ARTnews's Milton Esterow to speak at Swann on Nov 15

Swann is pleased to announce an upcoming talk by ARTnews editor & publisher Milton Esterow "on the current art scene and how to look at art without feeling inferior." Set against a fitting backdrop, the opening reception & preview of our Contemporary Art sale, the evening is sure to be both interesting and fun. The event is Tuesday, November 15 from 6 to 8 PM, with the talk starting at 6:30.  RSVP by November 8 to rsvp@swanngalleries.com.

Print Department Specialist Conner Williams with guests and jazz trio at the Atelier 17 reception.

Speaking of mingling, this past week's opening reception for the Atelier 17, Abstract Expressionism & The New York School auction was a great success.  Guests enjoyed jazz and martinis while perusing prints by Motherwell, Pollock, de Kooning and many others.

Print Department staffers Erin Bennett, Todd Weyman & Brittney Ingarra at the reception.

A Freudian Slip of Paper: 1933 Analysis Bill Comes to Auction

Despite the waning influence of his work in contemporary psychology, Sigmund Freud’s ideas, personality, and image continue to attract admirers. Freud’s importance to western culture is demonstrated by the widespread familiarity of his name and of the notion of the unconscious mind.

Cinema has been greatly influenced by his work—consider the films of Alfred Hitchcock from the 1940s and 1950s. Even today, Freud inspires important filmmakers: David Cronenberg’s latest film, A Dangerous Method, which screened early this month at the New York Film Festival at Lincoln Center, is a fictionalized account of the relationship between Freud and Carl Jung.

A practicing psychoanalyst or an avid moviegoer might be equally delighted by an item being offered in Swann’s November 3 Autographs auction. Lot 89, a brief note written out and signed by Freud on his correspondence card, states directly and without ceremony the amount of money due him for 23 hours of psychoanalysis. 

Freud wrote this bill for services rendered in 1933, a year of tremendous historical importance for the West. In that year, Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, leading to the destruction or flight of some of the greatest scientific minds of Europe; the Great Depression was at its worst, causing many to loose faith in the notion that science can solve our economic problems; and the World’s Fair opened in Chicago, celebrating a century of scientific progress and technological innovation. Also during that year, the American recipient of the bill, Roy R. Grinker, Sr., visited Freud in Vienna to be psychoanalyzed for the purpose of furthering his own study of psychology. 

Dr. Grinker, who was among Freud’s last patients, later founded the now-defunct Institute for Psychosomatic and Psychiatric Research and Training at Michael Reese Hospital in Chicago. For the privilege of being analyzed by the father of modern psychology, Dr. Grinker paid Freud’s rate at the time of $25/hour. Freud’s bill shows 2,400 Austrian shillings due for 23 hours between the months of September and October. One can only speculate on whether Dr. Grinker got his money’s worth.

Records for Pollock, Whistler & Rembrandt in This Week’s Sale

Wednesday’s Old Master Through Modern Prints sale, paired with yesterday’s Atelier 17,Abstract Expressionism & The New York School sale, brought nearly $3,000,000, and set print records for several major artists.

Jackson Pollock, Untitled, circa 1944-45. One of only two proofs.

A posthumously produced Jackson Pollock drypoint and engraving, Untitled, circa 1944-45, one of two proofs prior to an edition of 50 printed for the MoMA, New York, 1967, set a record for any print by Pollock sold at auction. Bringing $102,000, it was the top lot across both sale days.

James A.M. Whistler, Finette, 1859.

Among the stellar prints by Whistler in the Old Master through Modern section were five that set new auction records, and each of these brought more than $20,000. The top Whistler lot, Finette, a drypoint and etching on Japan paper, 1859, sold for $84,000.

Rembrandt van Rijn, Self Portrait Leaning on a Stone Sill, etching, 1639.

