THOMASTON, Maine – Thomaston Place Auction Galleries’ Three-Day Winter Auction on Feb. 16, 17 and 18 will present an incredible array of traditional and modern artwork, antiques, decorative items and ethnographic artifacts that will warm the hearts of collectors, decorators and dealers worldwide. Absentee and Internet bidding is available through LiveAuctioneers.
Thomaston Place owner and auctioneer Kaja Veilleux noted: “Our first sale of 2018 has us branching out to new fields of art and antiques, while at the same time introducing a newly designed auction hall. I hope everyone will join us for great auction.”
An important Jasper Francis Cropsey (New York, 1823-1900) painting titled Gray’s Elegy at Stoke Poges, Kent (actually Stoke Poges Buckinghamshire), inspired by the poem by English poet Thomas Gray, will lead the sale (est. $200,000-$300,000). Cropsey, who resided in the UK between 1856 and 1863, created several works depicting the picturesque church at Stoke Poges.
Paintings by Charles Walter Simpson (UK, 1885-1971), William Aiken Walker (South Carolina/Maryland, 1838-1921), Franklin Brooke Voss (New York, 1880-1953), Thomas Cowperthwaite Eakins (Pennsylvania, 1844-1916), Walt Kuhn (New York/California, 1877-1949), and James Taylor Harwood (Utah/California, 1860-1940) will also be featured in the auction.
On Friday, the auction focus will be on two fine collections – a recently discovered cache of perfectly preserved modern art from a Camden, Maine, estate, including works by a veritable who’s who of important late 20th-century contemporary artists; plus an extensive group of fine Inuit-crafted antiquities, art and artifacts, ranging from ancient tools and ceremonial items to contemporary sculptures. Best of all, everything on this day will be sold unreserved.
In addition to the many original works and signed fine art prints, the contemporary art collection includes many artist-signed exhibition posters, suggesting that the owner personally knew many of the artists, both American and European.
The 333-lots of Inuit artifacts will be led by two nicely patinated 19th Century carved wooden shamanic masks presented on metal museum stands.
On Saturday, the sale will include important fine art and antiques. In addition to the works by Cropsey, Simpson, Eakins, and Harwood, there will be an important elephant folio engraving by John James Audubon , Red Headed Woodpecker, Plate 27 from the Havell Edition of Birds of Americ” (est. $3,000-$5,000).
The 69-lot group of fine Asian antiques will include a framed panel of a circa 1730 embroidered silk panel of a Buddhist dance robe, probably made for use at court during the reign of the Yongzheng emperor (est. $5,000-$10,000).
Many pieces of antique furniture will be presented on Saturday, including an 18th-century American Queen Anne cherry highboy (est. $8,000-12,000).
The marine category will feature the Edmund P. Skillin Collection of scrimshaw and antique nautical items (including several pieces from his friend, Arctic explorer Rear Adm. Donald MacMillan), which has been on loan to a Maine museum for the past 35 years.
On Sunday, the auction will focus on jewelry and fine and decorative items of the late 19th and 20th centuries, including a Viennese gilt 900-silver, enamel and rock crystal compote (above); a five-piece sterling silver tea and coffee set by Georg Jensen (est. $6,000-$9,000); a 1931 Louis Vuitton crinoline trunk with lift out basket (est. $6,000-$8,000); and a 19th-century framed KPM porcelain plaque depicting a penitent Mary Magdalene (below).
There will be a collection of clocks, led by a 19th-century Viennese enameled figural table clock with globe form case enclosing a horizontally mounted fusee clock (est. $7,500-$10,000.
The Sunday furniture collection will include a Wooton desk in American walnut with raised burled panels (est. $3,000-$5,000) and an L. & J.G. Stickley seven-slat back settee in quartersawn oak (est. $2,000-$3,000).
The auction will begin at 11 a.m. Eastern time each day.
Call Thomaston Place Auction Galleries at 207-354-8141 for more information, or to reserve seats in the auction hall.
[av_button label=’View the fully illustrated catalog and bid on LiveAuctioneers.’ link=’manually,http://bit.ly/2icym2B’ link_target=’_blank’ size=’medium’ position=’center’ icon_select=’no’ icon=’ue800′ font=’entypo-fontello’ color=’theme-color’ custom_bg=’#444444′ custom_font=’#ffffff’ admin_preview_bg=” av_uid=’av-vilhr0′]