Antiques, Collectibles and Auction News

SOTHEBY’S SPRING 2008 SALES OF CONTEMPORARY ART IN NEW YORK ON MAY 14-15TH TO FEATURE IMPORTANT WORKS BY FRANCIS BACON,
MARK ROTHKO, ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG AND
JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT, AMONG MANY OTHERS
 
WORKS FROM THE COLLECTION OF HELGA AND WALTHER LAUFFS, ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT GERMAN PRIVATE COLLECTIONS OF CONTEMPORARY ART TO EVER APPEAR […]

FIRST MAJOR U.S. EXHIBITION IN 20 YEARS
TO RETHINK ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM,
ACTION/ABSTRACTION:
 POLLOCK, DE KOONING, AND AMERICAN ART, 1940-1976,
OPENS AT THE JEWISH MUSEUM ON MAY 4
NEW YORK, NY - The Jewish Museum will present Action/Abstraction: Pollock, de Kooning, and American Art, 1940-1976 from May 4 through September 21, 2008.  In the […]

On May 14-15, 2008, Sotheby’s will feature the work of a number of renowned Indian artists in its spring sales of Contemporary Art in New York. Highlighting the sales are works by Subodh Gupta, Anish Kapoor, Rameshwar Broota, T.V. Santosh, Chintan Upadhyay, Riyas Komu, Raqib Shaw and Bose Krishnamachari. In October 2007, Sotheby’s set a record for any Indian work of art sold at auction when Raqib Shaw’s Garden of Earthly Delights III sold for $5.4 million (over £2.7 million) in its Contemporary Evening Art sale in London (£400/600,000).

New York – Following a record breaking year for the category, Christie’s Latin American Sale will continue the momentum by staging its largest sale yet on May 28-29 in New York, expected to realize in excess of $30 million. With more than 320 paintings and sculptures included in the two-day auction, the sale is particularly strong covering Mexican and Cuban schools, and major artists including, Diego Rivera, Rufino Tamayo, Fernando Botero, Leonora Carrington, Claudio Bravo, Alfredo Ramos Martínez, Mario Carreño and others.

Today in a crowded salesroom, the only known “Shoeless” Joe Jackson Signature Model “Black Betsy” Game Bat Dating From His Major League Career sold for $301,000 to an American private collector. The bat was the highlight of Sotheby’s and SCP Auctions’ sale of Important Sports Memorabilia and Cards, which brought $2,518,130. Also among the top lots in the sale was the 1915 Cracker Jack Baseball Card Complete Set of (176) In Original Cracker Jack Album, which sold to applause for $157,000 (est. $50/75,000).

Sotheby’s spring Day sale of Contemporary Art on May 15th, 2008, will feature Ed Ruscha’s I Don’t Want No Retro Spective, 1979, an iconic work which recounts a fascinating story about the artist and the American actor, Bud Cort, arguably best known for his iconic role in the 1971 American film classic Harold and Maude opposite Ruth Gordon (est. $1/1.5 million). Immortalized on the cover for Edward Ruscha’s monumental 1982 retrospective, which originated at the San Francisco Museum of Art and later traveled to the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, I Don’t Want No Retro Spective will be the cover lot of the upcoming sale. Ruscha presented I Don’t Want No Retro Spective to his friend Bud Cort following Cort’s near-death accident on the Hollywood Freeway in 1979. Ruscha gave the work to the actor on his hospital bed, yet the phrase depicted, ‘I Don’t Want No Retro Spective,’ goes back several years earlier, when the pair was having dinner together at a Los Angeles restaurant. As Cort recalls, Ruscha had just returned from a show in Switzerland where he had mentioned that he had come across a theatre that was screening three of Bud’s films - Brewster McCloud, Harold and Maude and Why Shoot the Teacher? - and referred to it as somewhat of a ‘Cort retrospective’. In response, the actor paused then proclaimed, “I don’t want no retro spective”. Ruscha found this statement so amusing that he decided to memorialize it in one of his works, waiting for the appropriate moment to surprise Mr. Cort.

This morning, Sotheby’s London announced the sale in July of one of the most important oil paintings by J.M.W. Turner to come to the market in living memory. Pope’s Villa at Twickenham is an exceptional landscape view of Alexander Pope’s villa on the banks of the River Thames at Twickenham and since its exhibition at Turner’s gallery in 1808; the masterpiece has made only one appearance on the open market in 1827 – some 181 years ago. The painting, which is one of only a handful of major works by Turner that has remained in private hands, has hung at Sudeley Castle in Gloucestershire in recent decades and is now being sold by the Trustees of the late G.M. Dent-Brocklehurst. It is expected to fetch £5/7 million ($9.6/13.8 million) when it is sold in the Old Master Paintings Evening Sale in London on Wednesday, July 9, 2008.

The painting will be on view at Sotheby’s in New York with our major spring sales, beginning Friday, May 2, 2008.

The spring sale of African, Oceanic & Pre-Columbian Art is built around an historic offering from several distinguished private collections. The 163 lots offered are estimated to sell for $4.7/6.7 million and will be on exhibition at Sotheby’s New York prior to the auction from May 10th through May 15th.

Highlighting the sale from The Dinhofer Collection is A Magnificent and Highly Important Baga Serpent (est. $1.5/2 million), a great sculptural object from The Republic of Guinea. This monumental clan insignia was collected in 1957, just prior to the country’s independence, by art dealers Henri and Hélène Kamer. By 1961, the serpent was sold by the Kamers to the gallery of one of the most important dealers of 20th century art: Pierre Matisse, the son of Henri Matisse. In Matisse’s gallery on East 57th Street in New York, the Baga Serpent was exhibited alongside works by Joan Miró and various group shows of contemporary artists including Wifredo Lam, Jean Dubuffet and Alberto Giacometti. The Baga Serpent may have influenced the work of Alexander Calder, who frequented the gallery.

Selections from The Walter and Molly Bareiss Collection of African Art include A Superb and Important Songye Community Power Figure, which was collected in situ by Gaston Heenen, Governor of Katanga, before 1937 (est. $250/350,000); an offering of African treasures from The Bohlen Collection is highlighted by A Baule Male Figure, attributed to one of the Masters of Sakassou (est. $60/90,000). Works of Oceanic and Pre-Columbian Art will also be offered.

First ever sale of musical instruments and related books, autographs and manuscripts at Bloomsbury Auctions
Rome, 23 April 2008
Bloomsbury Auctions is pleased to announce its first ever sale of Musical Instruments and related works on paper to take place in Rome on Wednesday, May 7th. The Claude Lebet collection of musical […]

Let your imagination run wild at Scienceworks latest exhibition
Have you ever wanted to create your own ingenious inventions? Imagination Factory - Invent and Play is a new exhibition coming to Scienceworks that is set to inspire visitors to imagine, invent and play. 
With dozens of hands-on interactive exhibits, this exhibition will have the gears of […]