The Old Master section of the sale earned over $1 million on its own, and saw two records for Rembrandt etchings. Self Portrait Leaning on a Stone Sill, 1639, an extremely scarce print in excellent condition, brought $72,000, and Rembrandt’s The Descent from the Cross: Second Plate, 1633, a large print, sold for $69,000. 

Atelier 17 and Abstract Expressionism: Notes from the Catalogue

Jackson Pollock, Untitled, screenprint on Strathmore paper, 1951 (printed 1964).

The 1940s marked the moment of Stanley W. Hayter’s greatest influence--not only among printmakers--in the emergence of Abstract Expressionism in America. The term Abstract Expressionism was not first applied to American art. In fact, the German Expressionist magazine Der Sturm, which featured art and writings by abstract-bent artists, fostered its beginnings in 1919, when it first used the term. The first instance of the term in America came in 1929 from Alfred Barr, founding director of the Museum of Modern Art, in describing the art of Wassily Kandinsky. The term was not officially coined to describe a sphere of influence and proverbial school in America until 1946, when art critic Robert Coates conveyed the stylistic approach of Arshile Gorky, Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock as belonging to abstract expressionism. 

Willem de Kooning, For Lisa, color lithograph, 1984.

Hayter’s newly reestablished New York Atelier 17 provided an important link between printmaking and the emerging American artists. Many painters did not adjust easily to the rigorous technical requirements of printmaking, and some, including Pollock, made experimental prints, perhaps to stimulate and inform their work in other media. Many artists could trace the development of their artistic language through the Atelier and the abstract expressionistic tendencies practiced there.

While Hayter advocated both the theory and practice of automatism, he helped to fuse this Surrealist technique with the expressive power of abstraction. According to Hayter, “We had an experimental approach and created an environment where things could happen."

Robert Motherwell, Orange Lyric, color aquatint and carborundum on German etching paper, 1989.

Hayter embarked on a lecture series throughout the United States while also giving courses in Chicago and Brooklyn. Throughout the 1950s and 60s, printmaking departments became well established, and juried exhibitions and competitions also brought attention to the printmaking medium. The most prestigious of these competitive exhibitions were the Brooklyn Museum print national, and the Cincinnati Biennial of Color Lithography; these helped to legitimize the graphic arts, and made printmakers across the country realize that their creative community was large and more diverse than originally thought.

This Week's Top Lots

There were two very successful auctions at Swann Galleries this week, with record prices and several lots that had never been seen at auction.

Monday’s Early Printed, Medical & Scientific Books sale featured religious texts, classics, law books, works on anesthesia & medicine, as well as a selection of books of Iberian interest. The top lot, a book of music by Cristobal de Morales entitled Missarum liber primus, brought $33,600. It was the first time this book, a second edition of the first volume, printed in Lyon in 1546, had been offered at auction.

Cristobal de Morales' Missarum liber primus.

Another auction first was a Biblia sacra, a Latin bible printed in Salmanca, 1555. This first attempt to publish the Vatable Bible in Spain was suppressed by the Inquisition, and the book, which sold for $28,800, is one of only four known copies.

This 1555 Salmanca edition was placed on the first Spanish index of prohibited books in 1559.

There was a large offering of medical books in Monday’s sale as well, including works by Sigmund Freud, Marie Curie, and Benjamin Franklin. Franklin’s Some Account of the Success of Inoculation for the Small-Pox in England and America, with contributions by William Heberden, set an auction record, bringing $15,600.

Franklin's statistical account of smallpox inoculation in Boston is a first edition.

Fine Photographs were sold on Tuesday. The auction started with a bang when the very first lot, a group of nine early albumen prints of China from 1860, set off a bidding war that resulted in a price of $57,600, a record.

One of the nine images of China from the record-setting portfolio.

The top lot for the photographs sale was Berenice Abbott’s intrepid Retrospective Portfolio, printed in 1982.  Consisting of 50 large-format silver prints taken from 1930 to 1960, the group of images brought $90,000, a record for this portfolio.

A selection from Abbott's portfolio, titled Fifth Avenue, Nos. 4, 6, 8.

