Name: CHESLEY BONESTELL (1888-1986)
Brand: ATOMIC BOMBING OF NEW YORK
Price: 1400.00 USD
Availability: InStock

CHESLEY BONESTELL (1888-1986)
ATOMIC BOMBING OF NEW YORK
signed Chesley Bonestell (lower left)
mixed media on photograph
15¹⁄₂ x 18¹⁄₄ in. (38.1 x 46.3 cm.)
Executed circa 1948.

Anonymous sale; Heritage Auctions, Dallas, 13 October 2017, lot 71032.
Acquired at the above sale by the late owner.

R.S. Richardson, "Rocket Blitz from the Moon," Collier's, 23 October 1948, illustrated (Schuetz 23).
Ron Miller and Frederick Durant, The Art of Chesley Bonestell (London, 2001), pp. 72-73, illustrated.

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Lot Essay

"The beginning of the end for New York" (Collier's 23 October 1948)

Just about a year after Bonestell was commissioned by Coronet to depict astronomical, global apocalypse, he was commissioned by Collier's to depict man-made, nuclear apocalypse in America. The article was titled, "Rocket Blitz from the Moon" and illustrated by two Bonestell paintings. The first one depicted a nuclear rocket base on the Moon. At the time of publication in 1948, the launch of Sputnik was still nine years away, but the fear was already palpable. The first generation of ICBM's did not start development until the summer of 1954. In August of 1950, five years to the month after the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Collier's would publish as their lead article, "Hiroshima, U.S.A.: Can Anything Be Done About It?" also illustrated by Chesley Bonestell.

This image was captioned: "The beginning of the end for New York. One rocket has exploded between the Empire State Building and the Battery, another in Queens."