Swann realized $197,000 for John Biggers’ “Death and Resurrection,” improving on the $149,000 the firm got for it in April 2019 ($200/300,000).
Review by Madelia Hickman Ring
NEW YORK CITY — “We were thrilled to have several significant purchases by institutions recognizing the contributions of these artists to the history of American art,” were the words of Nigel Freeman, Swann Auction Galleries’ head of fine art, speaking about the result of the firm’s most recent twice-annual African American art auction, which took place on April 3, with a 193-lot sale that achieved a total of $1,797,755.
The auction reached its apex at $197,000, for “Death and Resurrection” by John Biggers (1924-2001). Commissioned by a Texas collector in 1996, the painting had previously sold at Swann for $149,000 in 2019. The 40-by-60-inch oil on linen canvas was considered a “wonderful example of the rich complexity in composition, subject matter and symbolism in Biggers’ late paintings,” in which the artist continued “to develop the important theme of the celebration of life and death” that drew on his study of African cultural practices.
Swann also got a higher price the second time around for “Signaler, I” by Hughie Lee-Smith (1915-1999), who was represented in the auction with four works. When the firm sold the painting in 2020, it brought $30,000, but in this sale it made $42,500, within expectations. It was not the highest price paid for a work by the artist — that honor would go to “Girl Fleeing,” which raked in $173,000, bolstered by provenance to the Founder’s Society at the Detroit Institute of Art (DIA) and two Detroit collections, as well as inclusion in a 2019-20 DIA exhibition and publication in Karma Gallery’s 2024 monograph on the artist.
Hughie Lee-Smith’s “Signaler, I” circa 1970, oil on linen canvas, 20 by 14 inches, traded hands at $42,500 ($35/50,000).
Rounding out the leaderboard at $93,750 was “Side-a-Sapelo” by Savannah, Ga., artist, Suzanne Jackson (b 1944). The catalog noted that the title referenced Sapelo Island, one of the Georgia Sea Islands and the site of Hog Hammock, the last remaining Gullah Geechee community in the Sea Islands.
Sculptural works came in different mediums, with an untitled hand-carved walnut piece made circa 2000s by Thaddeus “Thad” G. Mosley (b 1926) leading the category at $87,500. The 40-inch-tall composition had provenance to the collection and estate of Mosley’s friend David Lewis, a writer, painter and architect who founded Urban Design Associates (Pittsburgh, Penn.) and wrote Thaddeus Mosley: African-American Sculptor (Getty Research Institute, 1997).
For bronze sculptures, “Mother and Child” set the high bar at $26,000. It was the work of Elizabeth Catlett (1915-2012), was numbered “7” from an edition of 10, and illustrated in Samella S. Lewis’s 1984 book, The Art of Elizabeth Catlett.
Five new world auction records were established during the sale, including for the sale’s first lot: $21,250 for “Te Adoremus Domine” by Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller (1877-1968). The circa 1921 painted plaster panel came to auction from a Philadelphia collector, who purchased it from Swann in February 2010; it will be going to a new home in an undisclosed institution. According to the catalog, another example of the plaque is in the Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller Collection at the Danford Art Museum in Framingham, Mass.
The first lot of the sale was not only purchased by an institution but set a new auction record for the artist. “Te Adoremus Domine” by Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller, circa 1921, sold for $21,250 ($4/6,000).
Another lot that will be going to an institution for a new world-record price was Charles Searles’ (1937-2004) “Dancer #1,” which gaveled down for $40,000. According to the catalog, the work was “a striking and significant painting” by the artist, the first in his mid 1970s important “Dancer” series. Other works from that series were noted to be in the collections of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, La Salle University and the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art.
An institution also purchased Allan Rohan Crite’s (1910-2007) “Winter Scene from My Window,” though the $57,500 price they paid was not a record for the artist. The provenance to the Melvin Holmes Collection of African American Art in San Francisco and inclusion in a 2016 exhibition at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture undoubtedly contributed to its desirability.
Raymond Steth’s (1917-1997) circa 1940s lithograph titled “Crispus Attucks” was offered without listed provenance, exhibition or publication history but still achieved a new world record for the artist: $25,000. The catalog essay for the lot noted a scholar of his work — Dr Leslie King-Hammond — said “Steth, working primarily in aquatint and carbograph, produced a powerful series of studies that reflect deeply and often critically on Black life and culture in America. … Steth was a master of content and commentary.”
Raymond Steth, “Crispus Attucks,” circa 1940s, lithograph on cream wove paper, 18½ by 14 inches, brought $25,000 and a new world auction record for the artist ($3/5,000).
West Coast artist Raymond Howell (1927-2002) was, the catalog recorded, “a longtime fixture in the Bay Area art scene,” with exhibitions in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston and Provincetown, Mass., and a 1999 retrospective at Stanford University. His circa 1965-70 “Wash Day (Cityscape)” came to sale from a collection in Texas and realized $13,750, a new record for the artist.
The last auction record set in the sale was $9,375, for Sonya Clark’s (b 1967) “Afro Abe II,” a five-dollar bill hand-embroidered with black thread to depict Abraham Lincoln with an afro. According to the catalog, the “Afro Abe” series “lauds President Abraham Lincoln as an early civil rights leader, while revealing connections between money, power and pride. Clark began the series in 2007 when then-Senator Barack Obama began his presidential campaign. Over the next five years, she created 42 additional “Afro Abe” pieces to honor his place as the 44th President of the United States of America.
While the auction featured works by African American blue chip artists — Howardena Pindell, Ernie Barnes, Beauford Delaney, Sam Gilliam, Jacob Lawrence, Romare Bearden and Hank Willis Thomas, to name a few — it debuted two artists: Barry Johnson (b 1948) and Michael Susan Kendall (1952-1995). Johnson, a New York Native, was part of Harlem’s Studio Museum’s “Harlem Artists ‘69” exhibition and his body of abstract works was noted to have been inspired by jazz music. An untitled acrylic on cotton canvas, offered towards the end of the sale, brought $8,750. Kendall’s “Maiden Sea Voyage, Boston to Rome,” was included in her first solo exhibition (Wauters Gallery, New York City, 1978) and is the first of her works to come to auction. It sold for $6,250, within expectations.
The date of Swann’s fall African American art sale has not yet been set but it traditionally takes place in October.
Prices quoted include the buyer’s premium as reported to the auction house. For information, 212-254-4710 or www.swanngalleries.com.
