Federal 1822 walnut Daniel Oyster tall-case clock, Pennsylvania, moon phase dial. Estimate: $2,000-$4,000. Image courtesy Myers’ Antiques Auction Gallery.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – Myers’ Winter Americana auction, held once every two years, presents fresh from New England, New York and Florida estates an excellent selection of 18th and 19th century furnishings. This year’s sale will be on Feb. 19. Among the over 100 pieces of period American furniture, Myers will offer important furniture with provenance from Wayne Pratt, Christie’s and other major Americana specialists.
LiveAuctioneers.com will provide Internet live bidding for the 500-lot auction, which starts at noon Eastern.
Over 400 American decorative arts and antiques will be offered including a broad selection of fresh-to-the-market American paintings, folk art, samplers, quilts, toys, stoneware, Native American Indian art, bronzes, silver, weapons, nautical, whaling items, Nantucket baskets, textiles, more than 25 antique estate Oriental rugs, and assorted oddities ranging from historical Women Suffrage Movement items to signed Babe Ruth baseballs, and panoramic “Views of North America” Zuber scenic wallpaper. The auction catalog with detailed descriptions and multiple images for each item, is posted on LiveAuctioneers.com.
Preview hours are Saturday, Feb. 18th, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sunday, Feb. 19, from 10 a.m. to the start of the sale. Early preview is available by appointment. Absentee, telephone and online bidding via LiveAuctioneers.com are offered.
Myers Auction Gallery is located at 1600 Fourth St. North. Call 727-823-3249 email auctions@myersfineart.com. Visit Myers online at www.myersfineart.com for full catalog and further information.
Georgia stoneware face jug by Lanier Meaders, signed on base, 9 1/4 inches high. Image courtesy Pook & Pook Inc.
DOWNINGTOWN, Pa. – Pook & Pook Inc. will conduct a Decorative Arts Sale on Feb. 23-24, beginning at 10 a.m. Eastern both days. LiveAuctioneer.com will provide Internet live bidding.
Starting Pook & Pook’s Decorative Arts Sale is a collection of stoneware face jugs, many of which are creations from the Meaders family, a well-known group of potters from the south. Probably the most famous member of this family is Lanier Meaders, born in 1917 in Cleveland, Ga. He died 1998. Lanier, along with his three brothers, followed in his parents’ footsteps making Southern folk pottery throughout the 1900s. Celebrated for his face jugs, Lanier Meaders’ work is highly collectable. His work, along with several pieces by other members of the Meaders family, will be offered, as well as face jugs from other well-known potters.
The sale will continue with more pottery and porcelain. A group of stoneware jugs and crocks with beautiful cobalt decoration on traditional gray-brown backgrounds typical of American stoneware will cross the block. Included in this group are pieces impressed Biedinger & Caire, F.H. Cowden Harrisburg, J.M. Pruden Eliz-town, Haxstun Ottman NY, and others.
Following the stoneware are several lots of Rookwood pottery. One piece is marked 1881, just one year after Maria Storer started the now famous Rookwood Pottery in Cincinnati, Ohio. A few of the Rookwood pieces boast relief work with matte surfaces while others exhibit what might be referred to as Rookwood’s telltale look including the indicative high gloss finish.
Adorning every available wall space in the gallery and beyond are hundreds of paintings, drawings, etchings and prints. Many of the paintings are by listed artists, including a number of talented local artists. A wonderful oil on board landscape by Walter Van Den Hengel will be offered. Van Den Hengel, born in 1877 in Holland, immigrated to the United States and studied under Daniel Garber at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. This artist’s work rarely comes up for auction.
Another local artist, Philip Jamison (American, b. 1925) appears twice in this sale. Jamison studied at the Philadelphia Museum School of Art, taught at the Philadelphia College of Art and is known for his landscapes of Pennsylvania. Also crossing the block is an eclectic oil on masonite piece by Harry Dunn (American, 1929-1998) titled Peddlers Umbrella. Dunn’s unusual style and interesting way of looking at the world always finds an audience. The art continues with pieces by Robert Cleminson (British, active 1864-1903), Fen Cunningham (American, 1889-1975), Leonard Baskin (American, 1922-2000), George Thompson Hobbs (American, 1846-1929), 20 pieces by Marc Schoettle (American, 1925-1982) and dozens of other artists.
