SAN JOSE, Calif. – Jeff King, eBay’s Senior Director of Finding, has confirmed through eBay’s Announcements page that the current search engine in use on eBay will be retired in April of 2009. A new search engine that King describes “faster and easier” will take over the job of scouring the world’s busiest commerce site.
“In a nutshell, it looks at a multitude of details in listings to deliver more of the results you want,” said King. “It makes it easy to browse and narrow your selection, and lets you choose how you want to see the results. With the new auto-complete feature it even ‘anticipates’ what you’re typing in the search box.”
King said suggestions from eBay users had contributed to the new search design. “The response from the community to the new finding has been great,” he added. “We’ve incorporated a lot of these suggestions already, and in the coming months we’ll be introducing more new features and enhancements to make it even faster and easier.”
Until now, eBay buyers and sellers have been given the option of using the new or old search engine. As more and more registered users adopted the new technology – 90 percent, according to King – eBay is now ready to take the permanent leap to the improved model. Those who are still using the original search-engine technology will receive messages during their searches to remind them that the changeover will occur in April.
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IVOR, Va. – More than 400 fresh-to-the-market lots, drawn from prominent area estates, will be sold at auction Saturday, March 7, by auctioneers Tom Perry and Jay Bradshaw of Tom’s Auctions & Appraisals, beginning at 9 a.m. EST. The sale will be held in a former schoolhouse building now used for community activities, located at 8420 Bell Avenue in Ivor, a lovely rural town in eastern Virginia conveniently located off Route 460.
Consignments from four important estates will headline the event – two from Virginia Beach and one each from the Virginia towns of Smithfield and Drewryville. Other estates will also be represented, from Virginia, the Carolinas and other nearby states.
Many items slated to cross the block are indigenous to the area, specifically South Hampton County, Virginia. These include several log cabin quilts made around 1900 by a descendant of the consignor, measuring about 72 inches by 54 inches; an early framed print of the Confederate monument, placed in Courtland, Va.; a collection of locally dug Indian arrowheads, and an enormous hand-carved wooden arrowhead, over 2 feet tall.
Other Virginia-specific lots include a handwritten land deed, dated 1861 and with an additional related court document summoning local residents to court in 1907; an ambrotype; several daguerreotypes; and other early pictures and photos of various unidentified local residents, some in cases and ranging in dates from around 1860 to 1920.
Pennsylvania will also be represented, in the form of a beautiful six-board early blanket chest (circa 1840-1880), Pennsylvania Dutch painted, with feet; an early settle table that cleverly converts to a chair (circa 1850), pine, with huge boards, one drawer and a two-board top; a matching set of six early plank-bottom chairs (circa 1850s); and several other pairs of lovely early Pennsylvania painted chairs.
Victorian furniture will be offered in abundance. Examples include a large fancy side-by-side mahogany secretary; a walnut secretary (circa 1860s-1880s); an oak hall seat; a high-back bed; and a nice corner chair. Fine artwork will include a large oil on canvas rendering of St. Paul’s Church by Jean Batail (French, born 1930); and a large oil painting of Mary and Jesus by an unknown artist (circa 1880).
Seated figure, oil on canvas, 14 x 23 inches. Image courtesy Wooden Nickel Antiques.
CINCINNATI – Nearly 80 newly discovered works by Cincinnati artist Thomas Corwin Lindsay (1839-1907) will be exhibited at Eisele Gallery of Fine Art beginning March 7.
The recently discovered paintings came directly from the estate of a descendant of the artist. They had been stored in the attic of a family residence for more than 70 years. The renowned landscape, portrait and animal painter was active throughout the region from 1858 to 1905.
Most of the paintings were acquired by Wooden Nickel Antiques, owned by Mike and Patty Williams and Tim Miller. The Cincinnati business has a long-standing reputation nationwide as a reliable dealer of antiques and art. The owners of Wooden Nickel Antiques said they are pleased to have this unique opportunity to offer the works of an artist so important to the Cincinnati community in the setting of a local gallery.
