Stories for July '18
(Fragment)Stained Glass Not Seen in More Than 40 Years Goes on View
The Worcester Art Museum (WAM) in Worcester, Massachusetts, will present an exhibition of stained-glass works created by Louis C. Tiffany and John La Farge that have not been on view for more than 40 years. Originally commissioned for a Boston church in the late 1890s, the large stained-glass works were ... (Read More)
|
(Issue Story)EDITORIAL: New Jersey, No privacy for Successful Bidder
“Who bought it?”
It’s a question reporters often ask of auctioneers when discussing lots sold at auction. Most times they are politely rebuffed—auctioneers like to protect the privacy of winning bidders.
No such privacy exists if the auction lots were consigned by the state of New Jersey, according to a recent ruling ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Carlquist Named as Executive Director of Boscobel
The board of directors of Boscobel in Garrison, New York, has appointed Jennifer Carlquist as executive director, effective immediately.
Since joining Boscobel as curator in 2015, Carlquist has spearheaded several exhibitions, including Hudson Hewn: New York Furniture Now and Make-Do’s: Curiously Repaired Antiques. Before joining Boscobel’s staff, she served in curatorial ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Rockwell’s “Four Freedoms” on the Road
Heritage Auctions, Dallas, Texas, has committed to a two-year sponsorship of the Norman Rockwell Museum’s traveling exhibition Enduring Ideals: Rockwell, Roosevelt & the Four Freedoms. It is the first comprehensive exhibition of the artist’s iconic 1943 depictions of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s wartime defense of humanity’s fundamental human rights.
Rockwell’s Freedom ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Jewelry Distraction Thieves Hit Antiques Malls and Shops in Six States
According to the Jewelers’ Security Alliance (JSA), two white males are suspected to have carried out at least 12 distraction thefts of jewelry in antiques stores and antiques malls in six states. The suspects use keys or pick or break locks to get into jewelry showcases. Thefts have been reported ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)New York Ceramics and Glass Fair Is Canceled
Liz Lees and Meg Wendy, the organizers of the New York Ceramics & Glass Fair, have canceled the fair, which would have celebrated its 20th anniversary in January 2019 at the Bohemian National Hall on East 73rd Street in New York City.
Liz Lees, who, with her husband, Bill Caskey (d. ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Johanna McBrien Assumes Reins of Dedham Historical Society
Johanna McBrien, founding editor-in-chief and associate publisher of Antiques & Fine Art magazine, has accepted the position of executive director of the Dedham Historical Society. She assumed her new position on June 8.
The previous executive director, Vicky Kruckeberg, who served for eight years, retired in May.
“I’ll still work one day ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Barn Star Announces New Morristown Show
Barn Star Productions and Frank Gaglio announce a new antiques, vintage, and fine art event, the Armory Antiques at Morristown Show, to be held November 17 and 18 at the National Guard Armory, Morristown, New Jersey.
According to Gaglio, “This show will be a fresh, new approach to Morristown and the ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Massachusetts Dealer Arrested in Connection with Missing Warhol Paintings
Brian R. Walshe of Lynn, Massachusetts, was arrested on May 9 and charged in connection with taking and attempting to sell two Andy Warhol paintings on eBay. Walshe was charged with one count of wire fraud.
Brian R. Walshe.
According to court documents, in early November 2016, a gallery owner from Los ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Bill Introduced in Congress Would Require Dealers to Report High-Value Sales
A bill introduced in Congress in May by Representative Luke Messer of Indiana would add art and antiquities to the list of business types subject to anti-money-laundering rules.
If the bill is passed, the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network would require art and antiquities dealers to file certain reports and ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Dennis Raleigh Relocates
After 18 years of selling and living in Wiscasset, Maine, Dennis Raleigh has relocated to Searsport, Maine. Dennis Raleigh American Antiques & Folk Art’s brand new gallery at 15 W. Main Street (Route 1) is finally finished, and a grand opening is planned for Saturday, June 30, with refreshments starting ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)RISD Museum Receives $30,000 Grant for Gorham Silver Exhibit
The National Endowment for the Arts has approved an Art Works grant of $30,000 to the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art to support the exhibition Gorham Silver: Designing Brilliance 1850-1970, which will open in May 2019.