Never before has the exhibition hall been so packed with furniture. Everything from American to Continental, Asian to African, period furnishings to beautifully crafted modern reproductions can be found at the upcoming sale. Tables, chairs, sofas, settees, dressing tables, vitrines, candlestands, slant-front desks, corner cupboards, tall-case clocks, pie safes, chest on chests, butler’s desks, hanging cupboards, step-back cupboards, dressers, a folding screen, dry sinks, stools, a pedestal, lowboys, highboys, cradles, pewter cupboards, sideboards and love seats fill the gallery. Period pieces coming up for sale include a pair of George II dining chairs, circa 1750, an early 1800s painted hard pine one-piece corner cupboard, an English mahogany slant-front desk, circa 1800, and dozens of other vintage examples.
Modern reproductions include a Chippendale-style mahogany sofa made by a local cabinetmaker, the Irion Company Furniture Makers. Front and center in the hall is another piece by the same maker, an incredible reproduction Lancaster County schrank complete with red, green and yellow paint decoration. This beautifully made piece has already attracted much attention.
An assortment of decorative accessories fills in the rest of the sale. Textiles such as hooked rugs, Oriental carpets, samplers, quilts, coverlets and needleworks will be found throughout. Several toys, games and pieces of children’s furniture pepper the entire sale including hobby horses, candy containers, windup toys, play houses, several Noah’s Arks and pull toys. Buyers will also find baskets, fish decoys, animal carvings, torchieres, lock boxes, Christmas ornaments, bird decoys, miniature toleware, mirrors, redware, glass, clocks, jewelry, lighting, musical instruments and more.
Towards the end of day two, collectors of weapons and military ephemera will find over 30 lots of firearms, edged weapons, powder flasks, a Confederate flag and Civil War photographs. Following this is a group of Asian objects, including a beautiful ruby Peking glass bowl. A fine collection of Native American items will also be sold at the end of the day. This assembly includes a carved doll, a Tlingit frog bowl, a pottery olla, points, moccasins, totem poles, a carved caribou antler knife case from Greenland, and many other exciting finds.
The sale will end with approximately 200 items that came to Pook & Pook from a Pennsylvania museum. An entire room of the gallery is dedicated to these African, South Asian and Pacific Islander artifacts making exhibition landscape at this sale really entertaining. Included in this curious group of deaccessioned items are war shields, masks, carved figures, canoes and other quirky items that would make a fantastic conversation piece for any room of the house.
For details on this or any sale at Pook & Pook Inc., go to www.pookandpook.com or call 610-269-4040.
Rembrandt Bugatti (1884-1916) elephant bronze. Estimate: $300,000-$500,000. Image courtesy Burchard Galleries. ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – A magnificent elephant bronze was carried into a local appraisal fair where a representative of Burchard Galleries was working. The owner had no idea of the importance or value but a Burchard representative certainly did. The piece was gifted from several wealthy women, who were world travelers, to their caretaker over 45 years ago, then to his nephew about 10 years ago. It was that nephew who brought the Rembrandt Bugatti (Italian, 1884-1916) bronze elephant to the fair.
Burchard Galleries is proud to offer this important Rembrandt Bugatti bronze elephant in their Antiques & Fine Art Auction on Feb. 19. It carries an estimate of $300,000-$500,000. LiveAuctioneers.com will provide Internet live bidding.
Rare and highly prized, Bugatti’s animal bronzes have commanded in excess of $2 million at auction and are found in many museum and gallery collections all over the world.
Bugatti battled depression in his short lifetime. During World War I, the Antwerp Zoo was forced to kill most of its animals, many of which were Bugatti’s beloved subjects. He soon took his own life at age 31. He is of the same Bugatti family as Carlo, a furniture craftsman, and the most famous Ettore, automotive engineer and design legend.
The impressive elephant figure, circa 1912, has an incised signature stamped “Cire Perdue, AA Hebrard” and incised “2.” It measures 10 3/4 inches high by 15 inches long by 4 3/4 inches deep. An example of this bronze can be found page 329 of Veronique Fromanger’s Rembrandt Bugatti Repertoire Monograhique.
