Innholdsfortegnelse for March-April 2021/ No. 56 i American Fine Art Magazine

Welcome spring! At our headquarters here in Scottsdale, Arizona, as we are reading through the final proofs before American Fine Art Magazine’s March/April issue goes to press, one thing that shines through is the variety of art available to be purchased and to be seen. With museums opening, the shows are stacking up for collectors. In the pages, we bring amazing imagery and editorial for you including the Vose Galleries exhibition Sensations of Spring and Hawthorne Fine Art’s Views Across and Beyond: Important Works on Paper, to name a few gallery shows. As for museums exhibitions, we present Blakelock: By the Light of the Moon at the Figge Art Museum, Our Good Earth: Rural Life and American Art at the High Museum of Art and to expand horizons we have…

MARCH 12 Art of the West Heritage Auctions • Dallas, TX www.ha.com MARCH 13 Important Spring Auction Leland Little Auctions • Hillsborough, NC www.lelandlittle.com APRIL 8-10 Premier and Emporium Auctions Brunk Auctions • Asheville, NC www.brunkauctions.com APRIL 10 Scottsdale Art Auction Scottsdale Art Auction • Scottsdale, AZ www.scottsdaleartauction.com APRIL 16-18 Spring Estates Auction Neal Auction Company • New Orleans, LA www.nealauction.com APRIL 20 California Art Bonhams • Los Angeles, CA www.bonhams.com APRIL 22 African American Art Swann Auction Galleries • New York, NY www.swanngalleries.com APRIL 23 Illustration Art Heritage Auctions • Dallas, TX www.ha.com APRIL 27 California & American Fine Art Brunk Auctions • Monrovia, CA www.brunkauctions.com APRIL 29 Fine Art Auction Shannon’s Fine Art Auctioneers • Milford, CT www.shannons.com…

Georgia O’Keeffe: A Life Well Lived Photographs by Malcolm Varon with foreword by Cody Hartley and introduction by Barbara Buhler Lynes. (University of New Mexico Press, November 2021). Hardback with jacketed cloth, 112 pages with 64 color plates. $39.95. Georgia O’Keeffe is one of the most iconic figures in the American art world. Her long career spanned many subjects and mediums, but her life also has provided a sense of intrigue. In her early years, the budding artist gained recognition through Alfred Stieglitz, who had seen her charcoal drawings in 1916 and decided to mount an exhibition of her work at 291 without her permission. After their initial meeting, O’Keeffe and Stieglitz fell for one another and she quickly became his muse. Stieglitz photographed O’Keeffe between 1918 and 1925, with…

April 23-30 The Philadelphia Show info@phillyshow.org www.thephiladelphiashow.com The Philadelphia Art Museum is once again upholding their long tradition of engaging the public with top antiques and American fine art for The Philadelphia Show. While the event will be virtual this year, from April 23 to 30, there’s still much anticipation for work featured by over 50 new and returning dealers from across the country. Dealer’s such as Arader Galleries, Dixon-Hall Fine Art, Gemini Antiques, Glen Leroux Design and Hawthorne Fine Art, will present 20 works displayed through the museum’s online viewing room. “We expect to have the level of quality commensurate with the reputation of The Philadelphia Show and its 59-year history,” says show manager Huntley Platt. “The dealers always bring their freshest material to the [show], a treasure trove…

NEW YORK, NY SWANN AUCTION GALLERIES DECEMBER 10 African American Art $2.81 million Nine auction records were set during Swann Auction Galleries’ December 10 African American Art sale, including the highest-earning piece of the day, Charles Alston’s Black and White #8. The 1961 oil on canvas was the largest of the artist’s works to come to auction and was from his series of eight important pieces painted between 1959 and 1961. The painting, which had an estimate of $100,000 to $150,000, achieved $197,000. Also setting a record in the sale was Augusta Savage with her work Gamin, a plaster painted gold sculpture from around 1929. The piece, which had been acquired directly from the artist before coming to the auction block, sold for $112,500, against an estimate of $20,000 to…

