This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 10/28/2023
RYSS (Georges Gay, 1880–1928). L’EXTRAORDINAIRE RYSS. PRESENTE LE BARMAN DE SATAN. Paris: Nicolitch, 1920s. Lithograph in bright colors bears a full-length portrait of the French magician presenting Think-A-Drink or the Any Drink Called For routine in which any one of a number of beverages – alcoholic or otherwise – were produced on command from a glass pitcher and distributed to the audience for quaffing. Satan stands behind the performer with a giant red cape stretched between his hands. 54 × 38". Old folds retouched, A-. Linen backed. Robelly reported that Ryss was the originator of the “magic barman act,” though an exact date for his debut of the effect is unknown. Reporting on Ryss’s act in 1928 in The Sphinx, Dr. A.M. Wilson stated, “His closing trick is a corker. He fills two glasses with water and has two gentlemen in the audience stand up and hold the glasses high over their heads. Going back to the stage Ryss … claps his hands and the water instantly and visibly changes to ink. He then goes back into the audience and gives the glasses to two ladies to hold and repeats the experiment by changing the ink back to water again. The fact that Ryss is far away from the glasses when the change takes place makes the effect most startling.”