Unrestored copy of ‘Action Comics #1’ (DC, 1938), which marks the first appearance of Superman. Heritage Auctions image. BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – An unrestored copy of Action Comics #1 (DC, 1938) CGC 3.0, the most desirable comic book in the world, is expected to bring $350,000 or more when it crosses the block at Heritage Auctions as part of the company’s Nov. 20-22 Comics & Comic Art Signature® Auction.
The copy of Action #1, being offered for the first time at auction, is the top comic in the Prospect Mountain Collection, a fresh-to-the-hobby grouping of more than 2,000 Golden Age comic books collected in the late 1950s and 1960s by a former Navy sailor studying illustration on the G.I. Bill in New York City.
“It was a great time to find desirable Golden Age back issues,” said Barry Sandoval, director of operations for Comic and Comic Art at Heritage. “He was able to build a collection of key Golden Age comics on the budget of a student studying under the G.I. Bill, something clearly impossible today. Having experienced World War II as a child he was interested in war-themed covers and the result was a focus on Timely comics and the 1930s and 1940s superheroes.”
It was an interest in the great illustrators of the Golden Age, and in his favorite characters, which led him to acquire many issues that are now thought of as “keys” in the business, or classic covers, including a 5.0 CGC-Graded copy of Batman #1 (DC, 1940), estimated at $75,000+, a 6.0 CGC-Graded copy of Captain America Comics #1 (Timely, 1841), estimated at $70,000-plus, and a 6.0 CGC-graded copy of Wonder Woman #1 (DC, 1942), estimated at $7,000-plus.
The top lot on the original comic art side of the auction is sure to cause a storm with collectors as Todd McFarlane’s Amazing Spider-Man #300 original cover art (Marvel, 1988), one of the most important comic images of the 1980s, is expected to bring $250,000-plus.
“McFarlane art in general has seen a giant increase in demand over the last several years,” said Todd Hignite, vice president at Heritage Auctions, “with one of his pieces selling for more than $650,000 at Heritage two years ago. This is a key piece of cover art and one of his most famous covers overall, so the competition should be fierce among the top collectors.”
Top comic art collectors not looking for the McFarlane art will likely have their eyes on Frank Frazetta’s Jongor Fights Back paperback book cover painting original art (Popular Library, 1967), an example of fantasy art at its very finest, by the undisputed master of the genre, estimated at $200,000-plus.
A CGC-Graded 9.4 copy of Journey Into Mystery #83 (Marvel, 1962), the vaunted first appearance of Thor, is expected to bring $180,000+ from collectors when it crosses the block as the best copy of this important comic book ever offered by Heritage.
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
Unrestored copy of ‘Action Comics #1’ (DC, 1938), which marks the first appearance of Superman. Heritage Auctions image.
Maskatron, Six Million Dollar Man’s Enemy, sealed in box, est. $200-$300. Stephenson’s image PHILA., Pa. – Santa’s toyshop is opening early this year, and Stephenson’s Auctioneers in suburban Philadelphia is where a fine selection of antique and vintage dolls, toys and trains will make their holiday-season debut. The Friday, Nov. 14 auction featuring 350+ lots of playthings from estates and collections in the tri-state area will allow bidders to participate via their choice of several methods. Internet live bidding will be available through LiveAuctioneers.
The auction will begin at 2 p.m. Eastern Time with one of the largest and most diverse selections of dolls to appear at Stephenson’s in several years. Many of the dolls come with extensive wardrobes, some with their original trunks. Additionally, there are many group lots comprised of desirable period accessories, such as clothing, footwear, wigs and doll parts.
Lot 119, a beautiful 1952-53 Vogue Ginny “Rich Uncle” trunk set includes a 7-inch hard plastic Ginny with several outfits and accessories. The doll and its enviable wardrobe are secured in a red, handled tri-fold trunk. The auction estimate is $500-$700.
In 1972, Kenner produced its Blythe hard plastic and vinyl doll in a Native-American-patterned “Aztec Arrival” outfit. The 11-inch doll has an unusual feature – its oversize eyes change color when a string is pulled. In near-mint condition with a tagged outfit and extra pair of shoes, Blythe is entered as Lot 148 and is expected to make $800-$1,000 at auction.
Lot 213 is a rare, early Jumeau bisque-head “crying” doll with jointed body and stationary blue glass eyes. It stands 14½ inches tall and is marked “211, 4” on its head.
Among the many other dolls in the vast array to be auctioned are Madame Alexanders, Dionne Quints, an Ideal Toni doll, a Nancy Ann-style show doll, bubble-cut and other Barbie and Midge dolls; an 11-inch Schoenhut, a 1929 Averill Dimmie composition doll, a 1952-53 Wanda, Skookums and other ethnic dolls. Antique dolls are led by a large collection of bisque dolls made by premier Continental doll makers, including Armand Marseille, Kestner, Heinrich Handwerck, Simon & Halbig, Kammer & Reinhardt, Heubach, Kley & Hahn and many others.
Imelda Marcos would be envious of Lot 18, which contains over 100 pairs of vintage doll shoes. They vary in size, and some are made of leather. “Collectors can never have enough extra shoes for their dolls, so we expect a lot of interest in this lot,” said Cindy Stephenson, owner of Stephenson’s Auctioneers. The grouping is estimated at $80-$160.
