LAKE WORTH BEACH, Fla. – Fans of American studio furniture artist Paul Evans (1931-1987) enjoyed an unusual opportunity at Palm Beach Modern Auctions (PBMA) on February 17. Offered as subsequent lots were a 1975 Paul Evans Stalagmite table and a set of six sculpted bronze side chairs. The signed and dated table, its base made from bronzed resin over steel, hammered for $21,000 ($26,800 with buyer’s premium) against an estimate of $9,000-$12,000, while the set of chairs, which were estimated at $25,000-$35,000, hammered for $50,000 ($64,000 with buyer’s premium). Full results for the auction can be seen at LiveAuctioneers.
Lurking in the lot images for each was a photograph of the May 1975 shipping order that dispatched them from Wisneski Furniture Delivery of Bayonne, New Jersey. The presence of this paperwork “bolstered the sale,” according to Wade Terwilliger, president of the auction house. “People who collected Paul Evans’ work in the 1960s and 1970s did so out of passion for the aesthetic and craftsmanship, and didn’t always keep receipts. The owners of the Stalagmite table and sculpted bronze chairs in our February 17th sale kept meticulous records and passed those on to their children,” he said. “We often have gallery provenance or correspondence, but the level of documentation accompanying these pieces is pretty rare.”
The shipping slip identified the table base as model PE102 and the chairs as model PE106. Though Paul Evans did not design the two as complementary furnishings, the consignor paired the table with the chairs in their home. “Though not specifically intended for use together, the table and chairs have a shared texture – so important to Evans’ pieces – that ties them together. There was a good deal of crossover bidding on the two lots, buyers intending to use them together,” Terwilliger said, and observed that bidding for both was “heated from all sources”. That intensity ultimately resulted in the table going home with one bidder and the chairs being claimed by another, an outcome that surprised Terwilliger.
He was unfazed by the chairs selling for more than the Stalagmite table, a Paul Evans form that he said is popular at auction in any size. “The chairs are quite a find, especially in sets of six or more – though this is an atypical set in that there were no captain’s chairs,” he said. “Typically, we’ve seen them sold as four or six side chairs plus two arm chairs. Maybe one or two sets come to auction per year, anywhere, and we were excited to offer these.”
