$15,000
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sold
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Description
29" (74 cm.) Standing upon a red velvet-covered
platform is a handsome man representing a Mexican
troubadour or mariachi performer,having a
golden-brown-complexioned leather-covered
paper-mache head,brown glass eyes,articulated
leather eyelids,painted features,open mouth with
painted double row of teeth,black fleecy
hair,carton torso and legs,and paper-mache hands.
He is wearing his original silk fitted shirt and
pants with rich metallic decoration,silk
shawl,wide tie,and fringed hat. He carries a
uniquely-shaped seven-string African-style
double-necked mandolin.Movements and Music. He
moves his head in a circular side-to-side motion
as well as nodding,blinks his eyes,and strums the
mandolin in a realistic manner. He moves his lips
as though crooning along to the music. There are
two tunes. Roullet & Decamps,circa 1890,the rare
model appeared in their catalog as model #190,and
was surely designed to appeal to the fashionable
international clientele traveling to the 1889
Paris International Exposition. It was offered in
two sizes.