The star of the auction was this 10.10-carat fancy yellow diamond, 22K gold and platinum ring, which made $108,000 ($60/80,000).
Review by Carly Timpson; Photos Courtesy Cottone Auctions
GENESEO, N.Y. — On March 20, Cottone Auctions conducted a sale of 157 lots of fine art and antiques, including Tiffany Studios lamps, Americana, silver and estate jewelry. Boasting a sell-through rate of 99 percent, the sale realized $1.5 million overall. Michael Parsons, director of marketing for Cottone, shared that the auction was very successful and they saw participation from domestic and international bidders, including dealers and retail buyers.
As they always are, early Twentieth Century Favrile glass Tiffany Studios table lamps were a hit, but the top lot of the sale was a 10.10-carat fancy yellow diamond ring. The modified cushion-cut diamond was housed in a 22K gold four-prong setting with six more small deep yellow diamonds and several other round brilliant-cut diamonds bead-set on the profile. Both shoulders of the platinum shank were set with trapezoid brilliant-cut diamonds and more, these princess-cut, channel-set throughout the shank. In total, this behemoth of a ring weighed in at more than 19 grams — for context, the average diamond engagement ring weighs around 3-5 grams. After intense bidding, the ring crossed the block for $108,000, exceeding its $60/80,000 estimate.
An oil on canvas portrait of Lady Fitzwilliam, daughter of the Earl of Pembroke by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A. (British, 1769-1830), 20½ by 20½ inches, achieved $88,800 ($15/25,000).
There was an interesting story behind an unfinished oil on canvas portrait by Sir Thomas Lawrence, one of the leading British portrait painters in the early Nineteenth Century. Estimated at just $15/25,000, the square gilt-framed portrait of Lady Fitzwilliam, daughter of the Earl of Pembroke made an impressive $88,000. This incomplete portrait was part of the Bretby Heirlooms sale that was held for the Seventh Earl and the Dowager Countess of Chesterfield by Christie’s in London in June 1918. It was then acquired by Buffalo, N.Y., industrialist Colonel Charles Clifton from Knoedler & Co., New York, in 1923. A finished portrait, this one “Lady Elizabeth Mary, Countess of Belgrave” (later Marchioness of Westminster), was also owned by Clifton and achieved $20,400, below its estimate of $30/50,000.
The top-achieving Tiffany Studios lamp was an 18-inch red and green Peony shade on a Small Library base. From the Al & Sue Turner Collection, Bonita Springs, Fla., this circa 1910 lamp found a buyer for $78,000. Following behind at $75,000 was a Jeweled Geometric lamp on a Decorated Library base. This one was slightly larger than the Peony lamp, with the shade measuring 22½ inches in comparison to the other’s 18-inch diameter. The shade’s bright yellow-green glass design is interrupted by a band of pierced bronze vines towards the bottom, to which the jewels were attached. Descending in the family of its original owner and later acquired by a new owner in Detroit, a Tiffany Studios Apple Blossom lamp shade on Mud Turtle base found a buyer for $60,000. More than doubling its $25,000 high estimate, a circa 1905 Acorn lamp on a slightly bulbous Swamp Flower oil base made $55,200. The blue and yellow lamp was acquired in the early 1900s by A.A. Anderson, an artist, Western rancher and naturalist who was named the first Special Assistant of Forest Reserves and Yellowstone National Park by President Theodore Roosevelt and whose portrait of Thomas Edison hangs in the National Portrait Gallery. It had been in Anderson’s family ever since.
A Tiffany Studios Moorish hall lantern, circa 1900, 11½ inches in diameter and 42 inches long in total, swung to $70,800 ($8/12,000).
Another Tiffany piece that impressed bidders was not a table lamp but rather a hall lantern, dated slightly earlier given its attribution to the Tiffany Glass & Decorating Company, which was active from 1892 to 1900. This iridescent leaded glass Moorish lantern measured 15 inches long by 11½ inches in diameter and hung on a bronze rod with four chains, measuring 42 inches in total. A similar lantern example is at the Willard Memorial Chapel in Auburn, N.Y. Consigned from a West Coast collection, it went to a new owner for $70,800.
Continuing on the theme of the same maker, though diverting in media, a circa 1889 Louis Comfort Tiffany painting titled “Gossipy Market Women at Nuremberg” found a buyer for $60,000. Recently rediscovered, this oil on canvas painting was housed in its original carved giltwood frame attributed to Stanford White/ Louis C. Tiffany Decorating Company. The painting, completed while Tiffany was working on the Havemeyer Mansion, was exhibited in 1891 at the American Art Gallery, New York, and The Art Institute of Chicago and was later descended in the family of Henry M.V. Summers, a friend of President Theodore Roosevelt and an auctioneer in New York.
Prices quoted include the buyer’s premium as reported by the auction house. Cottone will have another art and antiques auction on May 30-31. For information, www.cottoneauctions.com or 585-243-1000.
