New & Noteworthy
Stay up to date with news, highlights, & features from across Freeman's.
Stay up to date with news, highlights, & features from across Freeman's.
Freeman’s | Hindman’s inaugural Post War and Contemporary Art auction in New York realized an impressive total of nearly $2 million, with standout results for renowned modern masters such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Helen Frankenthaler, and Alexander Calder. The 23-lot sale attracted over 120 registered bidders from across the globe, with the top lots of the day including Mark Grotjahn’s mesmerizing work Untitled (Violet and Canary Yellow Butterfly 43.78), 2012 and Stanley Whitney’s Stay Song #37, 2019, realizing $647,700 and $215,900 respectively. Gemma Sudlow, Executive Vice President and Managing Director of Freeman’s | Hindman New York on the rostrum next to Indian Dream, 1976 by Friedel Dzuba Speaking to the sale is Aaron Cator, Senior Specialist, Post War and Contemporary Art. “The firm broke new boundaries today by selling key works by artists such as Stanley Whitney, Mark Grotjahn, and Kenny Scharf in a highly focused and high-caliber sale. I look forward to building upon these important foundational successes in the year to come as we position ourselves as a formidable player in the global art market.” Expanding on this growth, Gemma Sudlow, Executive Vice President, Managing Director of the New York Region, states, “Less than a year into our new gallery space at 32 East 67 Street, we are delighted with the results of today’s inaugural sale of Post War and Contemporary Art in New York. Over the last week alone, we have welcomed more than 500 guests - including top advisors, fiduciaries, private clients, AD 100 decorators, and designers - to our galleries in the heart of Manhattan's Upper East Side. The thoughtful presentation of today’s auction and the strong international bidding that it garnered demonstrates our commitment to connecting our regional clients across the United States to the global art market.” Pop Culture Icons Pop culture icons took center stage with works by Andy Warhol and Kenny Scharf emerging as the day's standout pieces. The auction kicked off with Warhol’s Grace Kelly (1984) and Jane Fonda (1982), that achieved $139,700 and $28,575, respectively. The momentum continued with Kenny Scharf’s JUDY JUDY JUDY...AKA JUDY INFINITUM (2013), which far exceeded its $70,000 estimate, selling for $146,050. Featuring Judy Jetson soaring into infinity, this vibrant piece of pop surrealism further solidifies the enduring appeal of cultural icons in the art market. Modern Masters Abstract and landscape works by modern masters captivated bidders, with pieces by Roy Lichtenstein, Albert York, and Helen Frankenthaler exceeding expectations. Albert York’s Untitled (1982), a hauntingly sparse landscape, sparked early bidding excitement, ultimately achieving $76,200 against a $60,000 estimate. Additional standout works came from Helen Frankenthaler and Roy Lichtenstein, whose vibrant, colorful works Relay, II (1976) and La Nouvelle Chute de l'Amérique (the complete portfolio of ten with text by Allen Ginsberg and portfolio case), 1992 realized $76,200 and $82,550, respectively, underscoring the continued market appeal of these iconic artists. Additional Highlights · Lot 4 | Richard Mayhew | Untitled, 2018 | Sold for $38,100 · Lot 18 | Friedel Dzubas | Indian Dream, 1976 | Sold for $69,850 Freeman’s is a premier American auction house offering services in multiple categories including fine art, jewelry, design, books and manuscripts, furniture, decorative arts, antiquities, couture, and Asian works of art. With 16 regional locations nationwide, the firm provides auctions, appraisals, private sales, and art advisory services, connecting clients to the global art market. Freeman’s strives to bring art, history, and design to life by connecting people with extraordinary objects through exceptional service and expertise.
View an insightful discussion with industry experts Josh Baer, Alex Glauber, Todd Levin, and Betsy Bickar, moderated by our very own Gemma Sudlow at Freeman’s | Hindman New York. Dive into the conversation around market trends, the evolving role of art advisors, and what is driving the new generation of collectors. Watch the full panel on The Baer Faxt's YouTube channel and join us as we explore the future of art in an unpredictable market. Freeman’s | Hindman New York’s 2024 Post War & Contemporary Art sale is tomorrow, November 14 at 10 AM ET. Watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPHU_nTAXWE
On November 15, Freeman’s invites collectors and enthusiasts to participate in the firm’s premier Watches auction, featuring a selection of highly coveted timepieces.
