Davis Cup Champions: Harry Hopman, Neale Fraser, Tony Roche, and John Newcombe

Prague: Marcel Niederle, 1957-1969.
. Signed by Illustrator

21cm x 16cm to 19cm x 14.5cm. 6 original drawings, ink, ink wash, and pencil.

Six original caricatures by the Czech artist and caricaturist Marcel Niederle (1898-1990) of Harry Hopman and three of the players who won the Davis Cup under his captaincy. Hopman, in ink, dated 1969, the year he moved to the United States, had captained Australia to 16 Davis Cup wins between 1939 and 1967. Neale Fraser, Wimbledon champion in 1960, in two drawings: one in ink, captioned “Wimbledon 1957”, the other in pencil, undated and captioned “No. 1”, probably from 1959 or 1960, when he was ranked the world’s leading amateur. Tony Roche, French champion in 1966, in two undated drawings, one in pencil, the other in ink with ink wash and pencil. John Newcombe, seven-time major singles champion and Roche’s partner in 12 major doubles titles, in ink, undated. Niederle specialised in sporting subjects, particularly tennis and ice hockey. After working in New York as an illustrator for Sports Illustrated he returned to Czechoslovakia, where he drew the leading tennis players of the 1950s to the 1970s, a period dominated by Australian champions. No holdings of Niederle’s work can be traced in any Australian public collection.

Very minor wear to edges. Near Fine Condition.

AU$750