Another top lot was Edward S. Curtis’s Canyon del Muerto, a stunning orotone dated 1906.

This piece was offered in the original Curtis frame with a caption label verso.

Love Is in the Air at Swann

Much is said and written about the art market, with coverage of auctions often limited to top-selling lots and big names. But, every once in a while a more personal--even romantic--story emerges.

Jessica Miely, 27, Assistant Development Officer at the Metropolitan Museum of Art,
and Mac Joseph, 29, Social Media Marketing Manager at Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group,
visit Swann Galleries' Fine Photographs preview.

Yesterday's auction preview was visited by a young couple shopping for a photograph that would be a wedding gift for each other. Rather than surprising each other with, say, a watch, or a pair of earrings, they saw an opportunity to begin an art collection together. The two agreed on an image that appealed to both of their tastes, and left an order bid for the lot.

The couple previews material with Alex Van Clief of Swann's Photo Department

Of course, when it comes to leaving a bid for an item at auction, there are no guarantees. It's a little bit of a gamble--just like marriage itself. But, we certainly wish them luck, with the photograph and with their wedding this December!

Atelier 17 in New York: Notes from the Catalogue

Jackson Pollock, Untitled, drypoint and engraving, circa 1944-45.

The tradition of the artist-printmaker was not a fully developed one in the late 19th- and early 20th-century United States. Few American artists saw printmaking as a worthy endeavor, but rather a new and arduous process that was not worth their time and toil. When artists considered printmaking it was often as a means of reproducing their work, and they employed professional printmakers to fulfill their requests. Printmaking courses of the day promoted technical competence and picturesque subjects but did little to push the medium beyond second-rate status. 

Gabor Peterdi, Combat, brush and black and gray ink and wash on paper, 1950.

Atelier 17's Stanley Hayter promoted the print as an expressive and experimental process for form and meaning. This approach appealed to those who were disenchanted with the provincialism and conservatism in American art--particularly in New York in the late 1940s.

Mauricio Lasansky, Sol y Luna, engraving, etching, soft-ground etching, aquatint, scraping and burnishing, 1945.

At the onset of the World War II, Hayter left Paris for London and finally settled in New York in 1940, after a short stint giving courses at the California School of Fine Arts. At the New School for Social Research, Hayter was given a small space to re-establish his workshop. The close proximity of students and intellectual discourse surpassed that in Paris, with students often going for drinks after class, discussing art, ideas and even personal matters.


The draw of the workshop was the opportunity to study, converse and work
at the same table with many émigré European artists, including Chagall, Miró, Dalí and Masson, all of whom had worked with Hayter earlier in Paris. 

Fred Becker, Underwater, engraving and embossing, 1948.

Perhaps the watershed moment for the workshop’s re-establishment
came in the years 1944 and 1945, when the Museum of Modern Art organized an exhibition entitled “Hayter and Studio 17.” Among the exhibitors were Miró, Masson, Lasansky, Chagall, Calder, Lipchitz, and Peterdi. And, some of them went on to establish their own printmaking studios and programs at other American universities. These studios would perpetuate the spirit of the experimental workshop throughout the United States.

Letterio Calapai, Elemental Figure, etching and aquatint, 1946.

Others who worked at Atelier 17, and seem to have been influenced by ideas central to the studio, were artists experimenting with abstraction, including Reuben Kadish, Robert Motherwell, Louise Bourgeois, Louise Nevelson and Jackson Pollock.

Auctioneers in Action!

Our dueling auctioneers battled it out last Sunday at two different benefit auctions in New York, with successful and energetic results on both fronts.  Swann President Nicholas Lowry conducted the Garrison Art Center’s Artists on Location live auction, and Swann Vice President Daile Kaplan conducted the auction of classic and contemporary photographs at The Center for Photography at Woodstock’s Benefit Gala.

Daile Kaplan and Nicholas Lowry.