Color holds profound significance for everyone. It evokes emotion, triggers nostalgia, transforms spaces, and fuels artistic creation. Within this realm, Stanley Whitney (American, b. 1946) emerges as a masterful interpreter of color. Renowned for his vibrant color grid paintings, Whitney has established himself as one of the foremost abstract artists of his time, and we are honored to offer one such work, Stay Song #37 (2019). Dancing with vibrant hues of green, blue, red, yellow and orange, Stay Song #37 exhibits the quick, gestural, and spontaneous application of color for which Whitney is known. While he paints, Whitney immerses himself in a soundtrack of experimental jazz, drawing inspiration from artists such as Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman, and Charlie Parker. Here he highlights the importance of music to his work: Music was always there for me as a kind of rhythm—getting in rhythm, having rhythm...The idea of a painting being so still but so rhythmic at the same time. So getting the rhythm of the painting is really important to me; there’s no beginning to it and no end, and I can shift around in it from any one spot. [i] Despite his recent commercial success, Whitney’s path to artistic acclaim was long and challenging. After graduating with an MFA from Yale, he faced considerable obstacles as a black abstract artist in 1970s New York City. This was a time dominated by minimalism—often characterized by a muted color palette—and a prevailing focus within the Black artistic community on figurative works. In this environment, Whitney sought to develop his own distinctive artistic language, one that would eventually diverge from both minimalism and traditional figurative representation. Whitney struggled to find this language for some time. In an interview, Whitney states, “my difficulty was how to make color the subject because the way we were taught is that color supports content.” [ii] It was not until the 90s that Whitney developed the artistic language that would become his signature. After years without any major success in New York, Whitney accepted a position as a professor of art in Rome and moved there with his wife and fellow artist, Marina Adams. His time abroad had a profound impact on the way he interpreted color and space: ... I realized that, for the color not to be decorative, it had to be in the right space...Then when I was in Italy and Egypt in 1992, I understood the last piece was density. Seeing the Colosseum and the Pantheon in Rome and then in Egypt, the pyramids and temples, I realized I could stack the color together. [iii] This realization marked a significant artistic turning point for Whitney, paving the way for the color grid paintings he produces today. He treats color and space as one, creating an immersive experience for the viewer—a dynamic interplay where each hue interacts with its neighbor, generating a visual rhythm. The loose, geometric grid serves as his sole blueprint, while his application of color relies entirely on intuition. In conversation with colleague and artist David Reed, Whitney describes his process or, perhaps more accurately, his lack of a fixed process: The only system I have really is top, middle, and bottom. Even if I wanted to make a red painting, I couldn't do it. I have to let the color take me wherever it takes me. Sometimes I paint little paintings...and I go, oh, I can turn this into a big painting. But then I can’t do it because I have to be totally open to wherever the painting takes me. The idea that color cannot be controlled and that it has total freedom. One color can’t overpower another color, you know. [iii] As seen in the strong blocks of color in Stay Song #37, where cooler blues and greens confront deep reds, orange, and yellow, balancing the three-tiered grid through streaks of white and black, Stanley Whitney is an artist who is unabashedly unafraid of color. This technique dictates the dialogue within his work, and not only challenges conventional perceptions of abstraction but also invites viewers to engage with art as a living conversation. Bibliography: [i] Whitney, Stanley, and Leri, Louise. “The Space is in the Color.” Gagosian Quarterly. https://gagosian.com/quarterly/2020/04/10/interview-space-is-in-the-color-stanley-whitney-louise-neri/ [ii] Stanley Whitney, interviewed by Adrianna Campbell, “New York, New York,” Artforum, July 14, 2015. [iii] Whitney, Stanley, and David Reed. “Stanley Whitney.” BOMB, no. 123 (2013): 38–46. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24365406.
American artist Vic Payne (b.1960) demonstrates a remarkable ability to capture the spirit and essence of the American West through his artwork. His focus on themes such as cowboy culture, the natural world, and Native American history resonates with both traditional Western art enthusiasts and contemporary audiences alike. Payne's work showcases a meticulous attentiveness to detail and a strong sense of place, reflecting the history and mythology of the West. In his monumental work, Braveheart, the artist depicts a Native American man who reaches out towards a soaring eagle to snare the mystical bird and his coveted feathers. Eagle feathers are considered sacred and were often used in important cultural practices, such as prayer, healing, and the building of a war bonnet. To capture an eagle, however, was a challenge even for the savviest hunters. Lore tells us that the Native Americans had one clever, albeit unconventional method, to trap an eagle, which is shown in the present sculpture. Donning the pelt of a wolf, this warrior lured the eagle to him, only to surprise the bird and meet him in hand-to-talon combat. Braveheart is a dynamic, action-filled sculpture that showcases Payne’s technical skill, eye for composition, and appreciation of Native American culture.
A Montana native, Fremont Ellis settled in Santa Fe, NM, in 1919, and in 1921, was a founding member of Los Cinco Pintores, a group of modernist artists also including Josef Bakos, Walter Mruk, Will Shuster, and Willard Nash. Ellis distinguished himself from his peers by a less avant-garde approach, relying instead on techniques borrowed from both realism and impressionism, as well as the photographic medium. October Aspen evinces visual accuracy through a masterful portrayal of natural light, bathing peaks and recesses in the mountainous landscape in the background, while also spotlighting the aspen in the foreground with their subtly varied autumn shades, as if capturing a fleeting moment in time. The composition further subjugates the gaze to the heights surrounding Santa Fe through an opening amidst the trees, thereby guiding and immersing the viewer in the grandeur of the landscape.
