“Fall foliage” by Allen Butler Talcott, oil on board, 22 by 31¾ inches, signed lower left, found itself at the top of the sale with a price of $6,875 ($2/3,000).
Review by Madelia Hickman Ring; Photos Courtesy Lotus International Auctions
GUILFORD, CONN. — Lotus International Auctions’ July 30 online-only “Hot Summer Online” auction offered exactly 410 lots of fine art in a broad variety of media, as well as household furnishings, maps and magazines, to name some of the broad categories represented.
Allen Butler Talcott (American, 1867-1908) was a member of the Lyme Art Colony who specialized in landscapes; many of his paintings are in the collection of the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, Conn. The sale included two autumnal works by Talcott, the first of which achieved the sale-high of $6,875, the other earned $2,000.
Louis-Ernest Barrias (French, 1841-1905) was a member of the Beaux-Arts school who, in 1865, won the Prix de Rome prize for study at the French Academy in Rome. Though he worked mostly in marble in a romantic realist style influenced by Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux (French, 1827-1875). Two bronze statues of female musicians were included in the auction. Each had been cast at the Susse Freres foundry and each were offered with an estimate of $700-$1,400; both sold for $2,750 to share silver status. The first to be offered was titled “Reading the Notes” and stood 29 inches tall; the other was of similar height and depicted a classically draped figure playing the viola da gamba.
Bidders played “Reading the Notes” by Louis-Ernest Barrias, 29 inches tall, bronze, to $2,750 ($700-1,400).
A dramatic woodblock by Japanese artist Tomoo Inagaki (1902-1980) titled “Audience of Cats” that was from an edition of 50 multiplied its high estimate by a factor of more than eight to earn $1,625. It was one of just three woodblock prints in the sale and the only one by a Japanese artist.
Also exceeding expectations at $1,500 was a group of books and photographs — many of them nudes — taken by Bunny Yeager (American, 1929-2014) and Andre De Dienan. The female nude was the subject of three of the four works by Pal Fried (Hungarian/American, 1893-1976), in the sale; his “Nude Studio Model (Gladys),” alternatively titled “Black Stockings,” earned the highest of the group, going out to a new owner for $1,500, within expectations.
Fine art was not the only category to attract Lotus’ bidders, who played a vintage Guild model M20 six-string guitar to $1,250, nearly double its high estimate. It bore its original label inside and was accompanied by a lined hard case. A Tonka City truck with plow painted in bright orange that retained its original box, earned $875, nearly 15 times its high estimate. A red metal big rig, the side reading “Ryerson Steel,” drove to $125.
A mention of decorative arts highlights would be remiss without mentioning a 16½-inch diameter antique faience Longwy bird charger that flew to $313 and a Roseville pottery jardiniere in the Donatello pattern, in a matte green glaze overall with bas-relief figural friezes in dark and bright red, that stood 33½ inches tall and was topped off at $156.
Two Kurumba Antelope headdresses, both from the Upper Volta and both offered with estimates of $200/400, found buyers for $156.
Lotus International Auctions’ next sale has not yet been announced.
Prices quoted include the buyer’s premium as reported by the auction house. For information, www.lotusauctions.com or 203-689-5062.