Epergne, 1872, and plateau, 1876, designed by Thomas Pairpoint (1838-1902) and manufactured by the ... (Read More)
|
(Young Collectors)New World, New Problems
The Young Collector
Meeting new people is hard. It can be hard to figure out what to say, how to get a conversation started, or how to keep a conversation going. There are always those icebreaker routines where you are supposed to describe what you did on vacation or what the ... (Read More)
|
(Issue Story)Kris and Paul Casucci, Walker Homestead, Brookfield, Massachusetts
In the Trade
Kris and Paul Casucci entered the antiques business at the beginning of the Great Recession after losing their jobs, so they harbor no nostalgic memories of how much fun the business was for many of us during the second half of the 20th century. “It was the worst ... (Read More)
|
(Issue Story)Letter from London, July 2018
Three-Star Bid Secures Very First Michelin Guide
Now recognised around much of the world as an indispensible guide to fine dining and wining, the Guide Michelin was first published in 1900 and was at the time aimed at a very different market. In an extraordinarily ambitious promotion by the famous French ... (Read More)
|
(Book Review)Classical Principles for Modern Design
A Book Review
New York decorator and cheerleader for the Classical style Thomas Jayne calls Edith Wharton and Ogden Codman Jr.’s The Decoration of Houses the most important decorating book ever written. He organized his new book according to the chapters in The Decoration of Houses, beginning with “The Historical Tradition,” ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)AAMD Sanctions Two Museums
Two museums—the Berkshire Museum, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and the La Salle University Art Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania—are facing sanctions imposed by the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD), following sales at Christie’s and Sotheby’s.
The sanctions, announced on May 25, follow “the decision made by each institution to use the proceeds from recent ... (Read More)
|
(Computer Article)Labels, Computer Column #354
Computer Column #354
Labels
John P. Reid, [email protected]
It has been seven years (column #267 for April 2011) since we covered software for printing labels. Antiquers might print labels for items in a collection or a dealer’s inventory. Mailing labels are needed for a collectors club newsletter, a dealer’s sale announcement, or a ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Dinner Wear
Mary-Ann Wood creates jewelry from broken antique cups, plates, and saucers, crafting “designs cut from these fractured unfortunates” and turning them into unique costume jewelry pieces, mostly necklaces, earrings, lariats, and brooches.
Wood has been making jewelry out of dinnerware for almost 20 years at her business, DinnerWear Jewelry, located in ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)New Officers at Thomaston Place Auction Galleries
Paula Houst is the new chief financial officer and David Robichaud the new chief operations officer at Thomaston Place Auction Galleries in Thomaston, Maine.
Paula Houst.
David Robichaud.
Houst’s past experience includes positions in healthcare administration and tourism. A native of Cape Cod, Houst served as senior vice president and general manager for ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Inherited Calder Sculpture Leads to Court Fight
A gallery in New York City is facing a lawsuit over a purchase and sale that highlights the need for clear and careful estate planning.
A standing stabile by Alexander Calder was willed to Phyliss Meaders and Paul Meaders III, brother and sister, in 2001. Each owned half interest in the ... (Read More)
|
(Issue Story)Exhibitions, June 2018
Plate from Ackermann’s Repository, London, 1824. Courtesy Jane Nylander.
—Through July 8 —Concord, Massachusetts
As part of the statewide Mass Fashion collaborative project, Fresh Goods: Shopping for Clothing in a New England Town, 1750-1900, an exhibition at the Concord Museum, examines questions about the sources and context of small-town Massachusetts fashion. The ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)New CEO for Leslie Hindman Auctioneers
Leslie Hindman Auctioneers announced on June 5 that the firm has appointed Thomas Galbraith as chief executive officer, effective June 4. He succeeds Leslie Hindman, who founded the firm in 1982 and reopened it in 2003 after Sotheby’s, which had bought it in 1997, stopped conducting sales in Chicago in ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Three R.S. Prussia Bowls Reach a Combined $33,000
Three marked R.S. Prussia bowls—each one boasting a portrait and scenic décor of one of the four seasons—sold as individual lots for a combined $33,000 during part one of the sale of the collection of the late John and Lavaun Headlee, held on May 26 by Woody Auction in the ... (Read More)
|
(Fragment)Record Price Paid for E. Howard No. 57
An E. Howard No. 57 regulator clock set a new auction record for that model at $145,200 (includes buyer’s premium) at the May 19 sale at Fontaine’s Auction Gallery, Pittsfield, Massachusetts.