We are pleased to find our auctioneers' talents in such high demand for these fundraising events, even if they are competing for our attention by scheduling auctions on the same night!

Nicho Lowry in the Big Easy

Swann President and Principal Auctioneer Nicholas Lowry is in New Orleans, and will be conducting the O What a Night Live Auction at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art tomorrow, October 14.


The auction offers works by notable Southern artists, and in past years attendees have included important local figures and celebrities. Below is an image of Nicho at the 2010 event.

This year, the Museum will honor the work of beloved New Orleans artist George Dureau and his contributions to the community and the world. And, event co-chairs Allison Kendrick and Anna Beth Goodman promise an unforgettable evening of art, music and cuisine with Southern flair.

Franz Krieger WWII Album that Became Internet Sensation Comes to Auction

In June 2011, New York Times journalists James Barron and David W. Dunlap posted an article about a mystery WWII photograph album on the Times's blog, Lens, with a few representative images. Given the album's broad range of pictures -- Nazi solders en route to Minsk (the site of a concentration camp), political prisoners of war, a Jewish prisoner wearing a Star of David, Hitler arriving at Marienurg, as well as scenes of the photographer and his "frau" (a Marlene Dietrich-lookalike) -- the story was immediately picked up by Eines Tages, a site associated with the German magazine Der Spiegel, whose blog received more than 7 million hits in a single day!

An online reader in Germany quickly identified the pictures as the work of Franz Krieger (1914-1993), a former Austrian press photographer and businessman. Readers in South Africa, the U.S. and Europe posted additional information, clarifying the location or backstory to some of the pictures. Clearly the photographs still had extraordinary resonance and historical interest. Perhaps this overwhelming response may be attributed to Krieger's direct, if not artful, documentary style as well his special access to Hitler. Indeed, the album's narrative reflects a startling duality, alternating between pictures of the photographer's personal life and the military activities he was commissioned to document. The pictures offer glimpses into the quotidian nature of the soldiers' lives, which is counterpointed with compelling portraits depicting the victims of the Nazi's brutal campaign.


Now, this uncommon album containing 214 photographs from 1941-1942 is coming to auction. For more information, read the complete catalogue description.

Catch-22 Turns 50

Today, October 10, marks the 50th anniversary of the publication of Joseph Heller’s satirical anti-war novel Catch-22. There's been much news coverage, and various related events are planned, including an October 19 reading and discussion at Symphony Space in New York. On Tuesday, November 8, Swann Galleries will be offering several Heller items as part of our Art, Press & Illustrated Books / 19th & 20th Century Literature sale, all of which are signed or inscribed, including a first American edition of Catch-22.

Few works have had the immediate and enduring impact of Catch-22. Not without controversy, Heller’s black-humored evisceration of “Good War” cultural assumptions would become increasingly relevant in the years following its publication, especially in the wake of the escalating Vietnam War. A film version—directed by noted filmmaker Mike Nichols and scripted by Buck Henry, the pair behind the 1967 film The Graduate—was released in 1970 and also proved a success. Included in the auction is the Final Revised Draft of the screenplay inscribed by Heller, in which he enthusiastically praises the just-seen film.

All of the Heller material being offered is from noted New York collector Frank Adamucci, Jr., whom Heller himself described as “far and away my favorite autograph collector.” 

Other Catch-22 highlights include a signed British first edition; a signed, uncorrected proof of Heller’s dramatization of his most famous novel; and a wonderful association copy and advance proof that once belonged to W.H. Auden.

Atelier 17: Europe and the Early Years

Stanley W. Hayter, Cronos, engraving, soft-ground etching and scorper, 1944.

This is the first in a series of posts about Swann's October 27 auction of Atelier 17, Abstract Expressionism & The New York School.


The informal co-operative printmaking workshop that English painter and draftsman Stanley William Hayter opened in 1927 had its modest and unforeseen beginnings at his own dilapidated studio in Paris. In 1933 he moved to a studio at 17 rue Campagne-Premier, from where the now famous printmaking workshop would take its name.

