Peter Smith - Barnum's Bar Bending Ringling Clipperwhip
An act from Philip Barnum’s ‘Greatest Show on Earth‘ the Clipperwhip was a curious animal that balanced strength and dexterity into one complete unit. The Clipperwhip moved at lightning speed and skilfully weaved its way past obstacles
completely unhindered by its duality so Bluster had difficulty in catching it to spend any time sketching this lost
Impossimal.
With a chance viewing of the Clipperwhip but no drawing facilities to hand Bluster improvised and used a small metal
cleaning brush from his shaving kit to bend into a distinctive curly shape, a representation of the character. When he
returned to camp he made a sketch from memory using the curly metal shape as reference. Once he had finished
sketching he inadvertently pushed the papers in between the metal curl and found to his amazement the papers held
together with this paper ‘clip’. Upon meeting the Clipperwhip many years later Bluster found him to have an excellent memory and remembered him, but perhaps more interestingly he also bent him a new bit of metal into the shape of the now common paperclip.
Canvas On Board
18.75" x 30"
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