Rago's Fine Art Sales: May 2009 Two back to back sales of fine art at Rago Auctions. Friday, May 15th will be 19th and 20th Century American and European Art and Saturday, May 16th will be our sale of Post-War and Contemporary Art.
Cortes comes accompanied by a Certificate of Expertise & Authenticity from David Klein and is estimated at $15,000-20,000. A small and untitled Ralph Albert Blakelock landscape can be found at an estimate of $3,000-5,000. (It has been entered into the Nebraska Blakelock Inventory and assigned to Category II by Mr. Norman A. Geske.) Also of note is an untitled beachscape by Arthur Vidal Diehl with a presale estimate of $3,500- 4,500. Other artists represented by paintings here include Maurice Braun, Thomas A. De Decker, Tod Lindenmuth, Charles Green Shaw, Henry Pember Smith and Theodore Wores.
Rago’s will offer an elegant pencil on paper, ca. 1914, by Gustav Klimt. “Liebespaar nach rechts (Lovers)” is descended from the family of the artist, well-documented and offered with an estimate of $100,000-150,000. There is an archetypal gouache by Antonio Zoran Music, estimated at $15,000-20,000; a whimsical ink drawing by Marc Chagall (presale estimate $8,000-12,000), “Three Reclining Figures” by Henry Moore (presale estimate $25,000-35,000); and Fernand Leger’s “Les Deux Soldats” (presale estimate $20,000-30,000). A number of other fine works on paper vie for attention here, among them Charles Ephraim Burchfield’s “The Return of the Bluebirds, a pencil, ink and wash from 1952, examined by Burchfield scholar John W. Straus (presale estimate of $5,000-7,000); three lots of works on paper by Olaf Carl Wieghorst (presale estimate of $5,000-7,000); as well as the art of David Davidovich Burliuk and Walt Kuhn.
Rago’s strong reputation for works of American sculpture is only enhanced by this sale’s two fine bronzes by Frederick William MacMonnies, “Bacchante and Infant Faun” from 1894 (presale estimate $8,000-12,000) and the 1890 “Pan of Rohallion” (presale estimate $10,000-15,000). A muscular, figural bronze by Leonard Baskin is also of note, with an estimate of $8,000-12,000. There are two medals by Augustus Saint-Gaudens, as well as work by Antoine-Louis Barye, Beatrice Fenton, Eugen Gauss, Charles Henry Humphriss, Clio Hinton Huneker Bracken, Bonnie MacLeary, Edith Barretto Parsons and Hugo Robus.
Highlights among the prints include the pochoir “Sword Swallower” by Henri Matisse from the original edition of 100 of the Jazz portfolio ($9,000-12,000); Feme Couchee, a lithograph from a limited edition of 50 by Pablo Picasso (presale estimate $9,000-12,000); a 1641 Rembrandt van Rijn etching, “The Virgin and Child in the Clouds” for $4,000-6,000 (one of four by this artist in the sale); a Milton Avery woodcut entitled “Sailboat” (presale estimate $3,000-5,000); Nettie Blanche Lazzell’s woodcut “Cape Cod Cottage” (presale estimate $4,000-6,000); and more work from Picasso, as well as from Thomas Hart Benton, Georges Braque and Benton Murdoch Spruance.
Rago’s has also accepted a delightful selection of daguerreotypes and ambrotypes from a private collector. Many are occupational and, within this, medical. There are portraits of soldiers, Women's Rights activists, an African American nanny with her charge; children; animals; and gentlefolk, including a well-dressed man with both Star of David and cross.
Saturday, May 16th at Noon: Post-War and Contemporary Art
Rago’s Post-War and Contemporary sale rounds out the week of art auctions held in and around New