Mint and sealed in its colorful original box, a Kenner Maskatron – Six Million Dollar Man’s mortal enemy – stands 14 inches tall. An elusive 1970s toy in its factory packaging, Lot 264 is likely to garner a winning bid of $200-$300, if not more.
One of the most exciting pieces in the sale is Lot 340, a Johnny West action store display that was manufactured by Marx Toys for Quaker Oats’ 1970 “Best of the West” series. With human and equine figures mounted to its base, the 46¼-inch-wide display is an impressive boomer-era toy that weighs a hefty 45 lbs. Its pre-auction estimate is $500-$800.
A mini collection of Borden’s dairy-related toys and advertising includes Lot 318, a 14-inch-long horse-drawn milk wagon. Made by Rich Toys, it is constructed of painted wood and retains its appealing original decals for Borden’s “Milk & Cream” and “Farm Products.” A charming toy of yesteryear, it is estimated at $300-$500.
Trains have fascinated American children for many generations, so it’s no wonder that there are more people collecting trains than any other type of toy. Ask any train collector which U.S. brands they seek, and you’re sure to hear the names American Flyer and Lionel, both of which figure prominently in Stephenson’s sale. One prized example is Lot 300, a Lionel pre-war O-gauge freight train. The set includes a No. 8976 steam locomotive and 2227B tender, plus a boxcar, gondola, hopper, searchlight car and caboose. A great-looking lineup that’s ready to ride the rails, it could reach $600-$800 on auction day. Also in the train section are Marx, MTH and Rail King productions; accessories and track.
Other categories featured in the auction include cap guns, Japanese tin cars, die-cast vehicles, a collection of pressed-steel automotive toys by Tonka, Keystone, Structo, Smith-Miller and other popular brands; TootsieToys, GI Joes, 1980s Britains figures, and a very nice selection of vintage Christmas ornaments.
The Nov. 14 auction will commence at 2 p.m. Eastern Time.
For additional information on any lot in the sale, call Cindy Stephenson at 215-322-6182 or e-mail info@stephensonsauction.com.
View the fully illustrated catalog and sign up to bid absentee or live via the Internet at www.LiveAuctioneers.com.
English Regency period mahogany reading table with one from a pair of Chinese 19th century tall yoke-back armchairs in a classic Ming design. Photo W.R. Harvey/Sharon Fitzsimmons
LONDON – If I understood the antique furniture market just now, I could be a rich man. On the one hand, the brown Georgian and Victorian stuff remains hard to sell. Dealers and the general public seem not to want it, despite its obvious quality, and so prices are depressed.
As if to illustrate the fact, on a recent visit to our local saleroom, we noticed that a lovely little Georgian foldover tea table we had admired presale had failed to find a buyer. We bought it for £80. Frankly, we don’t have room for it, but there was a time when such tables were worth three or four times that amount, so I’m viewing it as a long-term investment.
At another sale we witnessed, the opposite seemed to be the case. A pretty but late 19th century French kingwood escritoire painted with lovers being serenaded in a landscape setting was estimated at £800-1,200, but sold for £5,400.
Intended as a lady’s writing desk, it had gilt metal mounts, a fitted interior and stood on cabriole legs. No fewer than 10 telephone bidders competed for its ownership, because, according to the auctioneer, its highly decorative design is currently popular.
Contrast it then with the pieces pictured here. They are examples of classical Chinese antiques, the popularity of which seems currently to have no bounds. Decorative is not part of the vocabulary used to describe them but buyers are clamouring for them, particularly Chinese collectors looking to repatriate pieces exported in the last century.
Part of the answer is the demand for pieces made from huanghuali, an indigenous wood, also known as “yellow flowering pear.” This type of rosewood was prized in furniture of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) and early years of the Qing dynasty (1644-1912) appreciated for its color, its scent and its distinctive grain, while its hardness allowed craftsmen to create elegant, slender yet strong pieces.
Shanxi Province, located in Northern China in the Yellow River valley west of the Taihang Mountains – its name means “west of the mountain” – is a region renowned for its fine furniture, its craftsmen adopting late Ming minimalism, and subsequently the more intricate late Qing styles. It was then that furniture design reached its zenith.
Nobles, court officials and wealthy families were the only groups of people able to afford hardwood furniture and aside from huanghuali, red sandalwood was the most expensive, its dense texture and hardness making it ideal to withstand the test of time. Other woods used were pear, rosewood, ebony and nanmu, a softer but still highly durable wood also used for boat building.
Purity of line, devotion to detail, and flawless construction produced pieces that exhibit restraint and dignity. No glue or nails were used in their construction and no real measurement, just the eye of master craftsmen, meaning that no two pieces are identical – except of course in the case, say, of a pair of plant stands. These would be an exact mirror of each other.
Chairs are perhaps the most sculptural pieces. In the Han Dynasty (206 B.C.-A.D. 220) people sat, slept and ate on mats on the floor. Elevated seating began with the introduction of the stool, probably by Buddhist monks from India. Woodblock prints and paintings from the Tang Dynasty (A.D. 618- 907) show stools, side chairs, and yoke and round-back armchairs, all of which were refined during the Ming period.
