Maine Antique Digest, December 2016

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22-D Maine Antique Digest, December 2016
- AUCTION -
22-D
Skinner, Inc., Boston, Massachusetts
Anemones in a Glass Jar Tops Sale in Boston
by Frances McQueeney-Jones Mascolo
Photos courtesy Skinner, Inc.
Robin S.R. Starr, the paintings department director and an auctioneer at Skinner,
Inc., summed up the September 23 paintings sale in the Boston gallery when she
said, “Overall, we are pleased, given the vagaries of the current market.” Those
vagaries make for volatile sales where results are all over the landscape. A case in point
could be the cover lot of the sale.
The cover lot, Anemones in a Glass Jar , a 13" x 16" oil on canvas by BritishModernist
artist Christopher “Kit” Wood (1901-1930), provoked an impressive competition
between two dealers until it commanded $351,000 (including buyer’s premium) from
one of them.
While sparse attendance at sales doesn't mean awhole lot anymore, an ominous silence
hung in the air until one of two phone bidders opened at $160,000 for Andrew Wyeth’s
21½" x 29½" watercolor Corn and Grist. It went for $195,000 (est. $150,000/250,000)
to an area dealer.
In addition to the Wyeth picture, a small
group of other American paintings sold.
A 13⅜" x 19⅜" oil on paper laid on canvas
mountain scene, Pilatus, Switzerland, by
German-born American artist Albert Bierstadt
(1830-1902) was monogrammed and titled
on the stretcher. It sold on the phone for its
opening bid at $18,450.
The Dory, a 20" x 27" oil on canvas by Boston artist and one of the Lynn Beach
painters Charles Herbert Woodbury (1864-1940), sold for $11,070 (est. $1500/2500). A
notation on the back of the canvas reads “For Charlotte from E.W.P. November 1950.”
The colorful 20" x 23" oil on canvas Beached Dories by Boston artist E. Ambrose Webster (1869-
1935), a founding member of the Provincetown art colony, sold for $10,455 (est. $4000/6000).
One other American painting, Catching the Turkey, Thanksgiving, by Anna Mary Robertson
Moses (1860-1961), also known as Grandma Moses, failed to sell. The painting carried an
estimate of $90,000/120,000, and bidding died at the opening bid of $65,000. The picture came
to light only after the publication of the Moses catalogue raisonné by Otto Kallir; the painting
was not included in it originally. It will be included in a supplement.
A 72½" x 30" untitled mixed media, oil, and sand on canvas by György Kepes (1906-2001)
was unsigned. Estimated at $7000/9000, it realized $13,530. The artist had given the painting to
Mimi and Gerald Berlin of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and it descended in the family.
Tête de la Luxure, a later casting of a 14½" bronze by Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), was signed
“ARodin” on the base, signed with a raised signature on the interior, and stamped “Alexis Rudier
Fondeur Paris” on the base. Estimated at $18,000/22,000, it brought $19,680. The head is from
a detail of Rodin’s 1882 Femme Accroupie that was made for the bronze doors, known as the
Gates of Hell, made for the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. The casting had sold at Skinner
in May 2006 for $37,600, at the top of the market. Through Way, a 1965 work in steel, 78" x
19" x 18", by Australian American artist Clement Meadmore (1929-2005), brought $12,915 (est.
$15,000/25,000). The piece was originally part of “Criss Cross,” a series of five steel sculptures
that was later separated into groups of two and three; then the group of two was separated into
single works. The 11¾" bronze Mercury Embracing Venus by John Singer Sargent (1856-1925)
was initialed “JSS” and numbered 7/7. It realized $12,300. Catalog notes reveal that a similar
bronze, Study for Eros and Psyche, circa 1917, is in the collection of the Sargent House Museum
in Gloucester, Massachusetts, but does not bear an edition number. That bronze was donated by
Violet Sargent Ormond, Sargent’s niece. A later Sargent descendant arranged for casts of some
of his smaller bronzes in the 1960s, but whether the Mercury and Venus work is one of those is
unknown. It is headed to a private collection.
The cover lot of the auction’s separate
prints and photographs catalog was a 15¼"
x 169/16" color woodcut titled Candy Apples
by California artist Wayne Thiebaud (b.
1920). It was made in 1987 and numbered
75/200. The image was published by Crown
Point Press in San Francisco and printed
by Tadashi Toda (1936-2000) in Kyoto,
Japan. From a California collection, it was
accompanied by a letter of documentation
from the publisher. It sold online for
$39,975 (est. $30,000/50,000).
Two William Wegman (b. 1943) dog
photographs sold. A 1993 color lithograph,
46½" x 34½", Back View, showing a
Weimaraner standing in a velour chair
looking soulfully behind her, brought
$1168.50. Wegman’s chromogenic print
Dendra, 5¾" x 9", shows a dog resting
majestically on a fallen birch log. She
fetched $799.50.
A Robert Motherwell (1915-1991)
1987 color lithograph, Game of Chance,
published by Tyler Graphics of Mount
Kisco, New York (Engberg & Banach,
377), realized $9840 (est. $4000/6000).
The image was signed and numbered
41/100 and bore the publisher’s dry stamp.
It, too, came from a California collection.
For more information, call (508) 970-3206
or check the website ).
Vagaries make for
volatile sales where
results are all over
the landscape.
“Educational Costs Are Really Going Up,” a 7" x 28½" ink on paper Peanuts
cartoon by Charles Monroe Schulz (1922-2000), is signed “Schulz,” and a pasted
label reads “Tm. Reg. U.S. Pat. Off—All rights reserved © 1969 by United
Featured Syndicates, Inc.” The cartoon brought $6765 and is headed to an
unidentified institution.
James Fitzgerald’s signed Fisherman, a 20" x 26" watercolor
on paper, is actually a double-sided composition with a signed
image of three fishermen looking over rocks in a rough sea on
the reverse. It sold for $8610 (est. $3000/5000).
Luminous Shore View with Sailing Vessels, this 39" x 58" oil
on canvas by Russian-born artist Aleksei Vasilievich Von
Hanzen (1876-1937), who was known for his coastal scenes,
was estimated at $5000/7000. It is signed and dated 1911 and
sold online for $15,990. The artist, a former law student,
studied art in Germany, was a painter of the Russian Navy,
and ultimately settled in the former Yugoslavia.
Winter Scene at Dusk, this 16"
x 26" oil on canvas by John
Joseph Enneking (1841-1916),
sold on the phone for $10,455.
The painting is included in the
forthcoming catalogue raisonné
by Patricia Jobe Pierce.
The highlight of the sale and the cover lot, Anemones in a Glass Jar, this 13" x 16"
oil on canvas by British Modernist artist Christopher “Kit” Wood (1901-1930),
provoked an impressive competition between two dealers until it sold for $351,000
(est. $70,000/90,000) to one of them bidding from London. Wood, who was known
as Kit, studied architecture before studying drawing at the Académie Julian in
Paris. His first exhibit was at Heal’s in London in 1924, and Anemones in a Glass
Jar was made around then. He died at 29, ending a promising career. The picture
had sold at Sotheby’s London in 1960 and came from an area collection.