Works by Picasso, Dali, Chagall at Baterbys, Feb. 7th About 270 original prints (many signed and/or numbered) by major 20th-century masters such as Dali, Picasso and Chagall will be sold at auction Feb. 7 by Baterbys Art Auction Gallery in Orlando, Fla.
News-Antique.com - Dec 19,2008 - (Orlando, Fla.) - About 270 original prints -- many of them signed and/or numbered, by major 20th-century masters like Salvador Dali, Pablo Picasso, Marc Chagall, Joan Miro and others -- will be sold at auction on Saturday, Feb. 7, by Baterbys Art Auction Gallery. The sale will be conducted live (and online), in the beautiful Pointe Orlando complex, located at 9101 International Drive in Orlando.
The auction will begin promptly at 2 p.m., with a one-hour preview from 1-2 p.m. The entire auctioneer's premium (10 percent of sales) will be donated to the Mission of Threshold Center for Autism in Winter Park, Fla. Baterbys will be moving into a new permanent gallery facility soon, also at Pointe Orlando. A grand opening is planned (date yet to be announced; watch baterbys.com for details).
One of the centerpieces of the auction promises to be a plate signed and numbered limited-edition lithograph by Salvador Dali, titled Etre Dieu (French for “Being God”). The plate, one of only 500 produced, is inspired from an “opera-poem” written by Dali himself and based on a libretto by Dali and Manuel Vasquez Montalban, with music by the French avant-garde musician Igor Wakhevitch.
Dali is the only painter to write a libretto for an opera-poem. Etre Dieu was first conceived in 1927 as a reflection of Dali's larger-than-life personality, and a collaboration with Federico Garcia Lorca, in Madrid, Spain. In 1974, Dali made a record of the opera in Paris. But he refused to follow Montalban's text word-for-word, declaring, “Dali never repeats himself.” Instead, he improvised.
Ultimately, Etre Dieu was produced as an audio-visual opera-poem in six parts, in 1985. The work features Dali as God and Brigitte Bardot as an artichoke. Also, Catherine the Great and Marilyn Monroe do a striptease. The 3-CD boxed set was published by German-label Eurostar, now out of business. It is so rare, only a few sets are known to exist (and it is not being offered at the Feb. 7 sale).
Another highlight of the sale will be about 25 original paintings by William Vincent Kirkpatrick (Fla./N.M., 1939-2004), from an estate of 200 artworks consigned to Baterbys. Born to Irish parents in St. Augustine, Fla., Kirkpatrick was an Impressionist painter of landscapes, florals, figures and Native American portraits. He also painted murals. He split his time between St. Augustine and Santa Fe, N.M.
In Santa Fe, Kirkpatrick was one of the Canyon Road artists, as well as the Taos artists not far away. He studied at Maitland Art College and later refined his craft under the noted artist-writer Alfred Morang, as well as Florida artist Tracy Lois Bartlett, who died earlier this year at age 106. A book of Kirkpatrick's rich and full life is soon to be published (and will be available online, at baterbys.com).
Also to be offered will be a collection of original prints and lithographs by Leonor Fini (French/Argentinian, 1908-1996), who studied and painted in the circle of Salvador Dali. Best know for her surreal female figures