The opening up of maritime trade after the end of the embargo in 1567 saw hardwoods flood in from South Asia, giving craftsmen the opportunity to exploit their high tensile strength and create more delicate and elegantly beautiful but still restrained pieces.
This period coincided with the development of a hierarchical society under the emperor and the rise of an elite scholarly class of intellectuals and mandarins who served him. With the job came security, wealth and power and the development of a rank of importance, reflected in where each sat in court in relation to the emperor and the chair they sat upon.
Interestingly, this did not necessarily mean that the more important you were, the more comfortable your chair became. Upholstery was never employed in antique Chinese chairs, the only concession to comfort being the woven cane seats or rich but loose fitting fabrics.
Homes, meanwhile, also reflected position and were furnished with tables for use at banquets, to study, paint and write and as stands for incense, wine, music or plants or to hold choice antiques, ancestral relics, or simply flowers. Such tables were flanked at each end by an armchair to be made available to honoured guests.
As with all other Chinese works of art, chairs and other pieces of furniture are a rich source of symbolism. The most common and perhaps most important of these techniques was to use carving, both relief and openwork. This would be applied not only to doors and larger panels, but also to aprons, spandrels and other areas of a piece.
The list is exhaustive. The most popular symbol was the “fu” character for good luck, which was very frequently used on the backs of chairs. Others include the “shou” for longevity and “wan” (an inverse swastika) for immortality, while, for example, the lion signifies power and protection; the crane wisdom; the dragon royal authority and male fertility and the peony wealth and high rank.
A chance to learn more about antique Chinese furniture will be offered during an exhibition titled “George Meets the Dragon” at dealers W.R. Harvey & Co, in Witney, Oxfordshire. It will show furniture and works of art from the reigns of seven monarchs and mandarins in China and Great Britain from the 18th and 19th centuries, the pieces standing side by side to illustrate how, despite being from such different cultures, they complement each other in style and designs and work well together in contemporary homes.
The Chinese furniture is from the Fitzsimmons Collection, belonging to Sharon Fitzsimmons, a noted expert who will be presenting a series of Sunday afternoon lectures throughout November. Further details and invitations from W.R.Harvey Antiques, telephone 01993 706501.
ADDITIONAL IMAGES OF NOTE
Pair of late 19th century round-back chairs from Shanxi Province. Photo Sharon FitzsimmonsPair of 19th century yoke-back armchairs from Shanxi Province. Photo Sharon FitzsimmonsA 19th century rosewood artist’s table from Shanxi Province. Photo Sharon FitzsimmonsElaborate 19th century folding round-back armchair, more like a three-dimensional sculpture. Photo Sharon FitzsimmonsThis carved huanghuali armchair with reclining back sold for £9,000. Photo Ewbank’s auctioneersA rare 19th century huanghuali round backed settee with later cushion sold old for £12,000. It was purchased by a buyer from Beijing. Photo Ewbank’s auctioneersThese huanghuali plant stands, sold for £4,800. Photo Ewbank’s auctioneers
The hat comes off this Uncle Sam stein and his head can be filled with beer. This red, white and blue Schierholz example sold for $5,040 in 2014 at Fox Auctions of Vallejo, Calif.
BEACHWOOD, Ohio – Uncle Sam seems very happy, perhaps because he is 101 years old this year. Or perhaps because his likeness has been used on a beer stein. How did he become famous? The initials “U.S.” were put on barrels of beef sent to the U.S. military during the War of 1812. Soldiers said the barrels’ U.S. mark stood for “Uncle Sam.” A newspaper reporter thought that was an interesting story and soon Uncle Sam became the nickname for the entire United States. But the picture of Uncle Sam as he looks today was not used until the 1860s, when Thomas Nast, the political cartoonist, created a man with a white beard and stars-and-stripes clothing.
A beer stein that looks like that Uncle Sam was made by Schierholz Porcelain of Plaue, Germany, in about 1890. The company, started in 1818, has undergone many changes in ownership and names, but it’s still working. The Uncle Sam stein is rare – only a few colored examples are known.
Several porcelain reproductions were made from 1986 to 1995, some multicolored and some with allover “honey” glaze. A more recent reproduction is made of pottery.
In 2014, a colorful Schierholz Uncle Sam stein sold for $5,040 at Fox Auctions in Vallejo, Calif.
Q: I’m 85 years old. After Pearl Harbor was bombed in 1941, I started collecting and selling scrap iron. Using that money, I bought a $25 U.S. war bond dated Dec. 23, 1942. I never cashed it and still have it. Is it worth more as a collectible than it does as a bond?
A: If the bond has your name on it, you or your heirs are the only ones who can redeem it. You paid $18.75 for your $25 bond in 1942. It stopped accruing interest in 1982, but over 40 years it earned $81.20 in interest. So today it’s worth $99.95. A collector would not pay anywhere near that price for the bond. If you like the way it looks, scan it in color and frame the image. Then go ahead and cash the bond.