Also included in this fine sale are two Johann Berthelsen (1883-1972, American) oil paintings of Central Park with an estimate of $10,000-$20,000 each and a large Adolf Kaufman (Austrian, 1848/58?-1916) oil on board of the Argonnes in Autumn, along with many other fine works of art among them, a rare 1922 Erté gouache.
Also, a plethora of estate fresh antiques, fine furnishings, and stunning gold, platinum and diamond jewelry will be sold as well as many other outstanding lots, which include vintage lighting in the form of a nice Quezal five-light chandelier, art glass by Tiffany and many lots of fine sterling silver. A large collection of carved wood African figures will be offered. The collection is from the estate of James E. Adkins, a physicist, musician and major African art collector from the St. Petersburg, Fla., area.
The sale will be conducted beginning at noon Eastern on Sunday, Feb., 19, at the Burchard Galleries facility at 2528 30th Ave. N., St. Petersburg, FL 33713 and also will be carried live online by LiveAuctioneers.com. Preview for the sale will be at the gallery from1-6 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 18. Advance seating arrangements are suggested.
For more information call Chris Ball at (727) 821-1167 or email chris@burchardgalleries.com or visit the website at www.burchardgalleries.com.
The 6-liter bottle of Brugerolle cognac in the Van der Bunt collection is said to have traveled with Napoleon on one of the French emperor’s campaigns. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AFP) – Thousands of bottles of rare cognac and other drink, some dating back to the French Revolution, went up for sale Friday, with its Dutch collector expected to reap several million dollars.
Describing it as the “largest collection of old liquors in the world,” a spokesman for Breda publisher Bay van der Bunt said around 5,000 bottles of cognac, whisky, armagnac and other liquors are to be sold for a total estimated price of $8 million (6 million euros).
Van der Bunt “promised his wife he’d sell his collection when she retired at age 65 and he’s making good on that promise,” Bart Laming told AFP.
He said that Van der Bunt, 63, who inherited part of the collection from his father and grandfather and stored it in a cellar at his home in the southwestern Dutch city, had no children to hand it to.
The collection includes a hand-blown 6-liter bottle of 1795 Brugerolle cognac believed to have been requisitioned by French revolutionary army officers.
“It is believed this bottle also accompanied Napoleon Bonaparte on his campaigns and is the only one left in the world,” Laming said.
On its own, the bottle has an asking price of 138,000 euros, although Van der Bunt is hoping to negotiate a sale for most of the collection as a single lot.
Van der Bunt, who has been adding to the collection for the last 35 years, bought the Brugerolle at a Christie’s auction in Chicago in 1990.
The collector, who ironically does not drink alcohol, also bought bottles from famous restaurants such as Maxim’s in Paris and Le Cirque in New York, Laming said.
He said that several buyers have already shown interest, mainly from China and Russia.
However the oldest cognac, dating back to 1760, will not be for sale.
“That is a real heirloom. It stays with Mr. Van der Bunt,” he said.
# # #
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The 6-liter bottle of Brugerolle cognac in the Van der Bunt collection is said to have traveled with Napoleon on one of the French emperor’s campaigns. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
MARSEILLE, France, (AFP) – Firefighters on Friday put out a blaze that raged overnight in La Cite Radieuse, an apartment block built by Le Corbusier and one of France’s architectural landmarks.
Forty fire engines and around 200 firefighters battled the blaze throughout the night after it broke out Thursday afternoon on the first floor of the nine-story concrete complex in the southern city of Marseille.
Eight of the building’s 334 apartments were destroyed along with four rooms in the hotel that occupies a middle floor, while 35 other apartments were damaged by smoke or water, firefighters said.
The block’s 1,500 residents were evacuated Thursday and five were treated in hospital for minor injuries, officials said. The cause of the fire remained unclear, they said.
The Cite Radieuse, whose residents enjoy unobstructed views over Marseille and the Mediterranean, was completed in 1952 and is regarded as one of Le Corbusier’s masterpieces.
