134 / 241
14-C Maine Antique Digest, December 2016
-
FEATURE -
14-C
Head of the House
Wes Cowan of Cowan’s Auctions, Cincinnati, Ohio
by Karla Klein Albertson
Photos courtesy Cowan’s Auctions
“H
ead of the House” is a new feature that
explores the founder, forte, and future of
major American auction houses. In his or
her own words, the current president is asked to explain
how the business began, which specialties have been
most successful, and what new trends are influencing
the marketplace. Once the salesroom was reserved for
dealers and wealthy collectors; now auctions permeate
the marketplace. Want another Modigliani, a painted
chest, or vintage shoes for a wedding? Bidding has never
been easier. Whatever collectors demand, auctioneers
supply.
Wes Cowan fully intended to pursue an academic career
based on his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. in anthropology. But
anthropology is the study of man, and somewhere along
the way, Cowan became fascinated with the artifacts
of human history. What began as a collecting sideline
eventually became a passionate avocation. Historical
Americana was the first focus of Cowan’s Auctions,
which has now expanded into multiple departments led
by specialists: American history; American Indian art;
decorative art; fine jewelry and timepieces; fine paintings
and works on paper; historic firearms andmilitaria; modern
and contemporary art and design; and modern ceramics.
How did it all begin?
“I was a collector of artifacts when I was a kid—I
was a collector of a lot of things when I was a kid.
American Indian artifacts in particular got my attention
when I was about ten years old. I entered college having
participated in a professional archaeological dig with the
University of Kentucky and knew that I was going to
be an archaeologist. So I got my B.A. and M.A. at the
University of Kentucky and my Ph.D. at the University
of Michigan. I focused on paleoethnobotany, which is the
study of the interrelationships between past human and
plant populations. So I was very interested in the origins
of agriculture, not only worldwide but in particular in
eastern North America, and the transformation of human
populations in the East into fully agricultural societies.
I taught three years at Ohio State and then I left to be
the curator of archaeology at the Cincinnati Museum
of Natural History; I was there for eleven years. I had a
great career; I published scholarly papers. I could have
remained in that position for the rest of my life.”
When did selling antiques enter the picture?
“When I was in graduate school at the University of
Michigan, I started going to antiques shops in southeastern
Michigan and buying 19th-century photographs, because
they were cheap and dealers really didn’t know what
they had. I pretty quickly found out that there were other
people interested in collecting these things, and so by the
time I took my first job at Ohio State, I had a nice little
business buying and selling antique photographs on the
side. They are visual artifacts. I was a pretty serious and
well-known collector and dealer of stereographica and
photographica. When I was at the museum in Cincinnati,
I was conducting mail and phone bid auctions of stereo
views, and I participated in the trade shows. Many
collectors in the 1980s and 1990s became dealers to
support their hobby.
“So after I had been at themuseumfor eleven years, I got
a call to do an appraisal of 19th-century photographs—it
was part of an estate. And the attorney asked if I wanted
to buy the collection, and I said, ‘Why don’t you let
me sell it at auction?’ I got an apprentice auctioneer’s
license in Ohio and worked with a licensed auctioneer
to sell the collection—and it was a great success. And
suddenly there were messages on my answering machine
saying, when are you having your next auction? So I had
another auction six months later, and I
came home from work and there were
even more messages. After one more
auction, I thought, I’ve had a great
career as an archaeologist, and it’s time
to do something different. So I hung
out my shingle in 1995. I was working
in a small building in the rear of my
lot, a renovated garage; it was just me
and a bookkeeper basically. I was still
just selling photographs and historical
ephemera, political memorabilia, all
American history.”
When did the business begin to
expand beyond its initial focus?
“I did that for four or five years,
fending off people who told me I
should sell silver and paintings and
“I told them I had a degree
in anthropology, gave them a
proposal, and it was a great sale.”
furniture. Then I had a call about an estate that belonged
to a former curator of decorative arts at the Cincinnati
Art Museum, two housefuls of stuff, and I thought I
probably should look at it. Too much of an opportunity.
So I became a paintings, furniture, and decorative arts
auction house. I hired a recent Winterthur graduate to
catalog all these things. About a year later, the Western
Reserve Historical Society in Cleveland decided that they
were going to deaccession their North American Indian
art collection, which had nothing to do with Cleveland
and the Western Reserve. They were planning to send it
to Christie’s. I told them I had a degree in anthropology,
gave them a proposal, and it was a great sale. No one was
selling American Indian in the Midwest, only on the East
and West Coasts. I hired Danica Farnand, who is now our
director of American Indian art.
“So my business was growing very organically and
very quickly. We were growing 20% to 30% annually for
five or six years. The next addition was historic firearms
and militaria; Jack Lewis served as consultant. The busi-
ness grew when opportunities arose. It was the same way
with modern ceramics—I’ve always liked them. Some-
one connected me with
Garth Clark and Mark
DelVecchio, who had
closed their place in New
York after thirty years
and retired to Santa Fe.
I’ve been working with
them for five years. We
have a sale on October
28. The market’s razor
thin, so of all the things
we sell, it’s probably the
most challenging. There
are fewer collectors, and
the collectors who were
buying in the 1970s and
1980s can’t understand
that not everybody wants
a Peter Voulkos plate. A
natural outgrowth of this
was to sell other mod-
ern, although it meant
competing directly with
specialists like Wright
and Rago. They’re in
an environment where
there’s more product to
get. It will be difficult for
anyone outside of those
major areas to make
much of an impact, in
my opinion, because they
have the advantage.”
What do you consider
your forte?
“I think we are nation-
ally recognized for our
American history depart-
ment. I changed the name
from historical Ameri-
cana to American his-
tory because I thought a
buyer would understand that better. I think that we are
an acknowledged leader also in the sale of 19th-cen-
tury photographs, and it’s a field that has remained very
strong in the face of declining prices everywhere else.
And it’s remained fairly strong because prices never rose
too high. The material was always fairly affordable—
except for daguerreotypes. For a while the market for
those grew astronomically, driven by a handful of collec-
tors and institutions.”
What do you see for the future of Cowan’s and the
market in general?
“That’s one of the fun parts of this business—looking
into the crystal ball and trying to figure out what’s
going to happen. I will tell you that I’m not alone in
recognizing that our business is changing as we speak.
Right now is probably the most challenging time to
be in the auction business in my twenty-two years in
the industry. There is an avalanche of material to sell
because baby boomers are retiring. These collections
When Wes Cowan launched his auction business in 1995,
he brought with him a strong academic background in
archaeology and a passion for the ephemeral artifacts of
American history. From this foundation, Cowan’s Auctions
has grown into a diverse firm with experts in multiple fields
from American Indian art to modern ceramics.
A recent American history high point at Cowan’s was this
well-documented presentation-style pipe tomahawk carried
by Captain Meriwether Lewis (1774-1809). It sold privately
in December 2015 for an undisclosed seven-figure price.
Cowan’s offers important
modern ceramics auctions
curated by experts Garth
Clark and Mark DelVecchio.
In November 2010 this Gash
stoneware stack pot, 48" high
x 16" diameter, a 1978 work
by Peter Voulkos (1924-2002),
sold for $105,750. The price
is a world record for an art-
work by Voulkos.
Over the last ten years, Cowan’s has sold personal belongings from the estate
of Margaret “Marge” Schott (1928-2004), owner of the Cincinnati Reds. In
addition to baseball memorabilia, there was a lot of fine jewelry, such as this
custom-made platinum and diamond necklace, which brought $192,000 in
April 2013.