: Winter landscapes were the theme of the day, both inside and out,
as more than 150 bidders braved the weather to attend Freeman's
recent sale of fine paintings and sculpture.
Many more bidders elected to stay in the comfort of home, with
more than 625 phone bids executed over the course of the sale and
another 280 bidders participating through eBay Live Auctions.
The sale as a whole was one of the most successful ever at
Freeman's, reaching a total of $3,168,680. A total of 221 of the
day's 229 lots (96.5 percent) sold successfully, with nearly 60
percent exceeding high estimate. The gallery's senior vice
president Alasdair Nichol, who put together the sale along with
David Weiss, was spent but smiling at the close of the day.
Although the 230 lots took nearly four hours to sell, this was
certainly the type of sale every auctioneer loves to take. There
seemed to be a forest of hands shooting up for nearly every lot,
said Nichol. "We've reinforced Freeman's position as the
country's premier auction house for Pennsylvania Impressionists,
and the sale received unprecedented levels of interest across the
board," he said.
The top lot of the day was a winter scene by Edward Willis
Redfield, consigned to Freeman's by a local private collector.
Bidding began at just under the low estimate of $300,000, but
competition in the room quickly surpassed the previous record
($519,500, set at Freeman's in December 2001). Many phone
bidders, primarily private Pennsylvania collectors, battled it
out until one took the painting home for a new world record of
$691,250.
Shortly after the Redfield, in the Pennsylvania Academy of the
Fine Arts section of the sale, was a run of five paintings by
another of the leading lights from the Pennsylvania Impressionist
movement, Walter Elmer Schofield. The consignor, Margaret
Phillips of Langhorne, Penn., is the grandniece of the artist,
and the paintings had descended to her through the family. The
previous auction record for Schofield was $60,000, which was
quickly eclipsed by the first of the Schofields in the sale.
"Montmartre," a 37- by 47-inch depiction of a corner café scene
from his 1896 trip to Europe, sold to the trade for $80,750.
The record did not last for very long - perhaps four or five
minutes - as the next lot sold for three times the previous
record. "River in Winter," a 40- by 48-inch landscape, sold to
the Redfield underbidder at $201,750.
The list of Pennsylvania Impressionists for whom Freeman's holds
the world record already a considerably lengthier list than any
other auction house grew considerably longer on Sunday.
"The Bridge at New Hope," Harry Leith-Ross, $102,750.
Overwhelming presale attention was directed toward a small
(16 by 20 inches) oil by Harry Leith-Ross depicting "The Bridge at
New Hope." The painting drew so much attention, in fact, that 25
bidders were ready to start a separate auction to determine who
would receive one of the 14 available lines for phone bidding. The
$10/15,000 estimate was in keeping with previous prices for
Leith-Ross's work, but the exquisite detail of the piece virtually
assured that a new top price would be set. The bidders did not
disappoint, as the final price of $102,750 paid by a local buyer
shattered all previous records.
Fern Coppedge, whose work has been a consistent top performer at
Freeman's, was represented by four paintings in the sale. The
previous record, set at Freeman's in 2002, was not exceeded, but
"Houses along a Stream, Early Autumn" from a private collection
in Washington, D.C., came within inches of the record at
$124,750. Another academy artist who has been popular with
Freeman's buyers is the "Red Rose Girl" and illustration artist
Jessie Willcox Smith, also represented by four pieces in the
sale. Her oil, mixed media and oil illustration of "The Young
Tennis Player" achieved the highest price of the four, selling
for $69,750.
Another record-getter in the section was "Still Life" by Jane
Piper. Estimated at $2/3,000, the colorful depiction of fruit and
flowers on a tabletop attracted bids from overseas and across the
country, but ultimately sold to a local private buyer at $22,325.
Other top performers from the academy section of the sale
included Wilbur Dean Hamilton's "Portrait of a Seated Lady" at
$23,500 (world record), with records also set for Richard Gibson
Wedderspoon, Julian E. Levi, John W. McCoy, Isabel Branson
Cartwright, Ethel V. Ashton, Gertrude Lambert and Charles Rudy.