In the years since Tony Duquette’s death at 85, the designer’s reputation has grown, due in large part to the efforts of Duquette’s longtime business partner, Hutton Wilkinson.
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A big, glossy monograph by Wilkinson, with Wendy Goodman, was published in 2007 (Abrams) and there’s a new line of Duquette’s designs in production by Baker Furniture. The designer’s original jewelry and objects have fetched strong prices at auction. And a small offering of jewelry is still made by the Duquette studio for sale at Bergdorf Goodman and select Saks Fifth Avenue stores. The line is designed by Wilkinson, in keeping with Duquette’s oeuvre.
One view of the Getz house, a Hollywood interior by Tony Duquette. Image courtesy of Hutton Wilkinson, Tony Duqette Inc.
Duquette’s singular style – lavish, exotic, ornamental – embraced a huge palette of periods and influences. He was a pioneer in recycling and reusing objects, but his well-known facility with makeshift materials shouldn’t be misconstrued: Duquette was an astute and devoted collector of 17th-, 18th- and 19th-century European furniture, and fine art and objects from around the globe, who also happened not to have been above using, say, a plastic plant spray-painted gold as a centerpiece.
This original Tony Duquette cast-resin rose chest from the 1940s is sometimes found at auction. He made about 24 pieces of this design in 1980. Image courtesy Hutton Wilkinson, Tony Duquette Inc.
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Elfin, whimsical, imaginative and enchanting are words used to describe Duquette, but he was a hard worker, too. Born in Los Angeles, he studied, on scholarship, at the Chouinard Institute there. After jobs assisting other designers and a stint at Bulllock’s department store, Duquette set up shop for himself, establishing a flourishing business interrupted only by his World War II Army service.
This Biomorphic table was re-released by Baker Furniture along with other Duquette designs. Image courtesy Hutton Wilkinson, Tony Duquette Inc.
Tony Duquette would say he was discovered by the society decorator Elsie de Wolf when he made a black and green lacquered secretary desk for her, and he was also a close friend of film director Vincente Minelli, for whom he designed sets. Other clients, variously commissioning jewelry, objects, furniture and whole interiors included Doris Duke, J. Paul Getty, the Duchess of Windsor, Elizabeth Arden and Norton Simon. According to Hutton Wilkinson, Duquette completed about one interiors project a year, in Los Angeles, San Francisco and throughout the world. The many homes he created for himself and his elegant wife, Beegle, were perhaps the best testament to Tony Duquette’s vision.
Tony Duquette made 10 or fewer pieces of jewelry each year, usually commissioned by clients. Some were marked ‘TONY DUQUETTE 18K,’ some were unmarked. The Tony Duquette studio still releases jewelry. Image courtesy Hutton Wilkinson, Tony Duquette Inc.
Sadly, Duquette’s masterpiece, Sortiligieum, a sprawling Malibu estate with two dozen thematically diverse small houses, was destroyed in a 1993 fire. “Each house was packed with its own collection of amazing furniture and objects Tony had collected, all lost in the fire. He never recovered from that,” said Wilkinson.
Another of Duquette’s Los Angeles residences, Dawnridge, now serves as headquarters for Tony Duquette Inc. Dawnridge has been renovated by Wilkinson and his wife, Ruth, in the spirit of Duquette’s original design. It is often rented out for special events and photo shoots.
Tony Duquette made 10 or fewer pieces of jewelry each year, usually commissioned by clients. Some were marked ‘TONY DUQUETTE 18K,’ some were unmarked. The Tony Duquette studio still releases jewelry. Image courtesy Hutton Wilkinson, Tony Duquette Inc.
Wilkinson often finds himself in the position of authenticating original Duquette pieces, of which there are very few extant. (For such inquiries, Wilkinson can be reached at huttonwilkinson@hotmail.com.) Furniture, ceramics, lighting and other decorative objects from Duquette’s studio were usually custom-made for specific interiors. A few pieces were made in multiples of 24, by hand, in the studio. These were seldom marked.
Wilkinson has another book about Tony Duquette, More is More (Abrams). Another good reference is Christie’s hard-to-find catalog for the 2000 auction of Tony Duquette’s estate.
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