In this fast-changing world, more collectors and executors of estates have been consigning works of high quality to the trade for sale rather than sending them to auction. “The buyers pay more money at auction with the high buyer’s premium, so the sellers can do better with a private sale as long as the dealer is reasonable with the commission,” said Alan Granby, who has a small collection of fresh-to-market marine paintings consigned for sale.
The seven paintings Janice Hyland and Alan Granby of Hyland Granby Antiques, Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, recently posted on their website are from the collection of George Lewis (1931-2022) of Sherborn, Massachusetts, and Vinalhaven, Maine, an avid sailor and careful collector of marine art.
“George lived all his life in a house overlooking the Charles River that was built by his parents, George Lewis and Muriel Saltonstall,” said Granby. “He was one of four founding partners of the Boston investment firm Thorndike, Doran, Paine, and Lewis that merged with and became Wellington Management. When he retired from Wellington in 1994 he remained an active investment partner in the Boston family business, S. & Co., Inc., until his death.”
Granby said Lewis began collecting marine paintings in the 1960s and 1970s at a time when paintings by Fitz Henry Lane and Robert Salmon were coming to market from Back Bay and Beacon Hill houses and offered for sale at Newbury Street galleries. He could afford the best, and the time he spent at sea sharpened his eye. The proceeds from the sale of the seven paintings will benefit a not-for-profit called the Haven Trust, which supports arts and humanities in Massachusetts and Maine.
Hyland Granby Antiques posted digital images of five works by Robert Salmon, one by Fitz Henry Lane, and one by marine painter Samuel Walters of Liverpool, England, with a full description of each painting and its frame along with its condition, price, and a list of comparable auction prices of similar works.
Robert Salmon (1775-c. 1845), Depiction of Boston Harbor at Sunset with Ships Becalmed and a Panoramic View of Shipping in Boston and the Boston Skyline, 16½" x 24¼" (sight size).
One painting offered was Depiction of Boston Harbor at Sunset with Ships Becalmed and a Panoramic View of Shipping in Boston and the Boston Skyline, circa 1830, by Robert Salmon (1775-c. 1845), 16½" x 24¼", its period gold-leaf frame with applied decorative patterns at each corner, regilded by the Peabody Essex Museum when it was exhibited there in the 2021 exhibition In American Waters: The Sea in American Painting, which then traveled to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in 2021-22. The price was $550,000, and the painting sold.
Fitz Henry Lane (1804-1865), Boston Harbor with Ships Becalmed, 25" x 30¼".
Also offered was the Luminist Boston Harbor with Ships Becalmed, circa 1850, by Fitz Henry Lane (1804-1865), 25" x 30¼", in a period frame with a gold leaf surface with a rich patina. It was shown at the National Gallery of Art in 1988 and is illustrated in John Wilmerding’s catalog for that exhibition, Paintings by Fitz Hugh Lane. (In 2004-05, it was discovered Henry, not Hugh, was Lane’s middle name.) The painting sold for around $3 million—half the $6,079,500 (including buyer’s premium) paid for Lane’s 20 1/8" x 30 1/8" Bar Island and Mount Desert Mountains from Somes Settlement in “The Spirit of America,” one of the sales of the Wolf collection at Sotheby’s in April 2023.
“It is only once in lifetime that a group like this comes along,” said Granby after he sold two of the paintings in the first days they were on the market. “I let my good customers know about the collection, and two of the best pictures sold first.”
Five more paintings were available at press time. For more information, see the Hyland Granby Antiques website (www.hylandgranby.com).
Originally published in the April 2025 issue of Maine Antique Digest. © 2025 Maine Antique Digest