Mark Grotjahn’s Untitled (Violet and Canary Yellow Butterfly 43.78), 2012 belongs to a series of large-scale paintings and drawings the artist began in 2001, investigating varying and multiple-point perspective and engaging vibrant color in new ways in each work in the series. The focal point here, as in his other series of “Perspective Drawings” serves as an anchor for work that is as much about process and chance as it is a careful study in abstraction. In an interview at the time of his 2010 exhibition at the Portland Art Museum, Grotjahn explained: “I changed the focal points because it changed the composition of the works and found that it was visually interesting and worthwhile… the only problems I was trying to solve were visual ones.” Often Grotjahn repeats forms within a series like Butterfly, working through similar shapes, perspectives and effects by employing different colors, often later exhibiting the works together. Their grand scale encompasses the viewer, occupying the whole visual field, something that critics have compared to the effect of Mark Rothko’s painting. The large-scale drawing on offer here, with its rich canary yellow and violet tones, reverberates in the viewer’s eye, creating a pulsating effect that draws the eye up and around and through, but also directly to the worked surface and its materiality. Born in 1968, Grotjahn studied at the University of Colorado at Boulder before completing his MFA at the University of California, Berkeley. In 1995, he was an artist-in-residence at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Madison, Maine. He moved to Los Angeles in 1996, opening an art gallery called Room 702 there with classmate Brent Petersen, an experience that gave him particular savvy into the art market. Though the gallery closed after only two years, it provided Grotjahn an opportunity to work closely with fellow artists and promote their work. Continuing his involvement in the art community in Los Angeles, he served as an artist trustee at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles from 2014 until February of this year. Mark Grotjahn’s work is included in the collections of the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.
This season, Freeman’s Hindman is very proud to introduce at auction, and throughout three different sales, several bronzes by Gaston Lachaise (many of which are fresh to market) from an important family collection in New York. Ranging in size and years, they provide a unique opportunity to rediscover the distinctive style of the French-born Master, once considered to be one of America’s best living sculptors.
As an English woman living in New York, I’ve made it my mission these past few years to celebrate British Royal events with a zeal never before known to me growing up in the UK. Last spring was no exception: my Westchester home was bedecked with bunting, the Victoria Sponge was sagging with jam and cream, and the gin and Pimms were flowing for the coronation of King Charles III. I find delight in the moments, then, where my former life and country of birth come to me in the most unexpected ways in my role as an auctioneer. The discovery, earlier this year, of a time-capsule collection from the country house of Copped Hall in Essex by way of an estate in Greenwich, Connecticut, has been a wonderful example of my old life colliding with my current one as I celebrate ten years as a New Yorker. The sale this June on behalf of the Aline Elwes McDonnell Trust was a highlight of our spring season where bidders from around the globe competed for a slice of English history with superb country house provenance. We kept one work as a highlight for our fall auction season and Old Master and 19th-century pictures sale this November in Philadelphia. At first glance, the work is a copy of the famous and larger-than-life equestrian portrait of King Charles I in the National Gallery, London. Pentiments, however, (the lack of the equerry offering up the helmet behind the horse, the red sash to King Charles I’s waist, and differences in color to the saddle) all point towards this being an unusual copy with variations. Analysis indicates that this is likely a late 17th or early 18th-century canvas with later additions to left and right (presumably added when the work was united with the present carved and gilded frame), with the central panel closely resembling in size the modello in the Royal Collection (RCIN 400571). Whilst not attributed to Van Dyck or his studio, the work joins the esteemed group of known country house copies listed in Susan J. Barnes et al., Van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2004, pp. 468–71 and the early full-size copies in the collection of the Prado and (formerly) at Hitchin Priory. Reduced-size copies have been recorded at Hellens, Much Marcle, Ickworth, and the Clarendon Collection.