The 73" tall clock had its original 14" diameter silvered dial with black incised Roman numerals and blued and pierced ... (Read More)
|
(Issue Story)Antique Jewelry and Colored Stones Highlight Skinner’s Sale and Fortuna’s White-Glove Sale of Bo
Antique Jewelry & Gemology
The first Skinner important jewelry auction of the year was May 15, highlighted by colored stones, diamonds, and antique and period jewelry. The top lot was a carved Colombian emerald from the estate of Emily Crane Chadbourne that “attracted international interest,” according to Skinner, and it sold ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Americana from the Rockefeller Collection
Christie’s, New York City
Photos courtesy Christie’s
“It was the first time I wrote a check dated the day after the date on the catalog and picked up my purchases at 2:30 in the morning,” said South Carolina decoy dealer Dick McIntyre, recounting his experience at the sale of Americana from the ... (Read More)
|
(Show)Hot Weather and Hot Show
Garden Art & Antiques Fair, Bronx, New York
Although a hot spell engulfed New York City the opening night and first day of the New York Botanical Garden’s annual Garden Art & Antiques Fair, the 90-plus-degree weather did not dampen the spirits of the 29 dealers and 500 patrons who sweltered ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)“Smitty” Axtell’s Country Americana
Buzz Hesse/Schillaci and Shultis Auctioneers, Otego, New York
Remember when collectors and dealers filled auction house seats—no online buying, banks of computers, or revolving stages and huge screens with videos showing each lot? Well, if you were at an auction in Otego, New York, on April 27 and 28, you would ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Arms, Silver, and Art Up for Grabs at Tremont
Tremont Auctions, Newton, Massachusetts
Photos courtesy Tremont Auctions
Knowledgeable collectors of historical arms swarmed Tremont Auctions to preview its April 28 military auction in the Newton, Massachusetts, gallery. They were there for the dispersion of several historical military arms collections, primarily 159 lots from the three-generation collection of Francis Earl Dunn of ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Time and Tools
Skinner, Marlborough, Massachusetts
Photos courtesy Skinner
“What the hell.” With that soft outburst, a friend sitting next to me bid again, $27,000 this time, risking bank account and marriage, he confessed. Luckily or unluckily for him, the phone bidder quickly replied with $28,000, and the war was over. They were competing for ... (Read More)
|
(Show)The Philadelphia Antiques and Art Show
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
It was an unseasonably cold 40 degrees in Philadelphia on Thursday, April 19, when the Philadelphia Antiques and Art Show opened. The winds howled and wall labels swayed. Those who checked their coats retrieved them after the first hour, and after three hours dealer Peter Pap had wrapped himself ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Americana Revisited
Leslie Hindman Auctioneers, Chicago, Illinois
Photos courtesy Leslie Hindman Auctioneers
A sale of furniture, decorative arts, and silver held April 18 and 19 at Leslie Hindman Auctioneers may forever be known as the sale with “the chest.”
The Americana highlight of the sale was this circa 1770 Chippendale mahogany chest-on-chest estimated at $100,000/200,000 ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)The Prices Are Right for the Michener
Doyle New York, New York City
Photos courtesy Doyle New York
Doyle New York’s auction of American paintings, furniture, and decorative arts on April 18 was a consistent sale where the paintings accounted for $813,344 of the overall total of $1,225,344 (including buyers’ premiums). The presale estimate of the entire sale was ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Hingham Highlights
Willis Henry Auctions, Plymouth, Massachusetts
Photos courtesy Willis Henry Auctions
Positioned as it has been on the South Shore of Massachusetts for well over four decades, Willis Henry Auctions is ideally located to gather collections and estates from surrounding towns. The sale on April 14 in Plymouth, Massachusetts, included many lots of ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Mormons, Mexicana, and Marilyn Monroe—All in a Day’s Work at Printed and Manuscript Americana Sa
Swann Galleries, New York City
Photos courtesy Swann Galleries
A first edition of The Book of Mormon was the top lot of Swann’s printed and manuscript Americana sale on April 12 in its New York City gallery—yet again. The auction house has done well with Mormon material for at least a decade. ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Second Annual Curated Sale of Historical Indiana Art
Jackson’s Auction & Real Estate Company, Indianapolis, Indiana
Photos courtesy Jackson’s Auction & Real Estate Company
Although Dennis Jackson has been selling Indiana art at auction since 1982, his family auction business tried something new last year: a sale of curated works. The idea was to offer paintings that needed no apologies ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Toomey & Co. Launches
Toomey & Co., Oak Park, Illinois
Photos courtesy Toomey & Co.
When an e-mail arrived in late December 2017 announcing the breakup of Treadway/Toomey Auctions in Oak Park, Illinois, it seemed to come out of the blue.
