"The Fishing Lady,"
$467,200.
NEW YORK CITY -- Important Americana was offered at Sotheby's on
May 22, with strong prices posted throughout the session. The
auction offered 327 lots with 290 of those finding buyers
resulting in an 88.7 percent sold rate and grossing an impressive
$3,816,580.
The auction was buoyed by several extremely desirable pieces of
Americana with some of the lots fetching prices in excess of more
than 20 times the high presale estimates.
The top price realized during the day came as a private American
collector bid an "extremely rare and important canvas work
picture," 'The Fishing Lady,'" well beyond the $30/50,000 presale
estimates to a selling price of $467,200.
Lady Liberty ship's carving, $388,800.
These needlework pieces have provided collectors with excitement
for almost a century with pieces from the "Fishing Lady" series
first being published in 1921 by Wallace Nutting in Furniture
of the Pilgrim Century, where it was misidentified with a
Seventeenth Century date. The origin of the "Fishing Lady"
embroideries, of which 17 are now known, would remain a mystery
until 1941 when an article in Antiques Magazine by
Nancy Graves Cabot revealed that they had been executed by young
girls in Boston boarding schools.
The rare needlework, executed in finely wrought red, coral,
green, blue and gold wool stitches, was framed in the original
rare double arched ebonized and gilded-slip frame with the
original glass. It had been part of the collection of noted
Connecticut collector Henry Wood Erving (1851-1941), a friend of
Wallace Nutting's, and had been consigned, along with numerous
other top lots from the sale, by descendants of Erving's family.
A painted pine ship's carving, which according to tradition came
from the packet ship Congress, Maine, circa 1840,
depicting Lady Liberty also did extremely well, handily exceeding
estimates. The seated figure with one hand resting on a
spread-winged eagle's head, her opposite arm resting on an
American shield with 13 stars and a Liberty cap atop a pole
extending from the crook of her arm, carried a presale estimate
of $200/300,000. The piece measured 37 inches in height and sold
after an impressive bout of bidding for $388,800.
A stoneware flask attributed to Henry Remmey soared past its
astonishingly inaccurate presale estimate of $3/5,000 to bring
$120,000.
Other items with a nautical theme included an overmantel oil on
panel, measuring 26 by 76 inches, depicting the Southeast view of
Boston harbor and lighthouse, 1789, by Jonathan Welch Edes that
was hammered down at $220,800, while a John Belamy American eagle
plaque, one of the largest examples known -- measuring more than
eight feet from wingtip to wingtip, sold at $120,000.
An extremely rare stoneware flask attributed to Henry Remmey,
from the Erving collection, soared past the $3/5,000 presale
estimates on its way to a selling price of $120,000. The rare
piece, though to be of New York origin, measured only six inches
high and little more than six inches across and less than two
inches wide. It was decorated with an incised and blue filled
bird and foliate on one side and three birds among foliate on the
other with the name Henry Edoson and a date of 1804 on the
reverse.
A carved and painted Punch cigar store figure, American, late
Nineteenth Century, also did well bringing a premium price of
$120,000 against an estimate of $25/35,000, selling to an
anonymous buyer.
Furniture in the auction attracted its fair share of attention
with a Chippendale mahogany secretary bookcase attributed to
either Job Townsend or John Goddard selling between estimates at
$96,000, a Queen Anne Connecticut cherry dressing table
attributed to the Wethersfield area exceeded estimates at $72,000
and a Federal inlaid and highly figured mahogany serpentine front
sideboard attributed to John Shaw also surpassed estimates
bringing $51,000.
