Maine Antique Digest March 2015

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10-A Maine Antique Digest, March 2015
Hixenbaugh Ancient Art
(HAA) has relocated to
the Chelsea neighborhood of
Manhattan in NewYork City after
nine years on the Upper East Side.
HAA handles art farom a va-
riety of ancient civilizations
that flourished in Europe, North
Africa, Western Asia, and the
Americas. The gallery is led by
Randall Hixenbaugh, a mem-
ber of several international art
dealers organizations including
the International Association of
Dealers in Ancient Art.
HAA’s new location is at
537AWest 23rd Street. For more
information, call (212) 989-9743
or check the Web site (www.
hixenbaugh.net).
Hixenbaugh
Ancient Art Relo-
cates to Chelsea
Customers and exhibitors
are invited to bring historic
military images to the 32nd annual
Spring D.C. Antique Photo and
Postcard Show, March 15, at the
Holiday Inn Rosslyn inArlington,
Virginia. The photos may be
scanned for future inclusion in
Military Images magazine or
appraised for possible future
auction consignments at Cowan’s
Auctions.
The magazine invitation was
extended by editor and pub-
lisher Ronald S. Coddington, a
North Arlington resident, who
purchased the 36-year old quar-
terly in 2013. The appraisal in-
vitation was made by auctioneer
Wes Cowan, also an appraiser on
PBS’s Antiques Roadshow.
Documenting the photograph-
ic history of the U.S. soldier and
sailor, the magazine, Codding-
ton said, “is particularly looking
for Civil War images in con-
junction with the war’s ongoing
150th year anniversary. But our
previous focus has included the
period through WWI, and so
we’re interested in military im-
ages from the next 50 or so years
as well.”
Coddington said he is pleased
to participate in the Arlington
show for the second year and
“hopes people will bring plenty
of photographs to copy.”
Cowan, who exhibited at the
show several years ago, said that
along with military images he is
also interested in a wider range
of historic photography, includ-
ing daguerreotypes, CDVs, cab-
inet cards, albumens, etc., plus
images of Native and African
Americans, occupations, et al.
The D.C. Antique Photo and
Postcard Show opens at 8:30
a.m. with a $25 preview admis-
sion and continues from 10 a.m.
to 4 p.m. with a $10 public ad-
mission. After 1 p.m., students
with ID will be admitted free of
charge. For more information,
contact Tom Rall at (703) 534-
8220 or Jeff Bradfield at (540)
476-2666.
Historic Military Images Sought
The New York City Book and
Ephemera Fair will have
its debut on Saturday, April 11,
at the Church of St. Ignatius
Loyola’s Wallace Hall on Park
Avenue. The fair will host more
than 50 dealers and is designed
as a satellite event of Rare
Book Week, the annual spring
roundup of auctions and selling
exhibitions.
Marvin Getman, president of
Impact Events Group, a New
England producer of specialty
antiques and book fairs since
1981, said the one-day event will
be an affordable complement to
the ABAA Antiquarian Book
Fair at the Park Avenue Armory.
The New York City Book
and Ephemera Fair will open
at 8 a.m. to give collectors and
dealers access to a wide range of
collectibles before they head to
the multiday event at the armory.
Getman will make it easy for
shoppers to get to the armory in
time for its noon opening by pro-
viding free shuttle bus service.
The shuttle will run continuous-
ly from 8 a.m. until noon.
A discount admission cou-
pon is available on line (www.
bookandpaperfairs.com). Tick-
ets are $15 at the door and $10
if purchased on line in advance.
For a complete list of dealers
appearing at the first New York
City Book and Ephemera Fair at
Wallace Hall, visit the Web site.
by Lita Solis Cohen
The Philadelphia Antiques
Show has been the largest
fund-raiser for Penn Medicine,
known as HUP (Hospital of the
University of Pennsylvania)
when the show was founded 53
years ago. In 2011 on its 50th
anniversary, it announced it had
raised more than $17 million for
Penn Medicine and was proud
to be known as “the place to
see the best Americana in the
marketplace.”
Within ten years of its found-
ing, antiques shows had become
the number one fund-raisers.
There were small antiques shows
at local churches on weekends;
middle-size shows in dance
halls and school gymnasiums;
and big shows in hotels, arenas,
and armories across America.
Some, like the New Hampshire
Antiques Dealers Association
Show, began small and grew.
The mother of them all was the
Winter Antiques Show at the
67th Street Armory on Park Ave-
nue in New York City.
