Over-commissioned

During the 1920ies, Gustaf was overwhelmed with jobs for the commercial market. There where a number of companies producing silverware, glassware, watches and silk stockings, all wanting to hire "Gustaf Tenggren, the young talented artist, rapidly coming into fame", as The New York Daily Mirror put it in an article from the mid twenties.
But at the same time he kept his illustration commissions. As his time was heavily scheduled he often worked double, as can be seen from these examples.

Cover for Bland Tomtar och Troll, Åhlén och Åkerlund 1926

1926 was the last year he illustrated the Swedish fairy tale annual Bland Tomtar och Troll (Among Gnomes and Trolls). The cover of his tenth book in the series shows a small boy on a winged horse, which has got nothing to do with any tale in the book. The illustrations were delivered to Åhlén och Åkerlund in May 1926.

Cover for Ruth Campbell, Small Fry and the Winged Horse, Volland 1927

In July the same year he delivered illustrations for Small Fry and The Winged Horse to be published Volland in 1927. The thought that the Bland Tomtar och Troll cover was first meant for Small Fry but refused by the publisher is not far away. 

Mercury running on the waves, illustration from Small Fry and the Winged Horse

Additionally you can see sea swallows on the BToT cover that appear in an illustration in Small Fry. It's easy to imagine the piles of drawings and paintings all mixed up on the drawing table in Tenggren's Manhattan Studio. And in the parlor at the same time, a young woman is waiting to sit for her portrait. Poor man.