One of my favorite things about the historic American art industry is the sense of community between collectors, dealers, museum curators, auction specialists and even the casual patrons. Everyone is always wanting to learn more, and the discourse about the rich history of art in America has only continued to grow and develop through the years. In shifting my role to executive editor of this publication, it will be my goal to have that community come alive through the pages of this magazine with engaging and relevant articles; previews of all the major upcoming gallery shows, museum exhibitions, auctions and events; and in-depth reports to highlight the strength of the market. This issue introduces a new feature titled Recent Arrivals to the gallery preview section of the magazine. In this…

Piercing the Inner Wall Mississippi Museum of Art presents Piercing the Inner Wall: The Art of Dusti Bongé, through May 23. The show, curated by Bradley Sumrall, Curator of the Collection, and organized by Ogden Museum of Southern Art, is an examination of the artist’s career from a regional and national perspective. The show situates her artwork into the larger context of 20th-century American art. It highlights her evolution from figurative and cubist depictions of her Mississippi home in the 1930s, through surrealism and to abstract expressionism in her mature work. The exhibition is timed with the release of the first major book devoted to the artist’s life: Dusti Bongé, Art and Life: Biloxi, New Orleans & New York. Helen Frankenthaler Late Works The innovation and creativity that persisted throughout…

While impressive auction results of historic American paintings and sculpture or an occasional celebrity collector may garner a newspaper headline now and then, there is no magazine, until now, that has offered complete and comprehensive coverage of the upcoming shows and events of this always-fascinating market that is so deeply tied to American history, society and culture. Previews of Upcoming Shows and Auctions The historic fine art of America’s greatest artists is in big demand and if you are serious about acquiring it, you need to know about it sooner so you can plan your collecting strategies. When you subscribe to American Fine Art Magazine you’ll know in advance what major works are coming to market because, every other month, you’ll have access to this valuable information when we email…

Imagine there are no images on these pages, no high-res renderings to catch your eye as you go by, hoping you’ll stop and dip into the essay. Imagine that’s the way it is. No images. Just these words. Or, perhaps, imagine the artworks on these pages as piles of smoldering ash and cinder. Or imagine them vanished, looted, replaced by other, less eclectic works, works that all pay tribute to some single figure of absolute authority. Or imagine that they were never there at all, the artworks in the United States Capitol, that there isn’t such a place, not anymore. Or that there never was. Apocryphally, though quoted incessantly, when Benjamin Franklin left the Constitutional Convention in 1787, a Mrs. Powell of Philadelphia asked him, “Well, Doctor, what have we…

Through March 19 Hawthorne Fine Art, LLC 135 E. 57th Street, 14th Floor New York, NY 10022 t: (212) 731-0550 www.hawthornefineart.com The breadth of watercolor painting techniques in 19thand 20th-century America can be seen in the exhibition Views Across and Beyond: Important Works on Paper, at Hawthorne Fine Art in New York, which is open by advanced appointment only. The 20 paintings were assembled by a private collector over three decades. Watercolor as a medium came into its own after the founding of the American Watercolor Society in 1866. A history of the society notes, “The Society wished to keep the quality of its membership high, but many top painters hesitated to join, because women had been allowed membership.” Ellen Robbins (1828-1905) was known for her floral paintings. One contemporary…

HILLSBOROUGH, NC LELAND LITTLE AUCTIONS MARCH 13 Important Spring Auction Leland Little Auctions will host its annual Important Spring Auction at 9 a.m. on March 13. The sale will include notable American artists, predominantly from the 20th century. One of the major highlights is a recently discovered early work by Joseph Christian Leyendecker titled Christ with Sainted Kings. The work by Leyendecker, who is known for his cover art for The Saturday Evening Post, is estimated to sell for $30,000 to $60,000. There will be two pieces available by Leyendecker contemporary Gerrit Beneker, who was known for painting working men in the industrial sector. His painting The Old Wharf, from 1925, was painted in Provincetown, Massachusetts, and is expected to sell between $5,000 and $10,000. A screen print titled After…