Joan Miró, Fraternity, etching, 1939.

Located in close proximity to Montparnasse, one of the liveliest quarters for artists, the workshop brought many casual visitors and serious students seeking training or advice on technical matters in printing. Among attractions of Atelier 17 in the beginning were the magnetic personality and technical prowess of Hayter as printmaker and teacher, and the presence of experienced artists such as the Surrealists Ernst, Giacometti, Masson, Miró, Tanguy, and others, including Calder, Campigli, Lipchitz and Picasso, who worked side by side with younger artists.

Yves Tanguy, La Mythe de la Roche Percée, etching, 1947.  

Hayter embraced automatism in the 1930s, encouraging his students to work without preliminary sketches, not transcribing a drawing or painting but creating a unique work. He even encouraged them to destroy the plate, taking proofs of the plates from time to time. These investigations in line engraving spurred experimentation with different intaglio techniques such as soft-ground etching, scorper and embossing, as well as relief printing of intaglio plates and even plaster molds.


Picasso would drop by to converse on technical matters concerning printmaking, something he would explore at the encouragement of Hayter. Others, like Miró and Ernst, would visit sporadically, as they had their more intimate group of Surrealist colleagues with whom they exchanged ideas and exhibited. 

Jacques Lipchitz, Couple et Enfant, etching, engraving and aquatint, circa 1940.  

The printmaking work of noted artists was sometimes seen as secondary to their painting and sculpture, but the younger artists, whose techniques, styles and even ideologies were less developed, collaborated with greater personal meaning. 

Max Ernst, Le Sonneur/Carte de l'Océan, color etching and embossing, 1950.

Money made from the few sales was often given back to the studio for supplies and those who had no money contributed their time to maintenance. In this atmosphere there were no teachers and all students, all learning from each other’s successes and failures.

Yesterday's Top Lots: African-American Fine Art

Yesterday's auction of African-American Fine Art saw heated bidding from dealers, collectors and institutions, resulting in strong prices for works by modern and contemporary artists.

Charles White's powerful drawing of a worker was the sale's top lot.

The sale's top lot was Charles White's large-scale drawing Work, crayon and charcoal on board, 1953, which brought $306,000. It was the second highest price paid at auction for a work by White--the highest was his General Moses (Harriet Tubman), Chinese ink on two joined sheets of illustration board, 1965, which sold at Swann in October 2007 for $360,000.

Barkley Hendricks's Twins are typical of his cool, stylish portrait subjects 

Also selling just below the previous artist record was Barkley L. Hendricks's Twins, oil and acrylic on canvas diptych, 1977, which sold for $108,000. The artist's Bid 'Em In/Slave (Angie), oil and acrylic on canvas, 1973 , sold for $144,000 in Swann's October 2009 auction.

Duncanson was the first African-American landscape painter to gain international renown.

Rounding out the top lots were Robert S. Duncanson's Untitled (Landscape), oil on canvas, late 1850s, which went to an institution for $120,000; and two untitled gouache paintings by Jacob Lawrence of Card Players, panels from a folding screen, circa 1941-42, $108,000.

These panels by Jacob Lawrence were likely realized while he was on honeymoon
in New Orleans in late 1941/early 1942.

Artist records that were set in the sale included Joseph Delaney's Low Key, oil on canvas, circa 1945, $33,600 and Loïs Mailou Jones, Marché de Kenscoff, Haiti, oil on canvas, 1962, $32,400.

This painting set a new artist record for Joseph Delaney.

One of the fine paintings by Loïs Mailou Jones from her estate that was offered in the auction.

Battling Swann Auctioneers!

With so many good causes in the New York area, and such talented auctioneers at Swann, it's no wonder two of our big names are participating in fundraisers on the same day.

Swann President Nicholas Lowry will be conducting the Garrison Art Center's Artists on Location live auction this Sunday, October 9 at 3:30 PM.