Presented in our European Furniture and Decorative Arts auction this October 15-16, the Myra and late Dr. Larry Karp Collection showcases one of the finest selections of mechanical music in recent years. This collection — encompassing musical boxes, automata, roller organs and more — represents forty years of collecting born from the couple's passion for this unique art form, which flourished in the mid-to-late 19th century. Few couples have been as deeply involved in the mechanical music community as Myra and Larry Karp. Myra, a former Musical Box Society International president, was the consummate organizer, expertly coordinating everything from large annual meetings to intimate gatherings in their home. Larry, a dedicated researcher and writer, contributed numerous articles to the Society’s publications and played a pivotal role on the Publications Committee, helping to guide the mission of educating members and the public. Larry’s adventurous spirit led him to travel extensively, searching for new instruments and forming friendships with top dealers and auctioneers across the UK and Europe. His keen eye for quality and rarity allowed him to discover early machines like sectional comb boxes, overture boxes, and clock bases. Yet his collecting ethos went beyond value; he was drawn to the unusual and whimsical, exemplified by a musical carpet sweeper in this auction. The collection features standout pieces that reflect the couple's discerning taste and commitment to the craft. Highlights include: Lot 44: A Rare Libellion Book Playing Music Box with Clock | Estimate: $7,000 - 10,000 Lot 30: A Rare "Revolver" Music Box by M.J. Paillard & Co. | Estimate: $10,000 - 15,000 Lot 28: A Chamber Barrel Organ by John Baptiste Rolin-Thomassin | Estimate: $2,000 - 3,000 Lot 6: A Nicole Frères Grand Format Overture Cylinder Music Box | Estimate: $15,000 - 20,000 Lot 24: A Symphonion Style 38B Eroica Upright Three Disc Music Box with Clock | Estimate: $20,000 - 25,000 Part II of the Karp collection will be featured in Freeman's | Hindman's April 2025 European Furniture and Decorative Arts auction, followed by Part III in a Collected Home auction. Many objects from this collection were documented in Musical Box Society International (MBSI) publications, underscoring the couple’s integral role in the community. As these treasures come to auction, they invite enthusiasts and collectors to celebrate the joy in each object, honoring a legacy that has enriched the world of mechanical music.
The Winchester Model 1866 Rifle revolutionized the firearms industry and became the first product to be offered by the famous Winchester Repeating Arms Company. Nicknamed the “Yellow Boy” due to the use of “gunmetal,” a brass-bronze alloy, for the gun’s frame, the 1866 quickly became a popular repeating rifle used throughout the American West by settlers, lawmen, outlaws, and Native Americans alike. The guns were produced in three primary models, a 24” barreled rifle, a 27” barreled musket, and a 20” barreled saddle ring carbine. While never adopted by the US military, the 1866 was acquired in some numbers by the French during the Franco-Prussian War, by the Ottoman Empire during the Russo-Turkish War, and by the Mexican government as well. Despite becoming somewhat outdated by the introduction of Winchester’s Model 1873 Rifle which fired the new centerfire, rather than rimfire ammunition, the Model 1866 remained in production for slightly more than three decades with some 170,101 being produced between 1866 and 1898. For collectors, one of the most desirable variants of the 1866 is the Saddle Ring Carbine, as these shorter, handier versions of the gun were popular with horsemen in the American West. The carbines were also produced in fewer numbers than the rifles, making them less common on today’s collector’s market. The most desirable of these guns are either those with provenance connecting them to a specific western luminary or those enhanced with engraving by the most famous engravers of the period—Nimschke, Young, or the Ulrichs. This particular example was produced in 1887 and is engraved with the Mexican “Eagle & Snake” motif. Several similarly decorated Model 1866s are attributed as engraving done by the Ulrich Brothers. The decoration suggests that this gun may have stories to tell of bandits and Federales south of the boarder during the turbulent decades that preceded the Mexican Revolution. INQUIRIES: emmafulmer@hindmanauctions.com TO BE OFFERED, OCTOBER 23, CINCINNATI Lot 179 Engraved Winchester Model 1866 Saddle Ring Carbine Attributed to the Ulrich Brothers Estimate: $9,000 - 12,000
Offered from the collection of Velma Engels, Denver, Colorado, the striking screenprint Target (1974) by celebrated American artist Jasper Johns (b. 1930) exemplifies Johns’ preoccupation with the intersections of abstraction and representational objects and the mechanical and the manmade. In the work, concentric circles of blue and yellow sit on a field of mostly bright red, the boldness of the red heightened by undertones of green, while a band of the secondary colors of green, orange, and purple span the upper edge of the image. Though a screenprint, printed by Simca Print Artists, New York, the application of color is purposefully painterly, building up layers of pure color in brushstroke-like swipes and complete with surgically applied “accidental” streaks and drips of pigment, as though of wet media applied to a work hanging on a wall. Heralded for his work in reintroducing representational forms back into abstraction, including series of flags, numbers, and targets beginning in 1954, Johns offers a unique perspective on how the formal properties of creating art can affect the relationship the viewer has with previously overlooked quotidian forms. Johns described in a 1965 interview how he became drawn to such forms: