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August 11 Art and Antiques Auction Wrap Up

August 17, 2012 | view archive

If you wanted to find a way to let your personal style shine in your home, our August 11th Art & Antiques Auction was the place to find the goods. I found myself daydreaming about many of the items offered in this auction… if I only had THAT poster or THAT chair, I thought, well, my life would suddenly become Technicolor beautiful.

Seriously. With a focus on vintage posters and modern design, we offered up some iconic merchandise that drew some serious bidding.

You already know this: One iconic chair will set the tone for an entire room. A floor bidder with an eye for good design knew this, too. She is now the proud new owner of a bentwood beauty by American designer George Mulhauser-- she knows that what this piece of design history may lack in function (after all, would you really invite your Aunt Tillie to employ it as her perch during your next Thanksgiving dinner?), it makes up for by pulling out all the stops for style and top drawer attitude. This showstopper strolled home to the tune of $1,500, which, if you ask me, isn’t a bad price tag for an icon.

Another Mulhauser design offered in the August 11 auction served some super good form mixed up with a healthy dose of function. The set surpassed their high estimate of $500 with a cozy hammer price of $750. Now, I want you to visualize the chair and ottoman in just about any space, and, whammo! You have yourself an anchor for your room.

If I had my way, I would have purchased that chair and ottoman and paired them up with every single one of the Herman Miller prints—which, in my opinion, were the sleepers of the sale, selling below estimate. I keep day dreaming about putting them in matching frames and filling an entire wall with them.

If you missed the opportunity to bid on these delightful bits of goodness, no worries!  We have a few available for Buy it Now purchase on our website.  Instant gratification.

Visit our Buy it Now Gallery

While I typically find myself attracted to certain posters for their subject, artist or time period, sometimes it’s all about size and nothing more. Sure, I would much rather stare at an artist’s interpretation of the Italian Riviera than an image of the frozen tundra—but, when it comes to big, splashy vintage images, the bigger the better. If I had to choose, I would most likely go large. I’m just that kind of girl.

Size matters.  Our own C Dub goes large with that gigantic My Fair Lady Poster

That’s why I loved our vintage poster session. There were opportunities to buy crazy huge examples—like the gigantic My Fair Lady movie poster that measured over 10’ high. Imagine THAT occupying a wall in your posh pad. It was as steal—bringing just $225 from an Internet bidder. I’d like to see where it ends up.

Then there was the not quite as big but even more fabulous French advertising poster by Leonetto Cappiello. This colorful color lithograph poster, dating from 1912, depicted an elephant pretty much declaring that he refused to smoke if he couldn’t use Le Nil cigarette papers. How’s that for making a big statement? It sold for $1,300.

If size isn’t on your side, or high ceilings are hard to come by in your neck of the woods, I am not opposed to collecting multiples to fill a space. There is power in numbers, and there were plenty of opportunities to gather examples in this sale.

I love a good story, and I have to admit, The Tiffany signed gouache preparatory design for a Little Orphant Annie  memorial window made a great story. Andrea made phone calls and dug deep in her research. I blogged about it. James Whitcomb Riley’s hometown newspaper, The Greenfield Daily Reporter, picked up the scent and wrote a story too. Read it now!

A lifetime Greenfield resident who he grew up a few doors down from the Riley Home and Museum read the story. He told us that he spent many childhood afternoons touring the historic property, growing a personal connection to the writer and the place he occupies in local history. We like stories like that.

The painting (est. $2,000-$4,000), sold to this gentleman. And that is what we call a happy ending. Andrea says, “Our hope was to keep the painting in Indiana. We did, and we are very pleased with the outcome of this sale.”

The August auction offered up another great selection of Asian antiques. The show stopper in this sale was a Chinese blue and white porcelain ginger jar (est. $150-$250) that wowed the crowd with a hammer price of $1,200. It sold to an Internet bidder.

I adore adornment. So, you can imagine how eye-popping pleased I was with the collection of Omani and Persian gold jewelry this auction featured. There was some fierce competition for the Omani examples—all of it selling within or above high estimate. These heavy duty treasures packed a punch with hammer prices ranging from $250 for a couple of smaller silver Omani examples, up to $2,600 for an 18K gold Persian hinged cuff bracelet.

We fell in love with these pieces.  We were so inspired, we decided to create a pin board.  Have a peek!

There were many other highlights throughout the auction. You can see the results for your self right here.

Stay tuned for our next cataloged auction, kids. We’re going to serve up some fantastic American Paintings AND sports memorabilia in September.