Maine Antique Digest March 2015

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26-B Maine Antique Digest, March 2015
- AUCTIONS -
Strawser Auctions, Hatfield, Pennsylvania, and Freeman’s, Philadelphia
Fine Majolica at Auction
by Lita Solis-Cohen
Photos courtesy Strawser Auctions and Freeman’s
At the 1851 Crystal Palace Exhibition in
Hyde Park, London, Herbert Minton intro-
duced Victorian majolica, a new line of
ceramics based on Renaissance designs and natural
forms with rich lead-glazed colors: bright green,
yellow, turquoise, and deep cobalt blue. This mod-
ern majolica, with roots in medieval Spain and
Renaissance Italy, became immensely popular.
Monumental garden urns, fountains, and ewers
were used in conservatories. Cheese bells had mice
scampering over them; glistening fish were laid
out on platters and atop sardine dishes; birds and
hares came out of game pie dishes—these were all
displayed on sideboards. Tea was poured from the
mouths of turtles, spiky fish, roosters, and even
from flat irons. Oysters were served from tiers
of majolica shells and eaten on majolica plates
of jewel-like colors. Oils, condiments, and spirits
were served in zoomorphic containers.
Americans discovered majolica at the Centen-
nial International Exhibition in Philadelphia in
1876, and at every succeeding world’s fair, potter-
ies introduced versions of the most popular designs
and new designs, reflecting the changing tastes,
from Japonism to Aesthetic Movement, reform
styles, and rustic naturalism. The revival of the
high-relief style of 16th-century French potter Ber-
nard Palissy, incorporating lizards, snakes, frogs,
lobsters, and snails, was particularly popular for a
while.
Then majolica fell out of favor. It was ignored
during most of the 20th century. In the 1970s and
1980s some pioneer collectors discovered its art-
istry and humor and began collecting majolica
with passion. The first comprehensive book on the
subject, Majolica: A Complete History and Illus-
trated Survey by Marilyn G. Karmason and Joan
Stacke, was published by Harry Abrams in 1989.
The market grew, reaching a high mark in the
1990s, after the book was published. It had some
ups and downs in the early years of the 21st cen-
tury and performed well at the huge sale of Mari-
lyn Karmason’s collection after her death in 2005.
Michael Strawser, a real-estate auctioneer in
Wolcottville, Indiana, and a majolica collector
who founded the International Majolica Society
in 1989, rented the Alderfer Auction facility in
rural Hatfield, Pennsylvania, for the Karmason
sale, which offered 669 lots that covered the entire
range of majolica—British, American, French,
Portuguese, and German. That sale brought nearly
$1.5 million. (Strawser has been holding sales of
majolica at Alderfer’s facility since 1990, and since
1995, two sales a year. The sales attract a group
of largely East Coast Collectors to a country loca-
tion that is far more economical than New York
and more convenient for buyers than Fort Wayne,
Indiana, where Strawser used to hold his fall sale.)
It took a long time for the market to absorb so
much majolica. Nicolaus Boston, a private British
dealer who now lives in Ireland but is well known
to American collectors from years of exhibiting at
high-profile shows in New York, Baltimore, and
Florida, said the current market is down 50% from
its highs in late 2006.
Since 2008 the majolica market has languished,
collectors have aged, and only a few new collec-
tors have discovered majolica’s charm. In 2014
majolica got a boost from academia. There was a
well-received seminar at the Bard Graduate Center
in New York City on May 16, 2014. Majolica: A
World View is available by video on the Bard Grad-
British Art in New Haven, Connecticut, included
two monumental pieces of majolica—a life-size
peacock from a private collection and an 84" high
elephant from the Thomas Goode collection—in
Sculpture Victorious: Art in an Age of Invention,
1837-1901 .The exhibition will be at the Tate Brit-
ain in London from February 25 to May 25. The
Minton elephant was first shown at the Paris exhi-
bition of 1889 and is usually seen in the window of
china merchant Thomas Goode on South Audley
Street in London. It is pictured on the exhibition
catalog cover.
Last fall enough majolica came up for sale
to provide a real test for the market. There was
a well-advertised sale of a private collection at
Freeman’s in Philadelphia—77 lots tucked into a
sale of English furniture held on October 7. It was
held just as members of the International Majolica
Society were on their way to their annual meeting
in New Orleans, where five dealers showed their
wares and some significant sales were made. On
November 18, Christie’s offered 16 lots of majol-
ica, mostly French, in a sale of 19th-century dec-
orative arts called “The Opulent Eye.” Then on
November 22, Michael Strawser and Nicolaus
Boston joined forces to see if they could put some
excitement back into the majolica market. They
did!
Their carefully curated and well-advertised sale
of 422 lots, titled “Fine Majolica for the Connois-
seur,” sold at the Alderfer Auction facilities in Hat-
field, Pennsylvania, to a room full of 30 collectors
fromVirginia, Texas, NewYork, Pennsylvania, and
New Jersey, and buyers on phones and the Inter-
net. In all, 390 of 422 lots of Victorian majolica
made in the 19th century by Minton, George Jones,
Wedgwood in England, Avisseau and Massier in
France, Bordalo Pinheiro in Portugal, and Lonitz
and others from Germany, and designed by such
luminaries as Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse, Paul
Comolera, and Christopher Dresser, sold for a total
of $718,482 (with the buyers’ premiums) against
a presale estimate of $550,000/850,000. The sale
had an impressive 92% sell-through rate. On-line
bidders were successful on 42% of the lots offered.
There were absentee and phone bidders as well,
many of whom never previewed but trusted the
condition reports prepared by Strawser and Bos-
ton. Eleven pieces brought five-figure prices, and
about 136 sold in the four figures. Most of the lots
that were passed have been sold since the sale.
“The market is more sophisticated than it was
several years ago,” said Boston. “Collectors are
more informed; they are drawn to whimsy, colors,
and bold designs, but they demand more histori-
cal information and focus on quality, such as the
sharpness of modeling, brightness of glazes, and
no or little glaze runs,” Boston added.
This important Minton majolica turquoise-ground flat iron teapot
has a frieze of mice around the sides and a large white cat wrapped
around the handle looking down at a mouse holding a carrot. It sold
on the phone for $42,000 (est. $20,000/30,000), the highest price of
the sale. Flat iron teapots in brown or cobalt blue have come into
the market in recent years; this is the only turquoise one. Collectors
want them in every color. Strawser.
This Minton majolica tea
service included the cat
and mouse flat iron teapot,
a design attributed to Christo-
pher Dresser, in a cobalt ground
and with a registration mark for
1875. The 7¾" x 7½" x 4" tea-
pot with a sugar and creamer
sold on the phone for $37,500 (est.
$40,000/60,000). The sugar
has a bird finial, and the
creamer has a squirrel on its
handle and a fox head
on its side. Freeman’s.
This rare Wedgwood majolica peacock
fruit tray and cream pitcher, circa 1875,
the tray modeled as a peacock with tail
feathers forming the fruit bowl and the
creamer formed of peacock feathers,
sold for $1560 (est. $2000/4000). A simi-
lar fruit bowl alone sold at Sotheby’s in
1997 for $6900. Strawser.
This rare Wedgwood majolica butter dish and cover,
1875, 7½" high, was inspired by Aesop’s fable about
the tortoise and the hare and is one of only two
known. It sold to a major collector in the salesroom
for $12,600 (est. $12,000/15,000). Strawser.
In the 1970s and 1980s
some pioneer collectors
discovered its artistry
and humor and began
collecting majolica with
passion.
“The current market wants the rare pieces of
the highest quality and in the best condition,” said
Strawser. “That is what this auction was about.”