The two final lots in the academy section came to Freeman's from
the collection of the late Philadelphia art collector and
philanthropist Benjamin Bernstein. Bernstein's collection
contained hundreds of works by the Philadelphia artists Seymour
Remenick and Julius Bloch, the majority of which will be offered
in a February 22 sale at Freeman's devoted only to the two
artists. Both works set records on December 7, with the $32,900
achieved for Bloch's "The Box Party" being especially noteworthy.
The Samuel T. Freeman Memorial Scholarship, established in 1999
to fund the final year at the academy for an outstanding graduate
student as chosen by the faculty, is funded each year from
Freeman's proceeds from the academy section of this sale. With
two percent of the nearly $1.7 million section set aside for the
donation, this year's sale will fund the $10,000 scholarship with
another $22,000 added to the Samuel T. Freeman endowment fund.
The second recipient of the scholarship, Noah Shem Klein, was
graduated from the academy in 2001 and will be given a solo
exhibition at Freeman's in June 2004.
With strong sections of European painting, modern painting and
sculpture, and American painting, the day's top results were not
confined to artists from the academy. Highlights from the
European section began with a "Portrait of a Lady, Half Length in
a Decollette Dress" attributed to the Irish artist Nathaniel Hone
selling to a phone bidder for $17,625, nearly triple the high
estimate. Two works by the British watercolorist Myles Birket
Foster also fared well, with "In the Garden" selling for just
under $10,000 and "Children Feeding Ducks from a Punt" achieving
a price of $14,100 against a $4/6,000 estimate.
The substantial Modern section of the sale was fed mainly by the
Bernstein collection, beginning with a bronze bust of Bernstein
by the British sculptor Dame Elizabeth Frink ($7,050 against a
$2/3,000 estimate).
Other top lots in the section included "Standing Diamond," a
bronze sculpture by Lynn Chadwick ($34,075) and two sound
sculptures by Harry Bertoia, the first with 36 22-inch rods
($16,450) and the second with 25 of similar height ($21,150).
Both results were more than double the high estimates.
Bernstein was also a collector of works from the CoBrA
Expressionist movement, and works by Jan Sierhuis, Eugene Brands,
Henk Willemese (new world record) and Anton Rooskens were
featured in the section. The top price was paid for "South Sea
Motif" by Rooskens, which sold for $32,900 against a $20/30,000
estimate.
Among the most whimsical of Bernstein's predilections was for the
delicate carved linden sculptures of Japanese artist Fumio
Yoshimura.
Estimated conservatively, all of the 11 Yoshimuras in the sale
greatly exceeded high estimate. The final piece in the
collection, a wonderfully detailed sculpture of an artichoke,
achieved the top price of $7,050. Most of the Yoshimura pieces
sold to a bidder on eBay Live Auctions, which was a more active
factor in the sale than ever before. Internet participation in
the sale exceeded $300,000, with top results to Internet buyers,
including a Coppedge for $70,500, and two Schofields at $42,300
and $22,325.
Yoshimura sculpture of an artichoke, $7,050.
Also selling to an eBay buyer was "La Premiere Danseuse" by
the Australian artist Norman Alfred Williams Lindsay. While a
number of Australian bidders were awake and on their phones at 7 am
Down Under, the American Internet bidder took the lot at $31,725.
International presence was strong throughout the sale, with Dutch
bidders competing strongly for the CoBrAworks, British bidders
scooping up the Birket Fosters and others, and an Internet bidder
from Paris taking home a Charles Zacharie Landelle.
Finally, the American section of the sale had a number of high
points as well, beginning with the Nineteenth Century artist
Hiram Dwight Torrey. Measuring 51 by 70 inches, "Indians in a
Wooded Landscape" sold for $25,850, another world record. Other
record and top prices from the section were paid for works by Lee
Gatch and A.G. Burton. The two top lots of the section were
"Figure on a Pier at the Edge of a Lake," which sold for $47,000
against an estimate of $10/15,000; and a Charles Marion Russell
watercolor of "Cowboy Riding his Horse Uphill," which sold to a
private collector in Montana for $64,250.
All told, the sale featured more than 20 world record prices and
only eight unsold lots, a ratio that bodes well both for the
continuing upward trends at Freeman's and for the Pennsylvania
Impressionist market as a whole.
Prices reported including buyer's premium of 171/2 percent up to
$50,000 and ten percent thereafter.