» Kanitra Fletcher has been named the first curator of African American and Afro-Diasporic art at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. Fletcher comes to the museum after serving as an associate curator at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. In her role at the National Gallery, Fletcher will oversee how Black art is presented. » The Metropolitan Museum of Art has announced the endowment of its directorship position through a donation from the Marina Kellen French Foundation and the Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Foundation. To recognize the gift, the role of director—of which Max Hollein has held since 2018—will be renamed Marina Kellen French Director immediately. The donation also provides support for general operating expenses. » The Smithsonian has scaled down its $2 billion construction project unveiled…

The best gifts are the ones that keep on giving, and by that measure the Hartford Steam Boiler Collection is a special one. In 2001, the Hartford Steam Boiler Inspection and Insurance Company made a generous and unprecedented gift of 190 pieces of art to the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, Connecticut. Now 20 years since that transformative donation, the museum is celebrating with a new examination of the collection. “For us, it’s really about looking forward, not back. The collection really connects with things that people find relevant today,” says curator Amy Kurtz Lansing, who adds that the collection is prompting new discussions about environmental issues, race and equality. “We celebrated the collection when it was 10 years old, so now that it’s 20 years old we thought…

FERN ISABEL COPPEDGE (1888-1915) Across the Delaware, New Hope Fern Isabel Coppedge was one of the few women to join the artists’ colony in New Hope, Pennsylvania. In 1918, she studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where she first became acquainted with the Pennsylvania Impressionists, popularly known as the New Hope School. Daniel Garber, who taught at the academy, introduced her to Bucks County. In 1920, she bought a 1773 two-story house across from Garber’s property in Lumberville. From her home, Coppedge had views of the Delaware River and the Lehigh Navigation Canal, scenery that inspired her subject matter. Across the Delaware, New Hope, painted in the 1920s, was done directly from nature, looking from New Jersey, across the Delaware River to the town of New Hope…

Through March 7 Canton Museum of Art 1001 Market Avenue North Canton, OH 44702 t: (330) 453-7666 www.cantonart.org The Canton Museum of Art in Ohio is currently displaying quite the significant exhibition of American impressionist work titled Dancing in the Light: Masterworks from the Age of American Impressionism. From 1878 through circa 1930, this unique exhibition traverses a turning point in American history and highlights some of the great impressionist painters of that time. “American impressionism emerged during an era bracketed by the Civil War and the Great Depression,” explains Christy Davis, curator of exhibitions at the Canton Museum of Art. “Such profound social and cultural change gave rise to American Impressionism, as the country also entered into a period of growth, national wealth and industry. There was a push…

April 9-10 Scottsdale Art Auction 7176 E. Main Street Scottsdale, AZ 85251 t: (480) 945-0225 www.scottsdaleartauction.com First-timers at a Western sale might think it’s all cowboys and cattle, and while there are plenty of works that show that part of the American West, there are also lots of other works that show the whole array of Western art, from mountain landscapes and scenes of Native American culture in the Southwest to wildlife and sporting art. Western art is an umbrella that shelters many genres. This is abundantly clear at a sale like Scottsdale Art Auction in Scottsdale, Arizona. This year’s sale, held over two sessions on April 9 and 10, will feature nearly 400 lots, all of which speak to the abundance of material that relates to the West. “This…

Sotheby’s fall American art sale in New York City produced steady results across a variety of works by classic American artists, which helped bring the sales total over $11 million. The December 11 sale featured works from many categories, from American illustration and Western images to impressionism and modernism. The top lot of the sale was Winslow Homer’s 1881 watercolor Two Girls on the Beach, Tynemouth (est. $2.5/3.5 million). The painting, with beautiful and vivid color on two figures standing amid a gloomy beach scene, landed just short of its low estimate when it closed at $2.4 million. Not far behind it in the sale was Mary Cassatt’s oil Children Playing with a Cat (est. $2/3 million) that landed within estimates at nearly $2.2 million. Though it sold at a…