The sale was led at $81,900 by a fine Tiffany Studios table lamp with bronze pineapple base and a turtleback shade. Along with the Tiffany Studios lantern in this review, it was gifted to the consignor by collector Lee B. Anderson.
Review by Greg Smith, Photos Courtesy Doyle
NEW YORK CITY – Doyle’s June 16 Design sale offered innovative works from renowned makers, tempting potential buyers towards a total gross of $1,204,844 with 90 percent of the 333 lots selling.
Tiffany Studios had five lots in the five figures, including the sale’s top at $81,900 with a bronze pineapple base table lamp featuring a turtleback shade. It was reportedly a gift to the consignor from collector Lee B. Anderson, whose collection – including numerous other examples from Tiffany Studios – Doyle sold in 2012. With the same provenance was a Moorish-style bronze and favrile turtleback hanging lantern of triangular form with coiled wire detail that took $31,500.
Other notables included a pair of bronze “Engrenage” low tables by Ingrid Donat, circa 2006, that sold for $53,550. The tables, with provenance to gallery Barry Friedman Ltd, were produced by Landowski Fondeur and numbered 1 of 8 and 3 of 8. Gabriella Crespi’s “Magic Cube Table” was produced by the artist in brass in the 1970s. It featured four slide-out planks to expand the table top area and sold for $17,640.
Frank Stella’s poster sketch for “Targowica,” a work from his “Polish Village” series, would sell for $75,600. It was executed in acrylic, oil pastel, fabric and paper collage on board laid to panel.
Of irregular three-legged form was a set of 12 Thonet Model 81 bentwood dining chairs that brought $10,080. They were finished in a dark stain with bentwood supports that began as stretchers between the legs and the back before curving around to finish as arm supports.
Mirrors reflected desire in two examples. Line Vautrin invented a resin called Talosel from cellulose acetate and used it, along with a material called Lumaline, in a mirror that took $16,380. Pedro Friedeberg adorned his gilt mirror with ten open hands, two closed-hand candleholders and a singular small white-painted head atop. The mirror was consigned from a home designed by David Barrett and sold for $8,820.
Fine art was led by a 1974 poster sketch for “Targowica” by Frank Stella at $75,600. It measured 45¾ by 30-7/8 inches and was executed in acrylic, oil pastel, fabric and paper collage on board laid to panel. Stella was moved to create his “Polish Village” series in the 1970s after receiving Maria and Kazimierz Piechotka’s 1959 book Wooden Synagogues from his friend, architect Richard Meier.
Ingrid Donat produced this pair of “Engrenage” (French for “gear”) tables in cast bronze in 2006. They brought $53,550 and represent two works from the edition of eight.
Rising to $20,160 was a 1976 graphite on paper by Martin Wong, “Vance Hotel Lobby,” from the “Eureka Sketchbook.” From 1964 to 1978, Wong lived in Eureka, Calif., above the Driftwood bar. In a 2020 interview, Doyle’s director of paintings Angelo Madrigale told Antiques and The Arts Weekly, “This period in Eureka, he starts to become an artist and find his vocabulary of images.” The Vance Hotel opened in 1922 and served as a major hub for the town. The hotel portion closed in 1972 while the first-floor businesses stayed open. Those too closed in the early 2000s and the building is now slated for development.
At $18,900, an auction record was set for Austrian artist Erich Comeriner with “Arbeit aus dem Vorkurs,” a circa 1926 paper collage on board measuring 23-3/8 by 16-3/8 inches. The work came from the estate of Jacqueline Loewe Fowler, the late trustee and donor to the American Folk Art Museum and other institutions. Comeriner studied at the Bauhaus during the period the work was made, its influence notable in the graphic design of the floating numbers and letters in the work.
All prices reported include buyer’s premium. For more information, www.doyle.com or 212-427-2730.