Q: My father was stationed at Schweinfurt, Germany, at the end of World War II. He didn’t smoke, so he used his ration of cigarettes to trade with locals for various items. One of these was a series of 15 drawings, 15 by 19 inches, of workers doing various tasks at the Schweinfurt Ball Bearing factory. The drawings were done in 1934 and 1935 and are in a linen presentation case with the letters “SFK” above “F&S” in a circle in the upper left corner of the cover. Since the Allied bombers heavily bombed Schweinfurt during the war, I have no idea if many of these drawings still exist. What would be the approximate value of this set of drawings?
A: Most of the ball bearings used by Germany’s Nazi forces were made in the city of Schweinfurt in 1939. The Allied bombing raids in 1943 were conducted in an effort to destroy Germany’s ability to produce airplane parts. “SKF” stands for Schwedische Kugellagerfabriken, a Swedish company that had a division in Germany that made ball bearings. “F & S” stands for Fichtel & Sachs, another major ball-bearing manufacturer. Drawings of working factories sell well today. The price would be determined mainly by the fame of the artist.
Q: I bought a vase at a thrift store for $2. It’s metal, has a raised tree design and is marked “McClelland Barclay” on the bottom. I learned he was an illustrator, but found no information about his metalwork. Can you help?
A: McClelland Barclay (1891-1942) worked in New York City as a commercial artist and magazine illustrator. He was a graduate of the Art Institute of Chicago and famous for his war posters, Saturday Evening Post “girls” and Ladies Home Journal covers. He designed jewelry for the Rice-Weiner Co. from 1939 to 1943. He also designed household accessories, such as metal bowls, bookends, vases, ashtrays, desk sets and lamps, all signed with his name. Barclay was a U.S. Navy officer during World War II. He died when his ship was torpedoed near the Solomon Islands. Your vase is worth about $175.
Q: I have a pair of antique Bohlin chaps. They say “Made in Hollywood, California.” They have stainless-steel conchas and buckles on them. They were owned by my grandmother, who claimed they originally belonged to Roy Rogers. Are they of any value?
A: Emil Helge Bohlin (1895-1980) was a Swedish immigrant who came to the United States in 1912. By 1916 he was working with a blacksmith in Cody, Wyo., making buckles, bits and spurs. In 1920 he opened a shop and made leather goods as well as buckle sets. He moved to Hollywood in the early 1920s and opened Hollywood Novelty and Leather Shop, where he made silver and leather goods. The business was renamed Edward H. Bohlin Inc., by 1926, and he started marking his pieces, “Bohlinmade, Hollywood, California.” Many Hollywood stars, including Roy Rogers, bought silver and leather goods from Bohlin. Bohlin’s company, still in business, is now in Los Angeles. Bohlin chaps have sold at auction recently for prices ranging from under $500 for a simple pair with no decoration to over $2,000. More elaborate pairs sell for much more. So would a pair once owned by Roy Rogers – but you would have to prove it
Tip: Avoid hanging your sports pennants in direct sunlight. They fade rapidly. Even indirect sunlight can fade felt. Display pennants in frames under UV glass. Avoid thumbtacks, which leave rusty holes.
Terry Kovel and Kim Kovel answer questions sent to the column. By sending a letter with a question, you give full permission for use in the column or any other Kovel forum. Names, addresses or email addresses will not be published. We cannot guarantee the return of photographs, but if a stamped envelope is included, we will try. The amount of mail makes personal answers or appraisals impossible. Write to Kovels, Auction Central News, King Features Syndicate, 300 W. 57th St., New York, NY 10019.
CURRENT PRICES
Current prices are recorded from antiques shows, flea markets, sales and auctions throughout the United States. Prices vary in different locations because of local economic conditions.
Kovels’ A Diary: How to Settle a Collector’s Estate. Our new week-by-week record of the settlement of an estate, from your first days gathering legal papers to the last days when you’re dividing antiques among heirs and selling everything else – even the house. How to identify pottery, jewelry and other popular collectibles. Tips on where and how to sell furniture, jewelry, dishes, figurines, record albums, bikes and even clothes. We include lots of pictures and prices and explain the advantages of a house sale, auction, selling to a dealer or donating to a charity. Learn about how to handle the special problems of security and theft. Plus a free current supplement with useful websites, auctions lists and other current information. Available only from Kovels for $19.95 plus $4.95 postage and handling. Order by phone at 800-303-1996, online at Kovels.com, or write to Kovels, P.O. Box 22900, Beachwood, OH 44122.
The hat comes off this Uncle Sam stein and his head can be filled with beer. This red, white and blue Schierholz example sold for $5,040 in 2014 at Fox Auctions of Vallejo, Calif.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s marble sculpture ‘Adam’ by Tullio Lombardo (ca. 1455–1532). Metropolitan Museum of Art image. NEW YORK – The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s marble sculpture Adam by Tullio Lombardo (circa 1455–1532) will return to public view on Tuesday, Nov. 11, following a major accident in 2002 and an unprecedented 12-year conservation project.
It is the first life-size nude marble statue since antiquity and the most important Italian Renaissance sculpture in North America. Tullio carved Adam in the early 1490s for the monumental tomb of doge Andrea Vendramin, now in the church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo, Venice, and it is the only signed sculpture from that iconic monument. The sculpture and its restoration will be the focus of “Tullio Lombardo’s Adam: A Masterpiece Restored,” the inaugural installation in the museum’s new Venetian Sculpture Gallery.
