I hadn’t been to this auction house in a couple years, but as soon as I walked in the door I noticed that very little had changed. Near the front door to the left was…
Bronze sculptures of Laszlo Ispanky
Posted in Art
Category: Art
I’ve always liked the movement and vibrant colors of the works of Charles Searles but had not loved them. That’s probably because I had not come face to face with a piece of his abstracts that spoke…
Readers ask about African mask & shadow puppets
Posted in Art, Ephemera/Paper/Documents, Performers, and Reader questions
Friday at Auction Finds is readers’ questions day. I try to guide readers to resources for them to determine the value of the items that they own. I’m not able to appraise their treasures, but…
I had seen the oil painting of a lush green landscape hanging on the wall, but it looked so much like the tourist art I see at auction that I didn’t stop to take notice…
Artsy 1930s Fortune magazine covers
Posted in Art, and Ephemera/Paper/Documents
On first glance, the image reminded me of a mural I’d perhaps seen of workers building a skyscraper in Chicago. I don’t remember where I saw the work – I’m sure it was during a…
A collection of Mexican feather art
Posted in Art
Birds of a feathers. That’s what they were. Pictures of birds made out of their own plumage. They were both strange and bizarre, but they were so wild with colors that they provoked me to stop and…
Readers ask about numbers book, black doll & Massey prints
Posted in Art, Books, Dolls, and Reader questions
Fridays at Auction Finds is readers’ questions day. I try to guide readers to resources for them to determine the value of the items that they own. I’m not able to appraise their treasures, but…
Watercolors by an artist named Dawson
Posted in Art
The paintings were quite lovely, that was my first thought as I saw them hanging on a wall at the auction house. They were watercolors, clean without any signs of poor upkeep or torn canvas…
I was surprised to learn that Alex Haley’s childhood memories had been immortalized in sculptures. I “discovered” them last summer while visiting the home of a friend’s sister who owned several figurines depicting his growing-up years in Henning, TN.…
When I first started going to auctions looking to buy African American art inexpensively, several pieces by Norman Lewis came up for sale. There were about three or four of his abstract compositions, none of which…