Dave Dube Artist or JARtist? Draws Antique Bottles, Fruit Jars, Advertising on Ephemera

You fruit jar collectors likely know Larry Munson (aka Larryjar) ,
of Montana. He's such a nice guy -- HI Larry, if you're reading this!

Through Larry I recently "met" (online, but that counts!) another nice guy, Dave Dube.

Dave is a celebrated artist, known for his works of hand drawn/hand painted (HD/HP) FIRST DAY COVERS.

He produces high quality miniature artwork on specially cancelled envelopes. Here's an article about Dave and his cover art, which says that collecting hand drawn/hand painted (HD/HP) covers appears to be one of the nation's fastest growing hobbies. Also called CACHETS, he even has his Lewis and Clark cachets in the Montana Historical Society's catalog.

OK, but this is a bottle club blog, so...??? Well, it turns out that Dave likes old bottles, too -- just not to collect, but to draw. He says:

"... I have a fascination with GLASS, and over the years have portrayed glass in graphite, pen & ink, acrylic, oil, watercolor and colored pencil. Looking at a piece of glass that has some color already in it is like holding a slide up to the light - your eye perceives true color without the distraction of other colors. ..."

I want to share with you some of his newest works of art, that are "OFF-the-envelope", as he calls it.

After digging through a box lot of "old paper" a dealer sent him, he found one that struck his fancy. It's just what most collectors would think was a pretty plain letter, ordering some RATIN poison. But Dave was inspired by it to find the aforementioned product -- a bottle -- and illustrate it onto the letter -- creating a unique piece of art/ephemera.

Here are some more bottle and jar illustrated ephemera pieces he's done. I am just showing you small thumbnails -- you will see a bigger view if you go to Dave's blog, "Old Paper Art". 

I've added a little of Dave's comments, but on his blog you can read his story about each piece. 

(Click on HIS blog's pix to see the enlarged views -- so much better than these thumbnails.)

"... This is one of the first pieces of old paper that I 'altered'. I contacted a fellow in California who had a filled bottle, and I traded him an image of the filled bottle for an image of the letterhead I was going to put it on. The back of this bottle is yet to come, as I have a second sheet of this letterhead.

The back of the bottle in red lettering says "Famous Brands of Kittitas County and Sody-Licious"! The bottling company was located in Ellensburg, Washington, and I found the bottle absolutely fascinating. ...."

"... I looked at the long list of items purchased, saw the words "Drey Mason Jars", and decided to do a bit of research before putting any images on this paper. I'm glad that I did. 

A fellow by the name of Leo Drey (he pronounced it DRY) was the president of the Schram Manufacturing Company between the years 1908 and 1920, the year that he died. Schram Manufacturing was bought out by the Ball Brothers in 1925. 

There is a great deal of confusing information about the relationship between these two companies, but when I finally found a picture of a square Drey Mason jar, I knew what I was going to put on this old paper! ..."

"... Kerr glass canning jars are primarily clear, unlike other glass canning jars, such as Ball, that come in a variety of colors. With the help of a long time collector of canning jars, Larry Munson, I was able to portray the only colored glass jar that Kerr produced, and I believe they produced it by accident. My gain! ..."

Lastly, here's his Coca Cola piece. Another plain order form, from the START UP Candy Co., with an order on it for Coca Cola inspired this great piece -- that candy co. is still in business!

Says Dave "... When I first was given this piece of paper, I thought it would be an easy task to find the right 'ingredients' for a visual fish to hang on the "Startup" hook. It took almost a month to finally find someone who could give me an image of the 'right' Coca-Cola bottle and the 'right' label to go with it. A gentleman from Atlanta, GA, by the name of Mr. Bill Baab was kind enough to send me not only a bottle that is proper for 1908, but also a copy of an original paper label, also proper for the period. And he sent them both to me on HIS DIME. I was blown away by the willingness of a total stranger to send me all the right pieces to put the puzzle together. Thus, Mr. Baab, this Coke is for you! ..."

Be sure to check out Dave's blog, and see more of his artwork. He has some non-bottle ephemera/art pieces that will make advertising collectors drool. I know we all look forward to seeing more of Dave Dube's beautiful artistic interpretations of advertising, and especially antique bottles.

Dave's always looking for more vintage paper/ephemera to use for his art projects, so dig through your stuff, and if you find something for him, email him at ddcachets@gmail.com

P.S. -- Check out Dave's new post with a thank you to the club, and a pic of his neat Ball Jar art cover. 

Thanks, Dave!

The FinBotClub Blog is published by the Findlay Antique Bottle Club of Ohio