The news marked the end of a successful 30-year era in which John Toomey hosted sales ... (Read More)
|
(Show)An Invitation Worth Accepting
Midwest Antique & Art Show and The Collector’s Eye, Cedar Rapids, Iowa
Thom Rawson had been after me for at least three years. “Come to my show,” he would say when I’d see him at events in Indiana or Illinois. And yet his semiannual Midwest Antique & Art Show and its ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Salmon Ship Portrait Brings $48,000
Northeast Auctions, Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Photos courtesy Northeast Auctions
Bidders have come to expect good marine paintings at a Northeast Auctions sale, and the highlight of the April 7 and 8 spring weekend sale in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, was an 1808 portrait of the Liverpool privateer Ceres, a 33¼" x 52½" oil ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Koekkoek Tops Eldred’s Auction
Robert C. Eldred Co., Inc., East Dennis, Massachusetts
Photos courtesy Eldred’s
Ten phones mustered for lot 29 at Eldred’s April 6 and 7 Americana and paintings sale at the East Dennis, Massachusetts, gallery. A 24¼" x 19¾" oil on panel winter landscape with wood gatherers and a village in the distance by ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)African-American Fine Art at Swann
Swann Galleries, New York City
Photos courtesy Swann Galleries
Swann Galleries, New York City, is the only major auction house to hold dedicated African-American fine art sales, and its spring sale on April 5, which set records for artists Beauford Delaney, Charles White, and Hale Woodruff, among others, was the house’s highest-grossing ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Tim Isaac’s Easter Monday Sale
Tim Isaac Antiques Art & Auctions, Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada
All prices in Canadian funds; U.S. funds in parentheses
On April 2 Tim Isaac Antiques Art & Auctions had a great sale at the Saint John Trade and Convention Centre in Saint John, New Brunswick, featuring the collection of the Reverend ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Maritime History Prevails at Hap Moore Auction
Hap Moore Antiques Auctions, York, Maine
The most historically significant items in Hap Moore’s March 31 auction in York, Maine, came from a single New England family. Among the top lots was a signed miniature watercolor of U.S. Navy Captain Edward Trenchard (1784/85-1824), paired with an engraving of his son Rear ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Institutions are Heavy Buyers at Printed and Manuscript African Americana Sale
Swann Galleries, New York City
Photos courtesy Swann Galleries
At the podium before the start of Swann Galleries’ auction of printed and manuscript African Americana on March 29, Nicholas D. Lowry, the house’s president and chief auctioneer, congratulated book department director Rick Stattler. The kudos were due for successfully “stepping into the ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Winter Estate Auction
Caddigan Auctioneers, Inc., Dedham, Massachusetts
Photos courtesy Caddigan Auctioneers
I’m glad to be back in Dedham,” said Joan Caddigan regarding the site of Caddigan Auctioneers’ March 25 sale. “Buyers will come to this location,” she said of the Holiday Inn of Dedham in Dedham, Massachusetts.
Joan Caddigan is seen here standing beside the ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)“Monumental March” Produces Record-Breaking Prices
Neal Auction Company, New Orleans, Louisiana
Photos courtesy Neal Auction Company
The spring estates auction at Neal Auction Company in New Orleans was known as “Monumental March” around the gallery. As it turned out, bigger was better—the crowd on the floor saw wall-spanning paintings by three important southern artists set record prices. ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Toys at Auction
Pook and Pook, Inc./Noel Barrett, Downingtown, Pennsylvania
Photos courtesy Pook and Pook/Noel Barrett
There were 25 bidders in the salesroom and two online bidding platforms active. “That’s the way it is these days,” said Noel Barrett as his toy sale at Pook & Pook, Inc., Downingtown, Pennsylvania, was about to begin on ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Tiffany Is a Trump Card
Cottone Auctions, Geneseo, New York
A rare Tiffany Bamboo leaded-glass and bronze floor lamp, circa 1910, sold for $241,900 (includes buyer’s premium) at the March 23 and 24 sale at Cottone Auctions, Geneseo, New York. It was the top lot.
Buyers loved the Tiffany brand. A vintage Tiffany 5.25-carat diamond ring sold ... (Read More)
|
(Auction)Alexander Hamilton Letter Leads Waverly Sale
Waverly Rare Books, Falls Church, Virginia
Photos courtesy Waverly Rare Books
Waverly Rare Books, a division of Quinn’s Auction Galleries, held a catalog auction of books, manuscripts, and maps on March 22 at Quinn’s showrooms in Falls Church, Virginia. Catherine Payling, newly appointed director of Waverly Rare Books (see M.A.D., September 2017, ... (Read More)
|
1 (800) 752-8521 • PO Box 1429 • Waldoboro, ME 04572
