 |
The Contemporary Art auction at Sotheby’s will be held in New York on May 9th, 10th and 11th. Exhibitions open May 6th.
The Contemporary Art Evening Auction will be held on May 10th
The Collection of Allan Stone will be auctioned off on May 9th
The undoubted highlight of the Old Master Paintings sale this May is Jan Steen’s School class with a sleeping schoolmaster, one of his finest treatments of a schoolroom interior. It is his only representation of a schoolroom still remaining in private hands which is both signed and dated. It has a remarkable provenance, going as far back as 1764, which includes the distinguished Baring collection in the 19th Century. This exciting picture perfectly demonstrates Steen’s mastery at depicting the humorous side of everyday life, which remains as true to life and as successful in capturing our attention today as it was to his viewers in the 17th Century.
Another highlight in the sale is a grand and joyful Village Kermesse with numerous peasants feasting by Joost Cornelisz. Droochsloot. This picture is one of his largest and most successful pictures.
The sale also features a strong selection of early Netherlandish, Flemish and German paintings, including a delightful Virgin and Child with an apple by the Master of the Female Half-Lengths, and a portrait of the Elector Frederick II ‘the Wise’ of Saxony (1463-1525) by Lucas Cranach the Elder. This portrait is one of a number of portraits Cranach painted of his most important early patron, and was possibly commissioned by John Frederick the Magnanimous (1503-1554) in 1532.
Other highlights include an amusing Interior of a Guardroom by Jacob Duck, and an attractive View of the Weesperplein with the Weesperpoort in Amsterdam, by Isaak Ouwater.
The forthcoming Swiss Art sale in Zurich includes a wide range of classic paintings by Switzerland’s most important artists such as Albert Anker, Alexandre Calame, Robert Zünd, Cuno Amiet, Ernest Biéler, Giovanni and Gottardo Segantini, Louis Soutter, Alberto Giacometti and Otto Morach. Works by Modern and Contemporary artists such as Max Bill, Daniel Spoerri, Andreas Rickenbacher also are featured.
The multifarious and outstanding selection reflects more than 150 years of Swiss Art. The most spectacular works in the sale includes a small group of paintings of women by the distinguished artists from the Swiss avant-garde at the early 20th century such as Ferdinand Hodler, Félix Vallotton and Augusto and Giovanni Giacometti. The top lots are a standing women in a blue dress with a dancing gesture, Fröhliches Weib (Joyful Woman), painted circa 1909 by Ferdinand Hodler, as well as Giovanni Giacometti’s Theodora from 1914, which depicts a beautiful naked woman laying on a canapé.
This sale offers a broad range of Dutch Romantic paintings as well as works by artists from The Hague and Amsterdam School.
One of the highlights is Willem Koekkoek’s Winter in the Streets of a Dutch Town (lot 22). After growing up in Amsterdam, Willem Koekkoek became one of the most distinguished painters of townscapes, travelling throughout the Netherlands. His paintings were greatly admired all over Europe for their nostalgic mood and uniquely refined and detailed style of painting. The present lot is an impressive example, not only because of its size, but also because of its ability to capture Holland’s Age of Romanticism.
A further significant highlight is Sunday Mass by Gari Melchers (lot 61). Attracted by the pictorial side of Holland, this American artist took special interest in depicting devotional peasant women with their colourful patterned dresses. During his life Melchers received multiple awards, establishing him as the leading American proponent of Naturalism. The present lot has been in the collection of Walther Rathenau, the Berlin industrialist and founder of the German Democratic Party, who was murdered in 1922 by officers of the extreme right wing party because of his Jewish background and political ideas.
Also included in this sale are five paintings from an important Canadian collection, each painting being a highlight in the artist’s oeuvre, including works by Cornelis Springer, Petrus van Schendel, Andreas Schelfhout, Salomon Verveer and Nicolaas Johannes Roosenboom (lots 39-43).
From another private collection and in the family of the present owner since 1964, is an impressive ice view by the master of winter scenes, Andreas Schelfhout (lot 38). This painting has all the elements an attractive winter landscape should have: windmills, skaters and a refreshment stall with figures having a drink.
Dutch impressionism is represented by several paintings and watercolours, all fresh to the market, and including artists like Jacob Maris, Johan Hendrik Weissenbruch, Hendrik Willem Mesdag, Isaac Israels and Floris Arntzenius. From a private collection in Canada a large canvas by Jozef Israels is offered (lot 70), depicting an interiorscene with a fishermen’s family, a subject which made Israels internationally respected as the master of Dutch realism.
Sotheby’s American Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture Sale on Thursday May 19 will present exceptional 19th Century, Impressionist, Ashcan, and Modernist works for collectors seeking the best examples by American artists.
We are delighted to offer the Property from a Distinguished East Coast Collection. This collection focuses on American Modernism and features an important figurative painting by Milton Avery, March Playing the Cello from 1943. Avery’s special regard for this loving portrait of his daughter is underscored by his inclusion of it in a later self-portrait. Another highlight from this collection is Thomas Hart Benton’s Flood Disaster (Homecoming – Kaw Valley), which was painted to raise governmental support from the United States Congress after the devastating flood of Kansas City in 1951.
Also on offer will be paintings, works on paper and sculpture from the Collection of Edward P. Evans. This collection is comprised of a range of 19th and 20th century works with a particular emphasis on American Impressionism and the Ashcan school. One of the highlights, Childe Hassam’s Quai St. Michel, painted during the artist’s Parisian sojourn during the late 1880’s, depicts an elegant woman browsing the famed bookinistes and framed by the city’s soft light and stone architecture. Another work, George Bellow’s Dock Builders, painted in 1916, was the first in a series by the artist portraying Maine’s rugged seaman and featuring the dynamic compositional style made famous by the artist in his early boxing scenes.