Thomas P. Campbell, director and CEO of the Metropolitan Museum, said, “We are proud to return this great Tullio sculpture to public view in a beautiful new gallery. Our extraordinary conservators collaborated with a team of experts over 12 years to pursue this extremely challenging work. The results of their care and innovation are stunning.”
The installation of this gallery was made possible by Assunta Sommella Peluso, Ignazio Peluso, Ada Peluso and Romano I. Peluso.
On the evening of Oct. 6, 2002, the pedestal supporting Tullio Lombardo’s 15th-century marble Adam collapsed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Vélez Blanco Patio. The sculpture, which has been in the museum’s permanent collection since 1936, was severely damaged. The Metropolitan Museum made a commitment to undertake a conservation project that would, to the fullest extent possible, return the statue to its original appearance. After 12 years of painstaking and pioneering conservation research and treatment, augmented by curatorial research, Tullio Lombardo’s restored masterpiece Adam will be unveiled in a new gallery specially created for this occasion.
The Metropolitan Museum, renowned for the depth of its curatorial, conservation, and scientific resources, was able to embark on this uniquely challenging restoration project by assembling a team of skilled and dedicated conservators, scientists, engineers and imaging experts from both inside and outside the museum. Their analysis, testing, and treatment have yielded a beautifully restored statue. The project has also resulted in significant advances in the field of sculpture conservation, which will be presented in this exhibition and in the 2014 volume of the Metropolitan Museum Journal.
Tullio Lombardo’s Adam
Tullio Lombardo came from a renowned northern Italian family of sculptors and architects. He carved Adam in the early 1490s for the tomb of Andrea Vendramin, doge of Venice. The monument is the most lavish of its kind, designed to resemble an ancient Roman triumphal arch, incorporating both classicizing and biblical reliefs and statuary. Tullio’s nude was inspired by idealizing ancient sculpture, but the sculptor subtly unbalanced Adam’s pose to show that he was not just God’s first perfect human being, but also the anxious victim of the Serpent’s wiles. Adam conveys the story of the Fall of Man, which with the images of Christ the Redeemer made him a suitable subject for a tomb monument. In this way, the memorial to an exemplary individual also meditates on humanity’s essential faults and its ability to overcome them. Adam originally stood in the niche to the left of Vendramin’s casket and effigy, which is now occupied by a helmeted warrior; a figure of Eve was meant for the other niche.
The tomb was originally located in Santa Maria dei Servi, but was moved to the basilica of Santi Giovanni e Paolo in the 1810s, where it remains. By 1821, Adam had been taken off the monument and brought to the Vendramin Calergi palace. In 1844 the Duchess of Berry bought the palace and its contents, and Adam remained with her descendants until 1931. By then Adam was in Paris, where the banker Henry Pereire acquired it. His widow sold the sculpture to an art dealer in 1935, and the museum purchased it the following year to much fanfare. Adam was displayed in several different Met galleries until the accident in 2002.
Conservation and Scientific Discoveries
On impact, Adam broke into 28 large pieces and hundreds of smaller fragments. Fortunately, the head, face, and torso were relatively unscathed in the fall. The arms, which bore the brunt of the impact, the lower legs, and the decorative tree trunk suffered major damage. From the outset, it was clear that the treatment of the broken sculpture would be a formidable project, posing an unusual series of challenges with little in the way of past practice to draw on. The conservators had to find a method that would limit handling of the sculpture and position the heavy fragments precisely without abrading the fresh, vulnerable break edges. The importance of Adam warranted critical evaluation of the use of pins and adhesives traditionally used by conservators and an investigation into less invasive and more reversible approaches. Historically, the reassembly of large-scale sculpture has relied on the use of multiple iron or steel pins, supplemented, more recently, by structural adhesives such as epoxies. Shortly after the accident, the museum’s conservators, conservation scientists, and curators, supported by an outside team of materials scientists and engineers, began an unprecedented multidisciplinary collaboration to determine the best course of treatment for the sculpture. The methods developed from this effort ultimately provided a new model for best practices and standards in the conservation of large stone sculpture.
Investigations began in 2003 with three-dimensional laser scanning of the major fragments. The laser scans led to a variety of research avenues including finite element analysis, a computer-based structural engineering investigation, which informed the team about the stresses and strains in the sculpture as well as the nature of the breaks. Extensive research and testing never before conducted on conservation materials was carried out to determine the best adhesives and pinning materials for the treatment. The innovative treatment of the sculpture followed, giving special attention to the use of mock-ups and empirical studies carried out in an effort to minimize handling of the fragile break surfaces on the sculpture. The fresh breaks to the Carrara marble posed several challenges to the conservators, and required them to diverge from traditional sculpture conservation techniques. For example, an external armature was developed that was sufficiently substantial to support the assembled sculpture without adhesive. The armature not only supported the sculpture during assembly but also served as the method of clamping the fragments once adhesive was applied. The related article in the Metropolitan Museum Journal summarizes the research, drilling and pinning techniques, and how the armature was conceived, constructed and utilized.
Following the structural work, the sculpture was carefully cleaned to remove surface grime that had accumulated over the years. Areas of loss were filled and toned to match the surrounding marble. The final stages of the treatment transformed the appearance of this damaged work of art so that it can once again be appreciated as a masterpiece of Renaissance art.