The target seemed to me to occupy a certain kind of relationship to seeing the way we see and to things in the world which we see, and this is the same kind of relationship that the flag had. We say it comes automatically. Automatically you tend to do this, but you see that there are relationships which can be made and those seem to me the relationships that could be made between two images. They’re both things which are seen and not looked at, not examined, and they both have clearly defined areas which could be measured and transferred to canvas. i In taking an easily recognized form and decontextualizing it through artistic intervention, the viewer can reexamine the object's formal abstract possibilities. In employing the use of screenprinting to this artistic intervention, Johns was also able to complicate the relationship between the mechanical and the manmade and further invite his audience to reengage with previously familiar elements. For Johns, “in making a painting, you work with what you see and what you do and the painting seems to me to be primarily concerned with those two things. The physical actions you take to make the painting, and the responses to looking at it.” ii Typically, the making of targets is a mechanical process. This target, however, takes the imagery associated with a target, repurposed through Johns’ intervention, and then likewise mechanically reproduced through the screenprinting process in order to make a uniform edition. The contrast of Johns’ target with the original mass-produced one is his use of composition and bold color that affects the response to the image, including the perfectly repeatable imperfect drips and ink dabs that provide testament to his intervention. Thus, this tour-de-force image offers a fascinating study of the abstraction of identifiable symbols and our understanding of them as well as the dichotomy between the hand of the artist and that which is exactly reproduced in this age of commercial reproduction. INQUIRIES: christinakiriakos@hindmanauctions.com CHICAGO VIEWING: 25 - 26 September 1550 West Carroll Avenue, Chicago, IL i Walter Hopps, “An Interview with Jasper Johns,” Artforum, March, 1965, https://www.artforum.com/features/an-interview-with-jasper-johns-211898/. iiIbid. Lot 45 | Jasper Johns (American, b. 1930) | Target, 1974 | Estimate $150,000 – 250,000 Property from the Collection of Velma Engels, Denver, Colorado
Pablo Picasso’s lifelong commitment to experimentation was applied to a truly prolific use of theme and media. Freeman’s | Hindman is pleased to offer a fantastic survey of Picasso’s career through a dedicated sale showcasing the artist’s works on September 26. This sale reflects the artist’s particular advancement of prints and ceramics, including examples of etching, drypoint, lithograph, linocut, and various ceramics from plates to vases to pitchers, emphasizing both Picasso’s artistic preoccupations as well as his spirit of collaboration, highlighting lifelong relationships. Through the prints and ceramics included here, Picasso explored artistic influences and new approaches, including past art historical tradition and mythology as well as new experiments based on the world around him such as those seen during his Blue Period and the development of Cubism. The artist’s early masterpiece, Le Repas Frugal (1904; printed 1913)—The Frugal Repast—was one of his first etchings. Made during his Blue Period, it echoes the impoverished experiences of the artist at the start of his career, depicting a blind man and the artist's then lover, Madeleine, sitting down to a sparse meal. Meanwhile, the linocut L'Homme à la fraise echoes the Spanish art historical tradition of Golden Age portraits by such artists as Diego Velázquez and El Greco of distinguished men with ruffled collars. Another example of Picasso’s examination of the Spanish Golden Age translated into twentieth-century aesthetics are the two original copper plates for etchings from his 1948 suite illustrating the poems of Luis de Góngora. These plates allow a unique insight into Picasso’s working process for printmaking. Important among this sale is the role of Picasso’s personal relationships and the subsequent effect on his work. This can be seen in his Cubist works of Jacqueline Roque, his second wife and muse, in both print—including the particularly striking linocut Jacqueline au Bandeau de Face (Grand Tête de Femme) (1962)—and ceramic, such as in Jacqueline au chevalet (1956). But, in addition to Jacqueline, also clearly defined are Picasso’s relationships with the printers, publishers, and ceramists so crucial to the use of this media, a network of friends the artist grew and maintained throughout his career. For his prints, among Picasso’s most important collaborators represented is Ambroise Vollard, Picasso’s early gallerist and publisher, who published both Le Repas Frugal and the well-known eponymous Vollard Suite in 1939. Works made possible by gallerist and publisher Louise Leiris are highlighted, including examples by printers Hidalgo Arnéra and the brothers Piero and Aldo Crommelynck, such as from Picasso’s late etching series, Séries 347 (1968). In 1946, Picasso and Louis Fort, the 1913 printer of Le Repas Frugal, were together in Vallauris, France, at a pottery exhibition where, impressed, Picasso asked to be introduced to the owners of Madoura, a local pottery workshop. By the following year, this original meeting with Suzanne and Georges Ramié would lead to a collaboration between Picasso and Madoura for 24 years. In addition to the range of Madoura works presented here which illustrate the fruits of this partnership, a particular highlight is the beautiful ceramic pitcher, Visage au nez noir, offered with the original crate from Madoura, complete with their signature stamps, as acquired by a noted Philadelphia collection directly in 