Lot description
A one-of-a-kind plaster Eloise Easter Egg, hand-painted by Hilary Knight, who illustrated the entire classic Kay Thompson book series about a mischievous little girl living in the Plaza Hotel. Etched into the red spiral around the upper portion of the egg are the words: "HAPPY EASTER EGG FROM ELOISE.” In tiny letters at the south pole, forming a circle, it reads: "KAY THOMPSON HILARY KNIGHT." The drawing of Eloise is in black paint with yellow hair and a red bow. Weenie is also drawn in black, with a red highlight for the paint inside the paint can he is holding. The spiral at the top is in red, and the bristles of the paint-brush are red. Hand-made, hand-painted, hand-etched, and then glazed. It has some minor scratches, nicks; handling and age wear. In 1999, Sam Irvin (author of Kay Thompson: From Eloise to Funny Face [New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011]) interviewed Hilary Knight about this Eloise Easter Egg, which Knight verified was authentic. He remembered making it for a charity auction but couldn’t remember the details. He said: “I’ve made two or three Eloise Easter Eggs over the years. All of them unique. The first one I made was for the White House Easter Egg Roll [around 1986 or 1987]. A friend of mine had spent some time at the Phoenix House, a drug rehabilitation facility that he had described as a dump. First Lady Nancy Reagan was promoting her ‘Just Say No’ to drugs campaign, so I wrote a letter urging her to do something to improve the conditions of Phoenix House. Her secretary called and said that the facility was not as bad as my friend had reported. Anyway, this was how my name came up in the First Lady’s office and it eventually evolved into my being asked to create an Eloise Egg for the Annual White House Easter Egg Roll. They wrote me a letter explaining that it was an annual tradition and that the Reagans were asking all these famous artists to contribute one-of-a-kind Easter Eggs. Not being a fan of the Reagans, I called Mrs. Reagan’s secretary and I asked, ‘What will happen to my Eloise Easter Egg after the event?’ I thought maybe it was going to be auctioned for charity or [would] go into a permanent White House collection, which would have been nice. But the response was, ‘Oh, the Reagans will take it.’ I wasn’t thrilled about that but I decided to do it anyway.” This Eloise Easter Egg is similar to the one Hilary Knight made for the White House Easter Egg Roll. The same size, same color scheme, same techniques. It was likely made in the late-1980s, not long after the one he made for the White House. In 1999, Sam Irvin bought this egg for from a dealer named Pete Baughman at Frogtown Books in Toledo, Ohio. Baughman said that he acquired the egg at an antique show from a woman named Lucy who deals in paper collectibles under the company name Ages of Pages.