Cycling/Prehistory/Bicycle/Grand bi/De Civry/Bondy...The... Lot 64

Cycling/Prehistory/Bicycle/Grand bi/De Civry/Bondy...The Poster of the Posters, when it comes to sports, and cycling in particular, it is indeed the image you have in front of you: this lithograph of an infernal freshness. The most mysterious, the most important and the rarest are the qualifiers that must accompany this marvel certified by two franked fiscal stamps! Yes, we are well in 1888, as much to say in the third great wave of the velocipedie, after the draisienne and the velocipede, and before the bicycle, it is the kingdom of the bicycle, as much to say of the grand-bi... Between 1875 and 1890, it is a question of being high perched to have a chance to win, the driving front wheel being synonymous of development. The three champions who race here knew how to tame this capricious machine of a dozen kilos and a height of 1m40-50. Half-acrobats, half-champions, they reign at full speed on a field where falls are commonplace. Frédéric de Civry (1861-1893) looks down on us in the foreground, Jules Dubois and Herbert Obadelston Duncan hold on, unless it is Charles Terront or Paul Médinger, they are all true whirling dervishes, they do not know vertigo or drunkenness and from Dax to Paris, London or Chicago, they amaze a flabbergasted public. Who is the author of this masterpiece? We don't know. Who is the printer? We don't know that either. What is almost certain is that this poster is very rare, and that there are less than five copies in the world. Are they in this condition? Yes, important, rare, mysterious, but authentic and essential, this document is exceptional. It is with this image that our forefathers living in July and August 1888 were invited by the Velo Sport Parisien to the inauguration of the Vélodrome Vincent de Bondy. A considerable event greeted by a dozen newspapers, which developed in two times, in the presence of more than 4000 spectators and the mayor of Bondy, without speaking about the elegant women who came with their most dapper finery to attend the six or seven races of each meeting... Did they take the train to Le Raincy? Perhaps. What wouldn't they have done to admire these phenomena? Their sideburns are as advantageous as their fine moustaches, their ankles are fine, the shoe elegant as the hat, as for the hand, it is firm and it grasps the handlebars from underneath. They are not jockeys, Madam, they are true gentlemen, crackers, capable of "bending" records, with the only strength of their hocks. Yes, knights of muscle. And even if for its inauguration the Vincent velodrome is not quite finished on July 29, because of a strike of the earthworkers, we will come back on August 26... It is to this last meeting that we are invited, because this time the velodrome will be really finished, and there will be no more jostling like the one caused by the fall of Fol and Médinger. Fortunately, a solid banquet and a lively ball enhanced by fireworks had closed this half-premiere. The great poster of a beautiful era. Lithography. TBE. 88,5x63