1969. This amazing selection of works thus embodies Picasso’s artistic vision and development from his twenties to his eighties, especially in highlighting the strength of his close circle of loved ones and collaborators who helped translate this developing vision into print and ceramic. Featured Images: Lot 14 | Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) L’Homme à la fraise, 1963 $20,000 - 30,000 Property from a Private Collector, Milwaukee, Wisconsin Lot 15 | Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) Jacqueline au Bandeau de Face (Grand Tête de Femme), 1962 $70,000 - 90,000 Lot 32 | Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) Visage au nez noir (A.R. 609) including original wooden crate from Madoura, 1969 $30,000 - 50,000 Property from a Private Collection, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania INQUIRIES: christinakiriakos@hindmanauctions.com VIEWING: 23 - 25 September 1550 West Carroll Avenue, Chicago, IL
Since its founding in 1982, Hindman Auctions has long championed the works of hometown artists and earned the distinguished reputation of being the go-to destination for the best examples by the Chicago School including, but not limited to, the Hairy Who?, the Chicago Imagists, the Monster Roster, and Midwestern Magical Realists and Surrealists. Hindman’s unparalleled expertise and dedicated passionate promotion of these important artists has pushed their respective markets to new heights and propelled many from a regional audience to a worldwide stage with international demand from collectors, setting numerous auction records along the way. Now better together, we look forward to carrying on this tradition of supporting locally sourced material as Freeman’s | Hindman is thrilled to have one of the strongest and widest ranging selections of works to come to auction in recent years by some of the most sought after Chicago makers in our September 25th Post War and Contemporary Art auction, serving as an introduction to the uninitiated and a reminder of our market-pacing excellence to those already in the know. 2022 was a benchmark year for the Surrealist sorceress Gertrude Abercrombie led by the single-artist, single-owner sale Casting Spells: The Gertrude Abercrombie Collection of Laura and Gary Maurer at Hindman Auctions in September. This sale was followed by the record setting result of Untitled (Woman with Tethered Horse and Moon) for $437,500 in December also at Hindman, breaking our own auction record established in February of that year. The season of the Jazz Witch has continued with more impressive results since and a major retrospective, Gertrude Abercrombie: The Whole World is a Mystery, poised to open in early 2025 at the Carnegie Museum of Art traveling, thereafter, to the Colby College Museum of Art, appropriately including many superb examples placed by Hindman over the years. It is no sleight of hand surprise that among the highlights of the upcoming sale is a spectacular example of Abercrombie’s painterly witchcraft, the aptly titled The Magician from 1957, the peak era of her powers. Under the influence of Magical Realist stylings of close friend John Wilde during this era the paint handling in this work is more precise and refined than we often see from Gertrude—depicting a raven haired stand in for the artist being levitated by the outstretched paw of a spooky black cat above a simplified version of the chaise lounge that graced the artist’s Dorchester Avenue apartment, pleasingly puzzling set pieces and performers in an eerily theatrical austere interior. Adding to the significance of this spell binding masterwork is the painting being still housed in its original frame, featuring a rarely seen original handwritten label. The label came from the famed Hyde Park fixture, the 57th Street Art Fair, where the current owner was present as a ten-year-old for the purchase of the work from Abercrombie by his father for $90—three zeros less than the high end of the current auction estimate. Also, of note in the auction from the Chicago Surrealist circle are two compellingly complex in content and concept 1946 gouaches by Abercrombie contemporary and friendly competitor Julia Thecla, Young Lady with a Bird and The Fire. These enigmatic dreamlike narratives artistically process the horrors of World War II into mesmerizing visual intrigue and are both from the same distinguished Milwaukee collection regifted to the family by artist, bird watcher, and friend Karl Priebe, to whom Thecla had originally gifted the works. Priebe was also a dear friend of Abercrombie who makes appearances in her paintings in the form of birds and bird eggs. So, it is not a large leap to assume the landing bird in Young Lady with a Bird could also represent him or his energy. Carrying on the tradition of fantastical and deeply personal imagery set forth by the Surrealist and Monster Roster artists before them—but with a groundbreaking youthful exuberance—were a group of School of the Art Institute of Chicago graduates who would later become known as the Imagists. They rose to prominence through a series of late 1960s raucous group shows curated by Don Baum at the Hyde Park Art Center as the short lived more specified collectives the Hairy Who?, the Nonplussed Some, and the False Image. All the artists in the movement studied under Whitney Halstead, Katherine Blackshear, and Ray Yoshida who each encouraged the investigation of non-traditional and non-western influences resulting in a unique brand of expression, dually of the moment and evergreen, generally characterized by high-key coloration, graphic intricate linework, playful humor, and low brow leaning pop culture influences. The September sale excitingly includes a wide range of extraordinary examples by many of the brightest Imagist stars. Roger Brown is most renowned for his hallmark stylized