyMagazine, PlayboyMansion