Posts Tagged ‘Sothebys’
Sotheby’s: Louis Comfort Tiffany Auction
In 1902, Louis Comfort Tiffany’s glass studio in Corona, Queens, became known as Tiffany Studios. One of the greatest Art Nouveau designers in the world, Tiffany loved the impurities in cheap jelly jars. He saw color possibilities in the chemistry, which were absent from finer glass.
When he could not convince fine-glass makers to recognize the value of these impurities, he hired English glassblower and chemist Arthur Nash, who invented favrile glass. What Nash managed to do was pour color into molten glass as the impurities were interacting, thereby embedding the color in the glass. Then Tiffany painted with it like Monet. Nash never shared the formula with anyone, and no one has ever been able to reproduce it since.
On December 15, 2011, Sotheby’s is having an auction of the best Tiffany Studios pieces currently on the market. A window has an estimated price of $600,000, a chandelier perhaps $700,000. The final hammer price will be much more. I hope a museum gets at least one of them. Here are some items and their details.
Three-panel magnolia window, exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, April 12 – September 9, 1990. Estimated price: $400,000 to $600,000.
Trumpet Creeper Chandelier bought by a private owner from the Macklowe Gallery. Estimated price: $500,000 to $700,000.
Poppy lamp with a rare blown glass “Pineapple” base from a Florida collection. Estimated Price: $90,000 to $120,000.
Dragonfly lamp with a rare, early blown glass base from Brooklyn :-). Estimated Price: $70,000 to $90,000.
Filed under: Style
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Sun Drop Diamond Auction at Sotheby’s
“But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the East, and Juliet is the sun!
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon
Who is already sick and pale with grief.”
In the play, Mr. Capulet tried to marry his daughter off to the highest bidder, but that didn’t go so well. I have greater hopes for Sotheby’s auction of the biggest yellow diamond in the world, the Sun Drop. Look at the clarity with which it catches dark peach and violet light.
Elizabeth Taylor owned it. It seems while everyone was frothing at the mouth in anticipation of the auction at Christie’s next month, Sotheby’s siphoned off a few choice gems of its own.
Filed under: Style
Sotheby’s, CEOs, and Union Workers
By BarbaraAnne:
While we worship the art that is sold at auctions, fantasize wearing diamonds in our mind’s vacation, luxury establishments hide another reality: how they treat their workers. Without people to move priceless art from place to place, there would be no glittering world. Pieces are heavy, or have to be moved with such care, the skill involved takes years to learn.
So we find Sotheby’s Auction House in a dispute with its art handlers, who belong to a union. As recession looms over the world, riots ensue in London, Greece is on the verge of collapse, Germany is furious it has to bail everyone out, and America… well.
The company made $680 million last year. The CEO gave himself a 125% raise, while asking for over 100 concessions from IBT 814, the Art Handlers Union. Now, Sotheby’s has locked union workers out and hired the desperately unemployed, who will work for less. It is just another nail in the coffin of the middle class. Craving escape, we are vulnerable — we, who want beauty to shut out the wasteland of predators. How easy is it to give up empathy for a glance at Monet?
We can’t do it. We must touch the people, who touch the art.
Filed under: Angst
Jadeite and Tourmaline Beads at Sotheby’s
By BarbaraAnne:
Minute details in small pieces of jewelry amaze the mind. “How did they do that?” Conception. Design. Tools. Talent. Imagination. Work. Devotion.
Sotheby’s is having a jewelry sale in Hong Kong, which features jadeite-tourmaline beads and pendants. The magnificent carving is mythical, uniquely close to the Chinese heart.
A whimsical fish of emerald-green jadeite plays in between diamonds and white gold. Price estimate: $40,000.
A panda of semi-translucent deep-green jadeite eats bamboo underneath a diamond bead. Price estimate: $15,000.
Bats are lavished on this purplish pink tourmaline, as seed pearls encase a jade bead above. Price estimate: $15,000.
Lotus roots, peach, and finger citron wish the wearer longevity, as they grace this pink tourmaline bead. Price estimate: $15,000.
Jadeite peaches and tourmaline finger citron and pomegranate combine magnificently, as the artist used nature’s natural colors to make this masterpiece. Price estimate: $15,000.
Filed under: Style
La Belle Romaine
He lived only 35 years and died in Paris of tubercular meningitis in July of 1920, but Amedeo Modigliani’s art lives on. Surrounded by French Impressionist landscapes, he had another vision: painting everyday women, nude, against a plain studio background. So he did, and changed the way the world thought about art. Born into an Italian Jewish family, he was plagued by serious illness, poverty, alcoholism, and narcotic addictions until he died. But his point was that all women who take care of themselves have beautiful bodies, beautiful hair, and a sensuality that should be celebrated. Point taken. One of his paintings, La Belle Romaine (1917), sold at Sotheby’s on Nov. 2 for $68 million.
BarbaraAnne
Filed under: Style