silhouetted figures at play in emblematic snapshot vistas or voyeuristically back-lit in signature gray architecture, and we are thrilled to have a trio of works from his 1970s salad days amongst top billing in the sale. His 1973 Bus Stop is a rare three-dimensional work—at once painting and sculpture it explores a favored Brown theme of the search for the elusive American Dream through the lens of tourism with a charming nod to Hopper’s The Nighthawks in the station window. Desert Crater from 1971 is another variation on the concept. Like a passport stamp or a sticker on a suitcase, it focuses on an idealized sightseeing destinationand the ambiguous activities of the vacationing visitors. Continuing Brown’s road trip slide show is the Tramp Art framed shaped canvas of Cattle Mutilation Crucifix, made during a brief residency in New Mexico. The piece references both the Christian cross and the intersection Brown lived at. In the tradition of his disaster paintings, it addresses the disturbing mystery of livestock dismembering. These unexplained mutilations that plagued ranches were a far cry from the wholesome romanticism of the cowboy. In a broader sense, they reflected an America at a crossroads of a fabled history and uncertain future with its dark conspiracy theories and ufology paranoia. Also in volume and variance in the sale are seminal works by fellow Imagist and Hairy Who? coiner Karl Wirsum, led by the 1980 painted sculpture Please Don’t Get Up that depicts a whimsical red, white, and blue figure springing forth from a green chair. Executed at the same time as the artist object show Hare Toddy Kong Tamari at the Museum of Contemporary Art, this work bridges the gap between his mixed media marionettes of the 70s and his wood cutout paintings yet to come. The work displays fine carpentry and craftmanship, one of the blue-collar calling cards of the group. With a tip of the hat to H.C. Westermann—one of the Imagists' heroes—it is also worth noting that the sculpture was part of the personal collection of Phyllis Kind, the gallerist with whom all the Imagists and associated artists showed. Of a similar vintage is a group of three Alien mugshot paintings, a fascinating precursor to his later Alien Dating Service series. These interstellar villains are also importantly reverse painted on acetate, a technique Wirsum cribbed from sign painters and became identifiably part of the Imagist visual repertoire. Rounding out the Wirsum offerings are two 1970s drawings by the artist. Drawing was a daily exercise where he initially worked out ideas and his preferred form of expression. Both works captivatingly illustrate the immediacy of inception that appealed to him so. There is always a lot to unpack in the respective works of Imagist power couple Jim Nutt and Gladys Nilsson. The auction includes remarkable works on paper by the husband and wife—the respective works contradictorily balance the naive and the naughty as both feature the underlying subject of underwear with virtuosic artistic execution. A 1972 specimen drawing by the aforementioned mentoring Ray Yoshida charting for classification abstracted humanoid forms gleaned from the negative spaces of comic book pages is also crucially included in the auction. On the heels of the closing of her critically acclaimed and stunning eponymous retrospective at the Art Institute of Chicago, we are delighted to be offering Christina Ramberg’s 1973 etched diptych, Back to Back, presenting two oppositional prints from separate plates of headless figures in convoluted, contorted garments bound together on a single sheet, perhaps separate parts of the same fractured physical frame. As well, the auction will thrillingly include Ramberg’s uncommon and wonderful 1986 quilt Japanese Showcase, an intriguing departure from her more well-known figurative work. The decisively patterned geometric abstraction of the textile utilizes the same meticulous precision and color sensibility as her paintings. After a stop at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles this incredible comprehensive show will serendipitously make its final stop at the Philadelphia Museum of Art further reinforcing the Chicago, Philadelphia bond. We invite you to explore the auction as an introduction to or to re-familiarize yourself with the eclectic group of exceptional artists, and discover the powerful visual threads that tie their individual visions together. Featured images: Lot 46 | Karl Wirsum (American, 1939-2021) Please Don’t Get Up, 1980. $30,000 – 50,000 Lot 75 | Gertrude Abercrombie (American, 1909-1977) The Magician, 1956 $70,000 - 90,000 Property from the Estate of Charles H. Reich Sr., Chicago, Illinois Lot 47 | Roger Brown (American, 1941-1997) Bus Stop, 1973-74 $40,000 - 60,000 Property from the Collection of Joe Valerio and Linda Searl, Chicago, Illinois Lot 77 | Julia Thecla (American, 1896-1973) The Fire, 1946 $8,000 - 12,000 INQUIRIES: zacharywirsum@hindmanauctions.com VIEWING: 20 - 24 September 1550 West Carroll Avenue, Chicago, IL
