Art: *Hard Lines

A roomful of crackling wartime caricatures — tures-Axis in Agony — went on the auc tion block in Manhattan this week to boost bond sales. The drawings were the work of topnotch Commercial Artist Boris Artzybasheff, who did them originally as Wickwire Spencer Steel Co. advertise ments. Most of Caricaturist Artzybasheff’s 32 imaginative, humorous, smoothly competent wash drawings show the Axis coming out second best against U.S. industrial might. In Artzybasheff’s fancy: ¶A crisscross pattern of steel wire becomes a cage for three hoary, gaping primates with the faces of Mussolini, Hitler and Tojo.

¶A cartoon called Island Hopping shows a steel-spring mannikin stepping triumphantly toward the Jap home fortress over Pacific islands which are not all terra firma (see cut).

¶The three Axis leaders scurry in terror before a thick hail of junked scrap-metal —wrenches, chainlinks, pots & pans, hammerheads, nuts & bolts, ashcans, an ancient boiler, a potbellied stove, a chamber pot.

¶A monster intricately built of cable, hooks and steel joints prepares to jerk a noose around a Jap’s neck—as the Rising Sun sets in the background.

Artzybasheff, 46, is the Russian-born son of Novelist Michael Artzybasheff (Sanine). An old hand at commercial art, he has successfully illustrated 50-odd books—although he does not particularly like to be called an illustrator. He speaks simon-pure American in a soft voice, looks and dresses like a banker. One of his best-known graphic products: covers for TIME.