The Met’s New Venetian Sculpture Gallery
Adam’s return to public view coincides with the inauguration of a new gallery for Venetian and northern Italian sculpture. Adam will be exhibited there alone and in the round for nearly eight months, accompanied by an in-depth account of its conservation on digital screens and text panels. Afterward, Adam will become the focal point of this permanent gallery, in a niche inspired by its original location on the tomb monument. It will be joined by highlights of the Met’s sculpture from this period, including Cristoforo Solari’s Saint Catherine of Alexandria, which was purchased with the new gallery in mind.
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s marble sculpture ‘Adam’ by Tullio Lombardo (ca. 1455–1532). Metropolitan Museum of Art image.
Early 1900s postcard view published by the Detroit Photographic Company of the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument in downtown Indianapolis. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. INDIANAPOLIS (AP) – Repairs to the Soldiers and Sailors Monument in downtown Indianapolis are going to take months longer to complete than first thought, an official said.
Crews erected scaffolding along the lower levels of two sides of the 112-year-old tower late week. They planned to repair leaks in the limestone and the monument’s bronze figures by late November, but the damage was more extensive than first thought, Indiana War Memorial Commission director Stewart Goodwin told WISH-TV.
“It’s something that does have a safety consideration,” he said. “Something could fall off of there – a piece of bronze or piece of stone.”
Goodwin said electrical workers will still be able to string thousands of lights on the monument for the city’s annual Circle of Lights festivities for the Christmas season that starts Nov. 28.
At least some scaffolding is expected to remain up through the Christmas season, since it cost $50,000 to construct the sections now in place. Goodwin said contractors will put more scaffolding up after Christmas around all four sides of the monument to look for additional damage.
“Right now, we’re in the investigative mode and we’re trying to solve what needs to be done and how we’re going to take care of that,” he said. “So there’s no way to know for a few months how much fixing the monument will cost.”
The observation deck of the 284-foot-tall tower and its gift shop were closed once crews started putting up scaffolding on Oct. 27.
Numerous repairs have been made to the monument in recent years, most notably in 2011, when the 38-foot-tall bronze sculpture named Victory atop the tower was taken down for about five months of restoration work.
The tower was completed in 1902 as a monument to Indiana’s military veterans, including more than 200,000 who served in Union forces during the Civil War.
Goodwin said the new goal is to have the monument repairs finished before next May’s Indy 500 activities start.
“It’s the kind of thing where you think you’ve got a home project that you can do on one Saturday afternoon and three weekends later you’re still working on it,” he said.
Copyright 2014 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-11-07-14 1848GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGES OF NOTE
Early 1900s postcard view published by the Detroit Photographic Company of the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument in downtown Indianapolis. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Detail of a Diego Rivera fresco at the Detroit Institute of Art. Image by Carptrash (talk). This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license. DETROIT (AP) – A judge cleared Detroit to emerge from bankruptcy Friday, approving a hard-fought turnaround plan with a fervent plea to the people of this one-time industrial powerhouse to “move past your anger” and help fix the Motor City.
“What happened in Detroit must never happen again,” federal Judge Steven Rhodes said in bringing the case to a close a relatively speedy 16 months after Detroit – the cradle of the auto industry – became the biggest city in U.S. history to file for bankruptcy.
The plan calls for cutting the pensions of 12,000 non-public safety retirees by 4.5 percent, erasing $7 billion of debt and spending $1.7 billion to demolish thousands of blighted buildings, make the city safer and improve long-neglected basic services.
Rhodes praised decisions that settled the most contentious issues in the case, including a deal to prevent the sale of world-class art at the Detroit Institute of Arts and a consensus that prevented pension cuts from getting even worse. He said the pension deal “borders on the miraculous,” though he acknowledged the cuts could still cause severe misfortune for many who have been trying to get by on less than $20,000 a year.
Politicians and civic leaders, including Republican Gov. Rick Snyder, hailed Friday’s milestone as a fresh start for the city. It was Snyder who agreed with state-appointed emergency manager Kevyn Orr to take the city into Chapter 9, a drastic, last-ditch move that he promoted during his fall re-election campaign.
Detroit was brought down by a combination of factors, including corruption and mismanagement at City Hall, a long decline in the auto industry, and a flight to the suburbs that caused the population to plummet to 688,000 from 1.2 million in 1980. The exodus has turned entire neighborhoods into desolate, boarded-up landscapes.
With more square miles than Manhattan, Boston and San Francisco combined, Detroit didn’t have enough tax revenue to cover pensions, retiree health insurance and buckets of debt sold to keep the budget afloat.
“Detroit’s inability to provide adequate municipal services runs deep and has for years. It is inhumane and intolerable, and it must be fixed,” the judge said.
In signing off on the plan, Rhodes appealed to residents who expressed sorrow and disgust about the city’s woes.
“Move past your anger. Move past it and join in the work that is necessary to fix this city,” he said. “Help your city leaders do that. It is your city.”
With Orr’s term over and the city recently returned to the control of elected officials, “It is now time to restore democracy to the people,” the judge said.