Other highlights include works by Raphaelle Peale, James McNeil Whistler, Theodore Earl Butler, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, Winslow Homer, Norman Rockwell, William Glackens, Marsden Hartley, and Western works by Albert Bierstadt, Ernest Blumenschein and Walter Ufer.
Sotheby’s sale of rugs and carpets this May is comprised of nearly two hundred pieces collected by the renowned dealers Bergi Andonian and Joseph W. Fell. The lots offered in the sale are predominantly small-scale tribal and village weavings from Anatolia, the Caucasus, Turkestan and Persia and also include works of more unusual origins, such as Peru and Kyrgyzstan. Besides rugs, a selection of textiles and a number of room-sized carpets will also be featured in this two-owner sale.
Highlights of the auction include a West Anatolian ‘Transylvanian’ rug from circa 1700 with a small medallion Oushak-derived field and unusual border (lot 18), a Lesghi long rug of multi-layered design and brilliant colors (lot 58), an eighteenth-century Cretan embroidery densely-decorated with fantastical creatures in rich hues (lot 127) and a rare group II Yomud C-gul main carpet that should be familiar to seasoned collectors of Turkmen rugs as it has been included in a number of prestigious publications and exhibitions (lot 134).
Check out the results for a marathon Asian Auction at Leslie Hindman Auctioneers.
Free sports memorabilia appraisal day planned for June 4 in Baltimore
WESTHAMPTON, N.Y. – Officials at Grey Flannel Auctions announced today that they have entered into a three-year marketing and promotional deal with the Babe Ruth Birthplace Foundation Inc. The foundation is an independent, not-for-profit educational institution dedicated to perpetuating the historic legacy of Babe Ruth, Baltimore’s Orioles and Colts; and local and regional sports. It also operates the Sports Legends Museum at Camden Yards.
As part of the new arrangement, Grey Flannel will conduct two annual events at the Sports Legends Museum, which is located adjacent to Baltimore’s Oriole Park and operated by the same management as the Babe Ruth Birthplace & Museum. The first of this year’s jointly sponsored events will be a free sports memorabilia appraisal fair held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, June 4, 2011, in the Sports Legends Museum’s theater.
Grey Flannel’s team of experts will be on hand to accept consignments to future auctions and to provide free appraisals on game-worn apparel, equipment, vintage collector cards, autographed items and any other professional sports memorabilia. Those who attend the appraisal fair will also be admitted free of charge to the Sports Legends Museum.
“It’s a great honor for us to be associated with the Babe Ruth Birthplace Foundation. Their exhibits and programs at the Babe Ruth Birthplace Museum and Sports Legends Museum at Camden Yards instill a very positive and lasting impression on youngsters, while at the same time honoring Baltimore’s titans of professional sports,” said Grey Flannel Auctions’ president, Richard E. Russek.
The appraisal fair will take place on the same day as an Orioles home game at Camden Yards (start time: 7:05 p.m.). “It’s a perfect way to spend the day – visiting the incredible Sports Legends Museum at no cost, meeting the Grey Flannel team at the free appraisal fair, then topping it off with an evening in Baltimore’s beautiful Oriole Park, watching the O’s play the Blue Jays,” Russek said.
Michael L. Gibbons, executive director of the Babe Ruth Birthplace & Museum and Sports Legends Museum at Camden Yards, commented: “I have long been a fan of Grey Flannel Auctions’ operation, and to be able to host this event with them for the next three years is very exciting for all of us at the Sports Legends Museum. We think it fits nicely within our mission and look forward to it with great anticipation. It’s a win-win for both sides.”
Additional information about the appraisal fair will be available soon at www.greyflannelauctions.com and www.baberuthmuseum.com.
The Robert Rubin Collection of African Art is one of the most important collections of African art to appear on the international market in recent years. Mr. Rubin (1934-2009) was a lifetime trustee of the Museum for African Art in New York and a major figure in the field. The relatively small collection of 50 works reflects his extraordinary taste and discernment and his quest for the finest examples from each region and style.
Among the many highlights is a Baule Male Ancestor Figure from Ivory Coast, which is known as the best of its type. It was created by a master carver whose attention to detail is unsurpassed in African art. The unusually large (24in) sculpture is of exceptionally high quality. It boasts impressive provenance and has also been widely published, including in the prestigious L’Art Negre by Pierre Meauze in 1967. Another major highlight from the sale is a Dogon Nduleri Male Ancestor Figure which is the Name-Piece of the Master of the Slanted Eyes and the companion to a female figure in the collection of the Musee du Louvre in Paris.
Brose catalogue for the Robert Rubin Collection of African Art
The May auction of African, Oceanic, and Pre-Columbian Art at Sotheby’s offers a rich selection of exceptional art from the traditional cultures of sub-Saharan Africa, the Pacific Islands and Indonesia, as well as Central and South America.
The sale features a strong selection of African art, including an important Punu Mask from Gabon which was published in Carl Einstein’s influential 1915 book Negerplastik. A magnificent Yoruba Female Figure of a woman offering a ram leads a group of West African art from the collection of Nancy and Richard Bloch. A rare and important Luba-Songye Kifwebe Mask is of the type that probably inspired one of Pablo Picasso’s most dynamic periods, 1907-1908, when he painted Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.
Browse catalogue for the African, Oceanic and Pre-Columbian Art auction