Sixty miles north, Swann Vice President Daile Kaplan will be conducting an auction of contemporary and classic photographs at The Center for Photography at Woodstock's Benefit Gala, which begins at 5:30 PM.

For information on these not-for profit arts and educational organizations, visit their websites: http://garrisonartcenter.org and http://www.cpw.org/index.html. And, please support the arts.

African-American Fine Art Across the Country

Hale Woodruff, Rape of Europa, oil on canvas, circa 1958. Estimate: $90,000 to $120,000.

Across the U.S. this fall, a bevy of museum shows related to the impressive works in Thursday’s African-American Fine Art auction have opened. 

Norman Lewis, Promenade, oil on canvas, 1961. Estimate: $120,000 to $180,000.

Just uptown from Swann, at the Studio Museum in Harlem, Spiral:Perspectives on an African-American Art Collective, winds down later this month. The show includes masterworks by Norman Lewis and Hale Woodruff; the show’s Bonfire shares the same calligraphic “ritual” figures as those in Lewis’s Promenade, which is being exhibited for the first time at Swann since its purchase in 1961. The auction catalogue’s cover lot, Woodruff’s Rape of Europa, is one of only four known paintings from the Mythic series—one of the others, Africa and the Bull, is on view in the Spiral show. Charles Alston and Romare Bearden were also active members of the collective and their work is included in the show.

Barkley L. Hendricks, Twins, oil and acrylic on canvas diptych, 1977. Estimate: $100,000 to $150,000.

Washington D.C.’s Corcoran Gallery of Art’s “30 Americans" features African-American artwork from the past three decades, including pieces by Barkley Hendricks, Carrie Mae Weems and Kara Walker.

Throughout Los Angeles, a group of exhibitions have just launched under the umbrella "Pacific Standard Time: an L.A. Art Story." While mid-century American art emerged predominantly in New York, the West Coast art scene is not to be ignored. The Getty Foundation helped launch a collaboration between 60 Southern California cultural institutions—several of the shows, including Now Dig This! Art and Black Los Angeles 1960-1980 at the Hammer Museum, charts the legacy of the city's pioneering African-American artists. Under the Big Black Sun: California Art 1974-1981 at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, includes Robert Colescott’s painting, My Shadow, which comes from the Robert Louis Stevenson poem, as shown in the crayon drawing—evidently for the painting—in the October 6^th auction.
Robert Colescott, I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me..., colored crayon, 1977. Estimate: $5,000 to $7,000.

Robert S. Duncanson, Untitled (Landscape), oil on canvas, late 1850s. Estimate: $60,000 to $90,000.

And, of course, Robert S. Duncanson’s Untitled (Landscape) oil on canvas only taps the surface of the works in his retrospective, Robert S. Duncanson: The Spiritual Striving of the Freedmen's Sons, at the Thomas Cole National Historic Site in Catskill, NY through October 30^th.  

Daile Kaplan Auctioneer at CPW Benefit Gala Auction

Daile Kaplan, Director of Swann Galleries' Photographs Department, will be the auctioneer at The Center for Photography at Woodstock's annual Benefit Gala on Sunday, October 9th.

Held at the Bearsville Theater in Woodstock, NY, the event will honor FotoFest founders Fred Baldwin and Wendy Watriss as the 2011 Vision Award Honorees.

Fred Baldwin and Wendy Watriss founded the photo festival FotoFest in 1983

The live auction offers contemporary and classic photographs, and proceeds will support the creative programs of the Center, a not-for-profit arts and educational organization. There are photographs by Berenice Abbott, Walker Evans, Robert Mapplethorpe, Mary Ellen Mark, Aaron Siskind, William Wegman and many others.

Auction highlights include Aaron Siskind's Rome 135, 1977,
vintage gelatin silver print, donated by the Aaron Siskind Foundation
and the Bruce Silverstein Gallery, NYC.

Online bidding is also available, visit http://cpw.auctionanything.com for more information.