Freeman’s | Hindman is honored to present the sale of the Collection of Dr. Richard J. Wattenmaker on September 22, 2024. Comprised of American and European Fine Art, Furniture and Decorative Arts, the single-owner event pays tribute to the Philadelphia author, teacher, and scholar's eclectic taste and extensive knowledge. Richard J. Wattenmaker was often described as an art savant. Born in Philadelphia in 1941, he enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania in 1963, while also studying at the Barnes Foundation under Violette de Mazia and Barton Church, where he met his wife Eva, then fresh off the boat from Sweden. He continued his education at the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University, where he received his MA and PhD following his dissertation on The Art of William Glackens. Starting his career as the Director of Rutgers University Art Gallery, Wattenmaker subsequently became the Chief Curator of Toronto’s Art Gallery of Ontario, Director of the Chrysler Museum, and Director at the Flint Institute of Arts. Wattenmaker also worked as the Director of the Smithsonian's Archives of American Art for seventeen years, and taught at the Barnes Foundation, where a yearly scholarship is still offered in his name. Throughout his career, Wattenmaker oversaw major shows and lectures dedicated to many of the artists for whom he would eventually become the leading reference, such as William Glackens, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, brothers Maurice and Charles Prendergast, as well as Jean Hugo, great grandson of poet and novelist Victor Hugo, whom Wattenmaker and his wife Eva knew personally and regularly visited in the South of France. The Wattenmaker Collection marks the first time so many works by the artist, whose 40th death anniversary is being loudly celebrated in France, are offered on the market. Almost naturally, Wattenmaker also started his own personal collection that echoed his many overlapping specialties and interests. He collected the artists he knew best, either personally or academically speaking. His penchant for the bold, shimmering colors of his many Modern, Surrealist, and Fauve works blended effortlessly with his appreciation for Pennsylvania history in his assortment of Fraktur and redware ceramics. Above all, Wattenmaker’s primary passion and a great source of his intrigue, pride, and joy was wrought iron, which he collected avidly, both in America and Europe, especially France. The Wattenmaker residence was a harmony of textures, colors, media, and aesthetics. In each room, fine art, furniture, and decorative arts not only lived and worked together, but actively engaged in dialogue–a bold and dynamic exchange of European and American influences. By doing so, Wattenmaker underscored his confidence in their equal status. Clearly indebted to Dr. Albert C. Barnes’ exhibiting and collecting philosophies, Wattenmaker displayed gridirons, hinges, locks, and other trammels next to Modern oils and drawings on walls punctuated by stepback cupboards filled with glazed redware. He curated his own home with an enigmatic and deeply personal arrangement that spoke to him and revealed inherent connections. In his award-winning book, American Paintings and Works on Paper in the Barnes Foundation, Wattenmaker quotes a letter from Henri Matisse, who thought such juxtapositions “help students understand a lot of things that the academies don’t teach.” Matisse found it “beneficial for the formation of American artists; a preparation for the flowering of American Art.” Freeman’s | Hindman's exhibition allows for a fresh, enlightening rediscovery of Dr. Wattenmaker's collection. This can be understood as both a tribute to the artists and craftsmanship represented in it and a way to educate all art lovers. The once intimate and very private Collection is now officially proudly out and open to the public—similar to Barnes’ historic move from Little Merion, PA, to Philadelphia in 2011. EXHIBITION DATES AND TIMES: SEPTEMBER 13-22 10:00 AM - 5:00 PM
CHICAGO—A Fancy Brownish Pink Diamond Ring (Lot 263) boasting 5.42 carats led Freeman’s | Hindman’s September 12th Important Jewelry auction, fetching $203,200 against a pre-sale estimate of $100,000 - $150,000. This ring was offered amongst a dazzling array of colored diamonds and jewelry from many notable collections, including Property from the Collection of Audre Deckmann Carlin and Jewelry from The Shawver Art Collection Trust. These collections achieved a sell-through rate by lot of 97% and 95%, respectively. The auction attracted529 participants from 20 countries. Continuing the day's theme was an alexandrite ring by Oscar Heyman with a mesmerizing and prominent color change (Lot 256) that sold for $190,500, far beyond its pre-sale estimate of $60,000 - $100,000 and an Oscar Heyman fancy deep orange-yellow diamond and diamond ‘Toi et Moi’ ring (Lot 261) that sold for $127,000 against a low estimate of $80,000. The sale of these extraordinary colored gemstones and diamonds punctuates a desire in the market for rare, one-of-a-kind pieces. Additionally, stand-out lots in the sale included three rare and unique Bulgari Monete, Cameo, and Intaglio necklaces from a private collector in Wisconsin. These extraordinary pieces are on trend with bold looks from the 1980s, that are synonymous with Bulgari. The storied house is celebrating its 140th anniversary this year. Leading the charge was the Bulgari, agate cameo, diamond, and yellow gold necklace (Lot 91), realizing a price of $114,300 against a low estimate of $20,000. Speaking to the sale is April Matteini, Senior Vice President, Head of Department, Jewelry, “It was an honor to present the extraordinary gemstones in the sale today. The fancy brownish pink diamond, alexandrite, and so many of the colored diamonds sold for well above their estimates, proving that collectors are paying strong prices for rare, colored gems.” “Today’s sale shows the growing interest in rare colored gems in all price ranges. From moonstones, orange garnets, and pink sapphires to an alexandrite and colored diamonds, clients are seeking the rare and unusual. It is our pleasure to offer such rare gems, and we look forward to offering our next selection in December,” says Dianne Batista, Senior Vice President, Jewelry and Watches. Additional Highlights | Important Jewelry Auction Lot 283 | 7.31 CARAT EMERALD CUT DIAMOND RING | Sold for $177,800 Lot 103 | BULGARI, COIN AND YELLOW GOLD 'MONETE' NECKLACE | Sold for $66,040 Lot 127 | HEMMERLE MOONSTONE, SAPPHIRE AND PORCELAIN EARRINGS | Sold for $24,130 Lot 262 | FANCY GREENISH YELLOW DIAMOND AND COLORED DIAMOND PENDANT | Sold for $76,200