Review & Photos By Laura Beach

WINDSOR, CONN. — What does a good, old-fashioned auction look like? Nadeau’s, on New Year’s Day. The Internet may have extended the global reach of auctioneers everywhere, but many bidders would argue that it has diminished the camaraderie and competition that make live auctions so compelling.

“Flight Into Egypt” by Henry Ossawa Tanner,
$84,000 ($40/80,000).

Not so at Nadeau’s on January 1, where, technical amenities notwithstanding, a standing-room-only crowd devoured nearly 700 lots. Views of points distant — from Egypt and Venice to Big Sur and Waikiki — transported bidders to exotic realms and pushed the sale’s total to $1,280,000. Property from the corporate collection of Credit Suisse and the estates of three former Hartford-area residents — Natalie Rafferty, Sylvia Leven and Anne S. Carey — added heft. It was the third year running that Nadeau’s New Year’s Day sale surpassed the million-dollar mark. Nadeau executed roughly 600 phone bids, 400 absentee bids and registered 2,000 bidders online.

Auctioneer Edwin J. Nadeau Jr called attention to this safe in a carved oak case by R.J. Horner, $12,000 ($4/6,000).

 
A house call yielded two of the day’s top lots, paintings by Henry Ossawa Tanner and Arthur Hill Gilbert.

“They literally came off a wall in Rockport, Mass.,” said auctioneer and company president Edwin J. Nadeau, Jr.

Acclaimed African American artist Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859–1937) enjoyed international renown after settling in France in the 1890s, where he was best known for Biblical scenes like “Flight Into Egypt.” Nadeau knocked down the small oil in a pleasingly limpid palette to collectors for $84,000.

Affirming the vibrant market for California painting, a Big Sur view by the Monterey Peninsula painter Arthur Hill Gilbert (1894–1970) achieved $25,200.

Late in the day, “Diamond Cove, Waikiki Beach, Hawaii” by Frank Chamberlain surprised all comers, sailing past its $600–$1,000 estimate to bring $27,600. The price appears to be an auction record for the artist who was born in San Francisco, moved to Hartford, studied at the Wadsworth Atheneum and the Art Students League, was affiliated with the MacDowell Colony and finally settled in Pasadena, where he died in 1961.

Other American paintings of note were “November in the Hills” by Guy C. Wiggins, $15,000; two oils by the Hartford-born African American artist Charles Ethan Porter, “Still Life with Fruit and Basket,” $9,600, and “Still Life of Roses,” $3,300; and “Hand Over the Money,” $25,200, a piquant trompe l’oeil work by the French-born New York City artist Victor Dubreuil.

“Diamond Cove, Waikiki Beach, Hawaii” by Frank Chamberlain, oil on panel,
11¾ by 20 inches, $27,600 ($600–$1,000).

Exhibited at the Watercolor Club of New York in 1910, a rare Orientalist gouache on paper by Francis Luis Mora fetched $4,200. Among European paintings, a Venetian canal view by Marin Rico y Ortega commanded $27,000.

“Portrait of Thomas Alva Edison” by Ellis Meyer Silvette (1876–1940), $16,250 ($2/4,000.

 
Nadeau continues to disperse historical Americana from the corporate collection of Credit Suisse. Last November, the firm auctioned Daniel Huntington’s “Portrait of Cornelius Vanderbilt,” $45,600, and Thomas Waterman Wood’s “Portrait of Andrew Carnegie,” $30,000. More captains of industry followed this round. Philip A. De Laszlo’s “Portrait of Andrew W. Mellon” achieved $25,200; Francis Lathrop’s “Portrait of Collis Potter Huntington,” $17,500; Ellis Meyer Silvette’s “Portrait of Thomas Alva Edison,” $16,250; and Adolfo Muller-Ury’s “Portrait of James Jerome Hill,” $15,600.

Works on paper ranged from Audubon’s hand-colored rendering of a male black-billed cuckoo bird, $17,500; to the Modernist lithograph “Overseas Highway” by Ralston Crawford, $10,200; and two 1965 Richard Diebenkorn lithographs, $3,000 each.

Father and son artisans Philip and Kelvin LaVerne made Asian-influenced tables and cabinets featuring patinated bronze surfaces. LaVerne coffee tables in the rare “Eternal Forest,” $20,400, and “Chan,” $4,800, patterns and a pair of “Shang Ti” end tables, $5,700, led furniture sales.

Decoratively painted and in outstanding condition, a Herring & Co. safe housed in an R.J. Horner carved oak case was an impressive specimen at $12,000. Bidders cottoned to an Art Nouveau cabinet, $5,000, signed Galle in inlay. From Steinway & Son’s “Crown Jewel” collection, a grand piano in an Indian rosewood headed musical instrument sales at $24,000.

One hundred lots of estate jewelry got the day going, a platinum and diamond tennis bracelet making $12,000.

Prices reported include the buyer’s premium.

More property from Credit Suisse and various owners was slated for sale at Nadeau’s on January 23.

Nadeau’s Auction Gallery is at 25 Meadow Road in Windsor. For more information, www.nadeausauction.com or 860-246-2444.

