Grogan & Company The Fall Auction
Sunday, November 7, 2021 • 11 AM
www.groganco.com
20 Charles St, Boston, MA 02114

BOSTON — Grogan & Company’s annual fall auction will take place on Sunday, November 7, at 11 am and will be live-streamed from the company’s Boston headquarters. The auction features a curated offering of more than 200 lots of fine art and jewelry.

A Van Cleef & Arpels “mystery-set” ruby and diamond leaf brooch headlines the jewelry section of the auction with an estimate of $70/100,000. The alluring mystery setting was designed by Van Cleef & Arpels in 1935 and lends itself brilliantly to depicting natural forms. Other significant signed jewelry pieces include two sets of Cartier platinum and diamond dress clips, including a paisley-form pair by descent within the Wanamaker family, Philadelphia and New York, with an estimate of $20/30,000, and a shield-form pair from the collection of an Orleans, Mass., estate with an estimate of $10/15,000. Also from the same estate is a Cartier gold and platinum “Tutti Frutti” brooch, which exemplifies the celebrated “East meets West” motif designed by Pierre Cartier and inspired by India’s decorative arts. This brooch bears an estimate of $15/30,000.
Other notable signed period pieces include an articulated tree brooch designed by René Boivin, presenting an eclectic combination of pink tourmalines, amethysts and contrasting green demantoid garnets ($25/35,000), as well as pieces by Tiffany and Company, Boucheron, Buccellati, David Webb and Louis Feron.

The auction also features a series of diamonds and colored stones, including a three-stone ring centering a 5.03-carat oval-cut diamond flanked by half moon-cut diamonds ($30/50,000). From the property of a Massachusetts family comes an engagement ring centering a 3.37-carat D, VS2 round brilliant-cut diamond ($50/60,000), alongside an three-stone ring centering a 10.04-carat fancy intense yellow diamond ($200/250,000). A no-heat 11.40-carat Ceylon sapphire ring bearing an estimate of $50/100,000 leads the selection of colored stones.

The fine art section of the auction begins with a selection of paintings by Boston School artists, including portraits by Adelaide Cole Chase and Frederic Bosley and landscapes by Gertrude Fiske and Elizabeth Roberts. Women artists are well represented throughout the sale, with several works by Grandma Moses offered alongside paintings by Modern and contemporary artists, including Elaine de Kooning, Ellen Gallagher, Euka Holmes, Anne Packard and Dorothy Knowles. Gallagher’s “Lips & Paper” was created in 1993, following her summer at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine where she began increasing the scale of her pieces and employing a technique of transfer printing on penmanship paper. According to Gallagher, “‘Lips and Paper’ is the direct precursor to ‘Afro Mountain’ (1994), which is in the collection of the Whitney and included in the 1995 Biennial.” The work, which was purchased directly from the artist by a Cambridge, Mass., woman, bears an estimate of $50/70,000.

Elaine de Kooning’s frenetic, colorful 1959 painting “Theme of the Bull #14” ($15/25,000) introduces a strong collection of mid-Twentieth Century works on paper from a private family collection, including watercolors by Claes Oldenburg and Lyonel Feininger and a 1965 acrylic “Burst” painting by Adolph Gottlieb with an estimate of $70/100,000. Most of the works in this collection were purchased directly from the respective artists in New York in the mid-Twentieth Century.

Harbor scenes abound in the fine art section of the auction, with a recently rediscovered and authenticated depiction of the Port of Antwerp (circa 1883-84) by William Merritt Chase bearing an estimate of $30/50,000. A Nineteenth Century China Trade painting by Sunqua measuring 17 by 30 inches and offered at $20/30,000, vividly captures the bustling activity of trade and commerce along the Canton waterfront, while a striking large-scale Emile Gruppe oil of Gloucester Harbor, likely painted in his prewar years, is estimated at $10/20,000.

These waterfront pieces are complemented by a 1962 scene of Deer Isle, Maine, by Wolf Kahn measuring 16 by 20 inches with an estimate of $5/10,000. The subdued palette, impressionist technique and textured surface of this painting is typical of Kahn’s early style, and stands in contrast to the vibrant palette he employed to depict wooded landscapes, fog-shrouded views and solitary barn in his later years. Kahns’ “Barn on the Auger Hole” (1985), measuring 16 by 20 inches and estimated at $5/10,000, represents this later style. Other notable landscapes in the sale include works by John Whorf, Ogden Minton Pleissner and Charles Burchfield, among others.

The auction will be live-streamed from Grogan & Company’s auction gallery in Boston’s historic Beacon Hill. Exhibition hours will begin on Monday, October 25. For more information www.groganco.com or 617-720-2020.

From upper left: 148. GRANDMA MOSES, A Blanket of Snow, 1945, oil on Masonite, 16 x 20 in., $30,000–50,000.
59. RENÉ BOIVIN Gold, Amethyst, and Pink Tourmaline ‘Cedar Tree’ Brooch, $25,000–35,000.
144. WOLF KAHN, Barn on the Auger Hole, 1985, oil on canvas, 16 x 20 in., $5,000–10,000.
36. VAN CLEEF & ARPELS ‘Mystery-Set’ Ruby and Diamond Leaf Brooch, $70,000–100,000.
160. ADOLPH GOTTLIEB, Untitled, 1965, acrylic on paper, 20 x 15 in., $70,000–100,000.
37. CARTIER Platinum and Diamond Dress Clips/Jabot, $20,000–30,000.
195. ARTHUR CLIFTON GOODWIN, Quincy Market, oil on canvas, 30 x 36 in., $10,000–15,000.
15. LOUIS FÉRON Gold, Colombian Emerald, and Diamond Ring, $10,000–15,000.
159. CLAES OLDENBURG, Crusoe Umbrella, 1977, watercolor and crayon on paper, 11 x 13 3/4 in., $15,000–25,000.
MASSACHUSETTS AUCTIONEER LICENSE NO. 800
• 617.720.2020