In the last decade, many an-
tiques shows have lost their
magic and are no longer viable
fund-raisers. The Philadelphia
show lost some momentumwhen
it moved from the 33rd Street
Armory to the passenger pier at
the Navy Yard in 2008 and then
to the cavernous Pennsylvania
Convention Center in 2012 with
its union labor and expensive
parking. The gate went steadily
down, and expenses went up.
Dealers who were annoyed
by the floor plan at the Navy
Yard dropped the show, and
more dealers left when the show
moved to the convention center.
The dealers who remained com-
plained about the quality and
expense of union porters and
electricians and the difficulties
of moving in and moving out.
Some said the Philadelphia show
had become a regional show and
no longer had a national draw.
They blamed the change on in-
experienced management and
volunteers, location, city taxes,
and a general lack of interest
in antiques among the younger
generations.
Over the years the Philadel-
phia show’s volunteer commit-
tees have not made good deci-
sions. They resented the tailgate
shows that set up in their wake
and did everything they could
to thwart them. Frank Gaglio
launched a popular show at the
First City Troop Armory at 23rd
Street and then at the cruise ship
passenger terminal at the Navy
Yard. The antiques show com-
mittee, afraid that the armory
would not be available, booked
the Navy pier for the Philadel-
phia show and also booked the
armory so that no other promot-
er could have it. Gaglio moved
his show to the convention cen-
ter for two years before reduc-
ing its size and returning to the
23rd Street Armory. He ran a
shuttle bus between the shows
at his own expense and gave the
Philadelphia show dealers free
early-buying tickets, which they
used, and they shopped.
With a cluster of shows on the
calendar—Barry Cohen, another
promoter, launched a show at
the University of Pennsylvania
skating rink—collectors flew in
from all parts of the county. Phil-
adelphia was an antiques desti-
nation in April like New York in
January and New Hampshire in
August, when conclaves of col-
lectors shop and meet for good
fellowship. Freeman’s and Pook
& Pook added auction sales to
the mix, and Philadelphia, with
its great museums, fine hotels,
good restaurants, and easy ac-
cess by Amtrak, plane, and
highways, was the place where
every serious collector wanted
to be. The Philadelphia Antiques
Show, with its special events and
lectures, was the magnet.
In the early days of the show,
Mrs. Moreau D. Brown, Mrs.
Brooke Roberts, Mrs. Robert
Mayock, and a few others each
ran the show for a number of
consecutive years. Since 1980,
the volunteer chairman has
changed yearly, and some of
the chairmen, with little interest
in antiques, never learned what
they were expected to do during
their year of apprenticeship.
Money was needlessly spent
on rebranding two years ago.
A key with tassel replaced the
famous Rittenhouse orrery in
its elaborate case by Thomas
Affleck. (The orrery logo was
brought back and modernized
last year by the new director,
Catherine Sweeney Singer.)
In the last several years, a
random targeting of dealers by
collection agencies representing
the tax collector of the city of
Philadelphia for a little-known
business tax has been disturb-
ing. Dealers had to pay accoun-
tants to figure out what they
owed. Once figured out, it was
not complicated or an excessive
amount and often not relevant.
Still, some dealers said it was
not worth the trouble and vowed
never to do another show in Phil-
adelphia again because of the
taxes.
That made it hard for Cather-
ine Sweeney Singer, who came
on board as director for the 2014
Philadelphia Antiques Show, to
recruit more dealers. A serious
automobile accident in March
2014 put Sweeney Singer out
of commission during a crucial
time, but the 2014 show went on
with a new floor plan and a loan
show from Historic Deerfield in
Massachusetts. It was the first
time the show did not celebrate a
Philadelphia institution or loans
from Philadelphia collections,
and it was not a popular choice
in a city with institutions such as
the Athenaeum of Philadelphia,
which celebrated its 200th anni-
versary in 2014, and the Phila-
delphia History Museum. These
institutions should have been
celebrated with loan shows.
Catherine Sweeney Singer
saw the show from her wheel-
chair last year and came up
with a plan to present to Penn
Medicine, which took over the
management of the show from
the hospital’s Board of Women
Visitors in the interest of finding
experienced fiscal management.
The show could not go on if it
continued to lose money.
A committee apparently spent
the summer looking for a new,
less expensive venue, but by the
time they decided on New Hall E
in the Pennsylvania Convention
Center, a more intimate space
facing Broad Street that might
allow valet parking, there was
not enough time to sign up the 75
dealers who are needed to make
the show a financial success.
Richard Worley, a collector
and chairman of the Antiques
Show Advisory Committee,
realized that more time was
needed for organization. So, as
dealers were setting up for the
Winter Antiques Show and the
Ceramics & Glass Fair in New
York City, they received an
e-mail from Worley informing
them that the 2015 Philadelphia
Antiques Show was canceled.