The case concluded in lightning speed by bankruptcy standards. The success was largely due to a series of deals between Detroit and major creditors, especially retirees who agreed to accept smaller pension checks after Rhodes said they had no protection under the Michigan Constitution. Also, bond insurers with more than $1 billion in claims eventually dropped their push to sell off art and settled for much less.
It took more than two years for a smaller city, Stockton, Calif., to get out of bankruptcy. San Bernardino, a California city even smaller than Stockton, is still operating under Chapter 9 protection more than two years after filing.
Rhodes had to accept Detroit’s remedy or reject it in full, not pick pieces. His appointed expert, Martha “Marti” Kopacz of Boston, said it was “skinny” but “feasible,” and she linked any future success to the skills of the mayor and City Council and a badly needed overhaul of technology at City Hall.
The most unusual feature of the plan is an $816 million pot of money funded by the state, foundations, philanthropists and the Detroit Institute of Arts. The money will forestall even deeper pension cuts and avert the sale of city-owned art at the museum – a step the judge warned “would forfeit Detroit’s future.”
Mayor Mike Duggan, in office less than a year, is the fourth mayor since 2008, when Kwame Kilpatrick resigned in a scandal. A dreadful debt deal under Kilpatrick that locked Detroit into a high interest rate when rates were falling during the recession contributed to the bankruptcy.
Detroit Regional Chamber President and CEO Sandy K. Baruah declared Detroit to be “on the cusp of a new era and primed to reinvent itself in a way many people did not think possible.”
“Exiting bankruptcy so effectively and thoughtfully has wiped out decades of mismanagement and created a historic opportunity to move the city without mortgaging its future,” Baruah said.
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Copyright 2014 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-11-08-14 0406GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
Detail of a Diego Rivera fresco at the Detroit Institute of Art. Image by Carptrash (talk). This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license.
‘Shepherdess Bringing in Sheep,’ Camille Pissaro, oil on canvas, 1886. Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art, University of Oklahoma. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Paintings.
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) – A national board said it won’t investigate the accreditation status of the University of Oklahoma’s art museum, where a hangs.
The 1886 piece, called Shepherdess Bringing In Sheep, is currently on display at the Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art, The Oklahoman reported.
Leone Meyer of France claims she is the rightful heir to the art she said was stolen from her family by the Nazis during World War II. She is suing the university to have the painting returned.
The school maintains it’s the rightful owner of the painting. It was bequeathed by an oil tycoon’s wife, who bought the art with her husband in 1956 at a New York gallery. She donated it to the college among more than 30 other works valued at around $50 million.
OU has refused to return the work to Meyer, citing a previous Swiss court ruling that denied the family’s claim based on a technicality. It doesn’t dispute that the painting was stolen by Nazis.
Oklahoma state Rep. Mike Reynolds, R-Oklahoma City, asked the American Alliance of Museums last week in a letter to investigate the museum’s accreditation status. The board said it won’t because of ongoing litigation.
“The accreditation commission is not a legal body,” Alliance President Ford Bell said.
Copyright 2014 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-11-07-14 2011GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
‘Shepherdess Bringing in Sheep,’ Camille Pissaro, oil on canvas, 1886. Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art, University of Oklahoma. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Paintings.
NEW YORK – The Art Fair Company has announced that it has changed the name of the Metro Show to Metro Curates. “We believe that the new name best reflects the curatorial aims of the fair,” said Fair Director Caroline Kerrigan. “Last year, we asked each of the participating galleries to create a booth based on a single artist or themed exhibit of works. From their enthusiastic response, as well as from fair-attendees, we believe that Metro Curates best exemplifies the mission of the fair – to present singular viewpoints among exhibitions that cross genres in unexpected ways.”
Along with its new name, comes an exciting roster of new galleries. Among them are:
Forum Gallery (New York), American Garage (Los Angeles), Joshua Lowenfels Works of Art (New York), Aaron Galleries (Chicago), Leatherwood Antiques (Sandwich, Mass.), Marion Harris (New York), and Rebecca Hossack Art Gallery (New York, London).
Returning to the fold are: American Primitive (New York), The Ames Gallery (Berkeley, Calif.), Carl Hammer Gallery (Chicago), Cavin-Morris Gallery (New York), David Richard Gallery (Santa Fe, N.M.), Douglas Dawson Gallery (Santa Fe, N.M.), Gail Martin Gallery (New York), Gemini Antiques (New York), Hill Gallery (Birmingham, Mich.), Jeff R. Bridgman American Antiques (York, Pa.), Just Folk (Los Angeles), Kathryn Markel Fine Arts (New York), M. Finkel & Daughter (Philadelphia), Mindy Solomon Gallery (St. Petersburg, Fla.), Ricco Maresca Gallery (New York), Steven S. Powers (New York), Stephen Romano Gallery (New York), William Siegal Gallery (Santa Fe, N.M.) and Clifford A. Wallach (Manalapan, N.J.).
In keeping with its celebration of living with art in all its forms, Jack Lenor Larsen will present the LongHouse Award for Design Excellence for best booth design. “We are honored to have Jack Lenor Larsen select the best- designed booth among the participating dealers,” Ms. Kerrigan said in announcing the award.
