October Legends Closing November 1
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 11/2/2014
After an extensive period of time working for Hugh Hefner at the Playboy mansion in Chicago, LeRoy Neiman embarked his colorful style with sports paintings. One of his favorite sports was boxing, and his first ever oil on canvas was this 1960 masterpiece, “The Middle Weight”. His fluid color schemes have a more muted pastel finish which portrays a fighter standing in front of his Everlast heavy bag, towel draped over his shoulders, likely finished with his workout training routine. Another boxer works the skipping rope, while a cigar chomping, tweed hat gentlemen either wants to sign the boxer to a contract for an upcoming fight, or maybe attempt to convince him to take a dive – commonplace during this time period. The 32.5 x 22.5 oil on canvas is in tremendous condition, beautifully matching color framed to a dimension of 37.5 x 27 inches. Beautiful one of a kind original oil painting by LeRoy Neiman, and one of his first sports paintings!