Worley told them the show had
struggled financially in recent
years and there was not enough
time to implement the plan pre-
sented by show director Cath-
erine Sweeney Singer over the
summer.
“We got off to a late start,”
said Worley in a phone inter-
view. “Too little time remains
to expand the dealer roster and
achieve the community under-
writing goals.” That explains
why no contracts had been sent
to dealers, and no longstanding
dealers were even asked if they
were coming back.
Worley said if they begin plan-
ning now, there will be a new
and different Philadelphia show
2015 Philadelphia Antiques Show Canceled
in April 2016. “It may be called
‘The Philadelphia Art and An-
tiques Show,’ and it will be a big
and diverse show at a delicious
venue. We are going to get start-
ed on it in February. We need to
take stock, organize volunteers,
build a Web site, work on mar-
keting, and reexamine the bud-
get and the concept of the show.”
Catherine Sweeney Singer
said she thinks she can put such
a show together by April 2016
and said she has a three-year
contract. “My ambitious plan is
to reinvent the show, expand it
to seventy-five dealers with ev-
ery discipline represented—con-
temporary art, old masters, pho-
tography, sculpture, design of all
periods, and Americana, which
is having a comeback.”
Sweeney Singer went on to
say, “It will be a show for a vi-
brant city where more young
people are living than ever be-
fore, and it will be a show that
will attract people from all parts
of the country.” She said it will
be in the New Hall E at the con-
vention center.
“When I was brought in, I told
them it would take time to re-
energize the show, and it would
take three years to accomplish
it. We need to have the show in
place nine months before it opens
to begin the advertising. We are
New Book and Ephemera Fair for NYC
Show
by Clayton Pennington
In 1994, collectors Barry and
Isabel Knispel of Saddle River,
New Jersey, paid $347,437
to Gallery 63 Antiques, New
York City, for Mending His
Ways, purportedly by Norman
Rockwell. Almost two decades
later, an appraisal for insurance
purposes revealed the painting is
not by Rockwell but by Harold
Anderson. The Knispels have
filed suit in Superior Court of
New Jersey, Bergen County,
against Gallery 63 Antiques,
Lawrence Sepenuk of Gallery
63, and the estate of Rochelle
Sepenuk.
According to records filed
with the court, in 1994 the Knis-
pels were solicited by Gallery
63, which sent marketing mate-
rials and information on various
paintings to the Knispels at their
home in New Jersey. In October
1994 the Knispels negotiated for
the purchase of multiple paint-
ings, including what Gallery 63
Antiques represented as an orig-
inal Norman Rockwell, titled
Mending His Ways.
The October 8, 1994, bill of
sale reads, “Sold to: Mrs. Isa-
bel Knispel, Saddle River, N.J.
1 Original oil on canvas, by
Norman Rockwell. The gallery
fully guarantees the originality
of this oil.” The bill of sale was
signed by the now-deceased Ro-
chelle Sepenuk on behalf of Gal-
lery 63 Antiques; the price was
$347,437.
In 2008 and in 2014, Sothe-
by’s presale marketing said Ro-
chelle Sepenuk was “one of the
top 19th Century dealers in New
York, and was known for her ex-
cellent eye, particularly in sculp-
ture and furniture. She sought
out the greatest examples in the
field, in both quality and scale.”
working on it as we speak.” The
54th Philadelphia show has an
ambitious plan. Sweeney Singer
seemed confident it can be car-
ried out.
Some dealers are shocked and
disappointed that there will be no
Philadelphia show this April, and
many privately blame Sweeney
Singer for the cancellation and
said they do not want to give her
another chance. Some longtime
exhibitors said they did not plan
to exhibit this year. This show
needed a sabbatical to come up
with new creative planning.
Other dealers think Sweeney
Singer can save the show. They
believe that she does think out-
side the box. She sees the big
picture as well as the regional
one. She is capable of putting
on a Philadelphia show unlike
any show elsewhere in the coun-
try and making the Philadelphia
show relevant again.
The Antiques Dealers’ Asso-
ciation of America, Inc., which
announced that the recipient of
its annual Award of Merit will
be David McCullough, Pulitz-
er Prize-winning historian, has
moved the dinner and award cer-
emony to the Philadelphia Muse-
um of Art on Saturday, April 11
at 7 p.m. instead of 8 p.m. For
information, call (203) 364-9913.
Stay tuned.
A $1,750,000 Norman Rockwell Becomes
a $20,000 Harold Anderson