Metro Curates embraces a wide range of offerings that include ethnographic material, applied and decorative arts, and historic to contemporary textiles, combined with modern and contemporary fine art and design. “From the outset our aim has been to illustrate the intellect, beauty, and vision in American arts and design, while placing it in a context that is both more contemporary and international,” said Kerrigan.
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The Opening Night Preview is Wednesday, January 21, from 6:00 to 9:00 PM. The show opens to the public on Thursday, January 22. Hours are Thursday, January 22: 11:00 AM to 7:00 PM; Friday, January 23: 11:00 AM to 7:00 PM; Saturday, January 24: 11:00 AM to 7:00 PM; Sunday, January 25: 12 noon – 5:30 pm. General admission is $20 per person; a multi-day pass is $35 per person.
The first Hasselblad camera body and Zeiss lens carried into orbit by Wally Schirra on Mercury-Atlas 8. RR Auction image. HOUSTON (AP) – One day about 50 years ago, according to legend, astronaut Wally Schirra walked into a Houston camera store and changed how humanity viewed itself.
That’s because Schirra bought a Hasselblad 500C camera, a state-of-the-art model used by professional photographers, to take in space. And during his October 1962 flight, Schirra snapped some of the earliest glamour shots of Earth.
“For the first time an astronaut didn’t bring a camera into space just to record data,” Robert Pearlman, one of the country’s leading experts on space collectibles, told the Houston Chronicle. “This camera was brought to capture images of the Earth to share with the world.”
Schirra’s successful modification of an off-the-shelf Hasselblad led to a long relationship between NASA and the Swedish camera company, and nearly all of the iconic Apollo photos from the moon were taken by astronauts using modified Hasselblads.
For these reasons, Pearlman says, there will be considerable excitement around the Nov. 13 auction of Schirra’s Hasselblad, both from space and photo buffs.
The Boston-based auction house, RR Auction, plans to announce the camera auction Tuesday. Although the firm has set a preliminary estimate of $50,000 to $100,000 for the camera, Pearlman, who runs the website CollectSpace, believes the Hasselblad will fetch considerably more, perhaps as much as $1 million.
Schirra was the fifth American astronaut to reach space, flying in a Mercury capsule that made six orbits before splashing into the Pacific Ocean.
During the initial U.S. spaceflights – the first two of which lasted only about 15 minutes – NASA was more concerned about getting its astronauts home in one piece than taking pretty pictures. The space agency, in a race with the Soviet Union, focused on achievements, not public relations activities.
Until Schirra’s flight the astronauts had no cameras, or inexpensive ones. In February 1962, when he became the first American to reach orbit, John Glenn brought a 35mm camera into space. But in terms of photograph quality the Hasselblad, a $450 camera at the time, was a game changer because its wider images captured more of the Earth’s curvature.
“Wally had a personal interest in photography, much more so than some of the other astronauts,” Pearlman said. “He wanted to share the experience with the world.”
Until his death in 2007 Schirra maintained the story that he bought the Hasselblad in a Houston camera store. Although there’s no receipt or official documentation to back that up, Schirra’s account makes sense, Pearlman said.
During the Mercury missions NASA was in the process of moving control of human spaceflight from Langley Research Center in Virginia to Houston. Schirra’s family moved to Houston in 1961, and his flight was the first one in which the city welcomed an astronaut back home.
Schirra’s flight laid the groundwork for future missions during the Gemini program in which astronauts began taking photographs of other astronauts in space, especially outside the capsule during spacewalks.
“The public was fascinated by those pictures of humans in space,” said Jennifer Levasseur, a curator of photography at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.
“There’s a realization at NASA that it’s not only important to take pictures of Earth but people too, because that’s what people can relate to.”
That leads directly to the iconic images of Apollo astronauts on the moon, most of whom left their cameras on the lunar surface. To conserve weight for the trip back to Earth they only brought back the camera’s magazine that held the film.
The camera, including the lens, body and film magazine, up for auction has been verified by both packing lists for the Mercury flights as well as photographic documentation. According to Pearlman, the lens being auctioned flew on both Mercury 8, Schirra’s flight, and Mercury 9, which carried Gordon Cooper. There is definitive evidence the camera body flew on Mercury 8, but it’s not certain the camera body flew on Mercury 9. The film magazine attached to the camera flew on Mercury 9.
After his 34-hour flight Cooper kept the camera, and sold it to a private buyer in 1995. Bobby Livingston, an official with the auction house, said he has documents written by Cooper at the time of the sale. Cooper died in 2004.
Until 2012 the legality of astronauts selling their personal artifacts was murky, but that year President Barack Obama signed a law granting NASA’s Mercury, Gemini and Apollo crew members “full ownership rights” to the artifacts they kept from more than 40 years ago.
“Articles that flew on Mercury that are in private hands are very rare, and actual equipment flown aboard the vehicles is incredibly rare,” Pearlman said. “For space artifact collectors this represents a very early example of space equipment.”
Copyright 2014 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-11-07-14 1724GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGES OF NOTE
The first Hasselblad camera body and Zeiss lens carried into orbit by Wally Schirra on Mercury-Atlas 8. RR Auction image.Astronaut Wally Schirra with the Hasselblad camera. RR Auction image.