Gallery

From left, "Portrait of Collis Potter Huntington" by Francis Lathrop (1849-1909), circa 1890s, ex-Credit Suisse, $ 17,500 ($ 1,5/$ 2,500); "Venetian Canal" by Marin Rico y Ortega (1833-1908), $ 27,000 ($ 20/40,000); top center, "Town Streets After Snowfall" by William Lester Stevens (1888-1969), $ 6,000; "Haystacks in the Fall" by Bruce Crane (1857-1937), $ 6,000 ($ 3/5,000); "The Uplands of Ceres" by Edward Arthur Walton (1860-1922), $ 10,625 ($ 10/15,000). Below, Giuseppe Corelli's "Napoli Da Posillipo," a gouache on paper, $ 1,125 ($ 500-$ 1,000) and, right, a set of four late Eighteenth or early Nineteenth Century hand colored mezzotints personifying the continents, $ 1,125 ($ 1/$ 2,000).

The sale kept an average of four to six house phones busy.

Art Nouveau cabinet with floral inlays, signed Galle,
height 30 inches, $ 5,000 ($ 2/4,000).

Grand piano in an East Indian rosewood case, from Steinway & Son’s
“Crown Jewel” collection, $ 24,000 ($ 15/25,000).

“Portrait of Andrew W. Mellon” by Philip A. deLaszlo (1869–1937), 1926, oil on canvas, 52 by 36 inches, $ 25,200 ($ 2/4,000). Mellon (1855–1937) was secretary of the treasury between 1921 and 1932, ambassador to the Court of St James’s and director of the Pittsburgh National Bank of Commerce. Ex-collection of Credit Suisse.

“Overseas Highway” by Ralston Crawford (1906–1978), signed color lithograph,
#4 from an edition of 24, sheet size 12½ by 18 inches, estate of Natalie Rafferty,
$ 10,200 ($ 6/10,000).

“Hand Over the Money” by Victor Dubreuil (1846–1946), oil on canvas,
10 by 12¼ inches, with Berry Hill Galleries’ label, estate of Natalie Rafferty,
$ 25,200 ($ 4/8,000).

A prospective bidder checks out a Mission oak server with hammered-copper pulls, $ 3,300 ($ 500/800). Duffner & Kimberly leaded-glass lamp, right, in a Thistle pattern with thistle and fleur-de-lis decorated vase, $ 13,200 ($ 12/18,000). Flanking a Steuben aurene vase, $ 375, is a pair of iridescent, feather design art glass vases attributed to Quezal, $ 480.

Regional American landscapes performed well. Above left, “Hills of Carmel Highlands overlooking Mount Doud, Big Sur,” a signed, oil on canvas by California artist Arthur Hill Gilbert (1894–1970), $ 25,200 ($ 6/10,000). Below, a prospective buyer inspects “Flooded Arun” by the Anglo French artist Jose Weiss (1859–1919), $ 660 ($ 800–$ 1,200). Right, from the Credit Suisse collection, oil portrait of James Jerome Hill, a Canadian-American railroad executive, by Adolfo Muller-Ury (1862–1947), circa 1902, $ 15,600 ($ 2/4,000). On the table, 19 polychrome decorated Delft tiles, $ 1,560 ($ 200/300).

The gauzy “November in the Hills” by Guy C. Wiggins (1883–1962), 1920,
with a 1989 receipt from The Cooley Gallery, Old Lyme, Conn., was a nice buy
at $ 15,000 ($ 4/8,000). Below it, “Stream in the Thick Woods” by John Frederick Kensett (1816–1872), $ 7,200 ($ 1/$ 3,000). Far left, “Arabian Pastime,”
a watercolor and gouache on paper by Francis Luis Mora (1874–1940),
an Orientalist work exhibited at the Watercolor Club of New York in 1910, $ 4,200 ($ 3/5,000). Center top, “Still Life with Fruit and Basket” by Charles Ethan Porter (1847–1923), $ 9,600 ($ 6/10,000) and, below it, Porter’s “Still Life of Roses,”
$ 3,300 ($ 1/$ 2,000).

A bidder took this 1967–68 Gibson L-50 Sunburst guitar, $ 780, for a test drive. The top Gibson at the sale brought $ 5,700 ($ 1,5/2,500).

These three majolica polychrome bottles, $ 420, in fitted box were cataloged as Nineteenth Century Italian or Portuguese.

Measuring 13 by 11 inches, this 1933 oil on artist’s board still life by the Russian-born Connecticut artist Simka Simkhovitch (1893–1949)
was a nice buy at $ 540.

Edwin J. Nadeau III, RIGHT, reviews absentee bids with staff before the sale.

Company president Edwin J. Nadeau Jr called the $ 1.3 million auction.

The sale included a single-owner collection of marble-topped Victorian tables. One of the best was this circa 1860, floral-carved rosewood example, $ 4,200
($ 3/5,000), in the manner of New York cabinetmaker John Henry Belter.

Nadeau owns the market in benchmade Colonial Revival furniture by Hartford, Conn., area cabinetmakers. One of many examples was this Queen Anne-style highboy by Fineberg, $ 1,680.

This “Eternal Forest” coffee table, 41¾ inches in diameter with an acid-etched
and enameled brass surface, by Philip and Kelvin Laverne, doubled its high estimate, selling for $ 20,400 ($ 5/9,000). Two subsequent Laverne lots — a “Chan” coffee table of the same dimensions, $ 4,800, and a pair of “Shang Ti”
end tables, $ 5,700 — also did well.

This 11-by-18-foot Bidjar runner led carpet offerings at $ 12,500 ($ 10/15,000).