Described as a “vertical village,” the complex stands on giant concrete stilts, contains a restaurant, shops and a gym, and on its roof has a communal terrace that features a running track and a paddling pool for children.
Classified as a historic monument, it was originally designed for social housing but today is mostly occupied by middle-class professionals.
Born Charles-Edouard Jeanneret in Switzerland, the architect and designer became a French citizen in 1930 and took the name Le Corbusier. He died in 1965 at the age of 77.
Portrait of folk artist Howard Finster painted by his son Roy Finster, dated 1995. Image courtesy LiveAuctioneers.com Archive and Kimball M. Sterling Inc.
ATLANTA (AP) – A northwest Georgia county has bought the garden where the late folk artist Howard Finster held court for tourists and art lovers from around the world.
Chattooga County, where Paradise Garden has been based since Finster began building it in 1961, used donations and grant money to buy the small plot for $125,000, said Jordan Poole, executive director with the Paradise Garden Foundation. The foundation will continue to work on restoring the quirky garden, which was featured in a 1983 R.E.M. video.
Finster, a bicycle repairman and preacher who turned to art to spread God’s word, has long been considered the grandfather of the American folk art movement. He filled the garden, located about 100 miles northwest of Atlanta, with primitive mosaics, sculptures and buildings. It was the setting for numerous weddings that Finster presided over.
The garden fell into disrepair after his death in 2001. The county’s ownership will protect it from ever being closed down, Poole said Wednesday.
“It means Paradise Garden is still owned by an entity—it can’t be snatched up by a private investor who goes in there and starts removing everything,” Poole said.
The county bought the four-acre plot in late December after receiving news it had won an Appalachian Regional Commission grant, said the county’s sole commissioner, Jason Winters. The county is in a much better position to apply for grants to help restore the crumbling structures in the garden than the nonprofit that bought the property from Finster’s family, he said.
Winters said he hopes to create a tourism economy around the garden, which drew more than 2,000 visitors last year with no marketing. The county will lease the garden to Poole’s foundation, which will be in charge of maintaining and restoring the property, Winters said.
“Finster was a citizen of Chattooga County first, and he was proud of his home and we need to be proud of him,” Winters said.
So far, volunteers have helped shore up the tier wedding cake-like World’s Folk Art Church and put on a new roof with money raised by auctioning off art from the garden. Volunteers also help guide tours of the garden for visitors who show up on its doorstep.
The foundation has also revived FinsterFest, a folk art festival that Finster held every year in the garden to help promote hundreds of unknown artists.
“It’s exactly what my father would have wanted,” Beverly Finster said Wednesday night.
Her father began creating what he called “sacred art” in 1976 after a vision appeared to him in a dollop of paint on one of his fingertips. His art, which featured everything from ants to Elvis, gained national fame after members of R.E.M. befriended him.
The artist painted the covers of albums for R.E.M., Talking Heads and other bands in the 1980s, and soon his primitive paintings and sculptures became famous, drawing thousands every year to his home near the Alabama-Georgia border.
His art spilled from the basement of his home into his backyard, where he carefully placed mosaic Bible verses into the sidewalk and turned objects like bicycles, car motor parts and dolls into sculptures. Some of the objects in the garden look like the contents of a child’s toy box or a recycling bin were dumped into piles of wet concrete, drying into a misshapen heap.
A shack is made out of bottles embedded in concrete. Trashcans are painted with messages about transforming trash into treasure. One wall is a scrapbook of family photos and clippings from newspapers, all preserved behind glass.
Everything about the garden is folksy, right down to the name, which is Paradise Garden or Paradise Gardens, depending who you ask. Howard Finster—who sometimes wrote his name as “Finister,” which is the way residents in Chattooga pronounce it—used both in legal documents, Poole said.
The artist eventually produced 48,000 pieces, including quirky wooden statues and sculptures made from other people’s trash. He awed architects with his complex folk art church, which seemed impossible for a man lacking formal engineering training.
Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-02-09-12 1540GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
Portrait of folk artist Howard Finster painted by his son Roy Finster, dated 1995. Image courtesy LiveAuctioneers.com Archive and Kimball M. Sterling Inc.
