Friday at Auction Finds is readers’ questions day. I try to guide readers to resources for them to determine the value of their items. I’m not able to appraise their treasures, but I can do some preliminary research to get them started. So, these are market values based on prices I find on the web, not appraisal for insurance purposes that I suggest for items that have been determined to be of great value.
Today’s question is about a Faith Ringgold doll named Cassie Louise Lightfoot from her “Tar Beach” children’s book.
Question:
Do you know where I might be able to buy a Faith Ringgold doll? I have been looking for one for a few years.
Answer:
The reader wrote me after seeing a blog post I had done about doll artists at the recent Harlem Holiday Doll Show and Sale. Several very talented artists displayed some of their beautiful and creative dolls.
I’m very familiar with Ringgold’s story quilts and paintings. I recall seeing an exhibit of her works at Philadelphia’s Moore College of Art and Design in 2005 when she received a Visionary Woman Award. She had received an honorary doctorate of fine arts from the college in 1986.
Ringgold is an internationally known artist, educator and activist, and her works are in the collections of major museums, including the Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
Some years ago, when I was promoted to a new position at my old newspaper, two friends presented me with a framed poster of Ringgold’s 1998 story quilt titled “Tar Beach,” which she adapted from the times she and her family spent on the roof of their Harlem apartment building. They knew I loved and collected African American art, and I hung the piece proudly on my office wall.
“Tar Beach” became the title and subject of Ringgold’s first children’s book in 1991. She has written or illustrated 14 books.
“When my mother died in 1981, I started making quilts as a tribute to her,” she writes on the scholastic.com website. “During that time, I was trying to get my autobiography published, but no one wanted to print my story. In 1983, I began writing stories on my quilts, as an alternative. That way, when my quilts were hung up to look at, or photographed for a book, people could still read my stories. I have ‘written’ 30 story quilts since then. They are written the way I write my children’s stories – each section written on the quilt is a page.”
I didn’t know that Ringgold made dolls, so I went sleuthing and found several of her art dolls on the web. I also found a commercially made doll named Cassie Louise Lightfoot, the main character in “Tar Beach.” She gave a child-size Cassie to Chelsea Clinton in 1994.
In an interview, Ringgold said she grew up with black dolls. She made her first fabric art doll as an adult around 1970 with assistance from her mother Willi Posey, who was a fashion designer and seamstress. The artist also created a family of fabric people – or soft sculptures – from her childhood in “The Family of Woman Series,” their faces resembling African masks and their clothes made by her mother.
Around 1978 and 1979, she created an International Dolls Collection, which featured the couples Bill and Happi, Frank and Tina, and Ramon and Anita. Her last collaboration with her mother was the Ringgold Doll Kits, which featured a mother, father, sister and brother. It came with a pattern printed on muslin fabric and pastel dye sticks that became permanent after ironing, Ringgold said in an interview.
With Ringgold having made several dolls, I wondered which doll the reader was referring to.
My reply:
Which Faith Ringgold have you been looking for? The Cassie doll from “Tar Beach” seems to be the only one offered for sale. I could not find any of her non-commercial art dolls for sale.
Later, I found a Cassie doll with a miniature copy of “Tar Beach” selling for $75 on a Ringgold website. The doll without the book was offered for $50. Abebooks.com said that this particular set was a limited edition made in 1993 and was not longer available. The site was selling it for $255, with the doll signed on the sash. Two retailers on amazon.com were selling the set new for more than $7,500, and another was selling it used for $374.
Reader’s reply:
Yes, the Cassie doll would be start. Is it “signed” by Ms. Ringgold? I believe she made other dolls that are less mass-produced than Cassie.
My reply:
Try eBay. If you can’t find Cassie the first time, keep looking. I found one that sold two years ago in an online auction for $30.
Everything turns up on eBay. The Cassie set sold recently on the auction site for $19.99 while another set listed for $74.99 did not sell. Do an advanced Search under “Completed Listings,” which show what has or has not sold and for how much.
You’ll be hard-pressed to find one that is signed. First, get the doll and if Ringgold shows up at an exhibit near you, take the doll and ask her to sign the box (or the sash). People do it all the time with books, so why not dolls.
Reader’s reply:
Great suggestion, Sherry! Ms. Ringgold is frequently in NYC so this sounds like a plan. I will let you know if I am successful.
During my years as a resident in Washington Heights, living in a 5th floor walk-up. The roof was our top- yard. Later on I bought “Tar Beach” to illustrate my experience and soon after, I found Cassie on a side walk sale.