ARTFIXdaily News Feed - Breaking News from the Art World

Crocker Tavern House: A Colonial treasure for sale on Cape Cod

ArtfixDaily / May 25th, 2010

A superb example of 18th-century New England craftsmanship is on the market. Crocker Tavern House, a pre-Revolutionary War estate in seaside Barnstable, Massachusetts, is steeped in history. The Crocker Tavern House played an instrumental role in the birth of American liberty. Whigs (Patriots) ...

Whitney Museum will break ground downtown

ArtfixDaily / May 25th, 2010

After a quarter century of quibble, the vote was unanimous for the Whitney Museum to expand with a new building in the meatpacking district of Manhattan. On Tuesday afternoon the museum board finally agreed to build in the new downtown location with an expected completion date of 2015. The ...

Shelburne Museum rolls out 11 new summer exhibitions

ArtfixDaily / May 24th, 2010

From luminist marine paintings to Ogden Pleissner sporting art, New England landscapes by Jay Hall Connaway to Victorian crazy quilts, Vermont's venerable Shelburne Museum, which touts its many "collections within collections," has organized a near-dozen diverse exhibitions for the summer ...

Minor prevails over Christie's in court

ArtfixDaily / May 24th, 2010

CNet cofounder Halsey Minor won the favor of a San Francisco jury in his complicated dispute with Christie's International. The court ordered Christie's to pay $8.57 million in damages to Minor for a perceived drop in the retail value of his paintings held by the auctioneer. Christie's employees ...

"Andy Warhol: Making Money" debuts

ARTFIXdaily blogs / May 23rd, 2010

A book hand-made by Pop artist Andy Warhol as a gift for a young girl will be published for the first time this fall. Rizzoli is releasing a fascimile edition of the one-of-the-kind "Making Money." Originally created by Warhol in 1981, the book features a series of his exuberant freehand ...

"American Masters from the Collection of John and Jean Wilkinson' opens

ARTRIXdaily blogs / May 23rd, 2010

Twenty works by leading American artists such as Thomas Cole, George Inness, Alfred Maurer, Jane Peterson, Thomas B. Pope and Anthony Thieme, are on loan from the private collection of John and Jean Wilkinson to the Appleton Museum of Art. The exhibit, which runs through July 25, illustrates ...

Wyeth, O'Keeffe lead American art auctions in New York

Bloomberg / May 20th, 2010

A silent scene of a clam-digging expedition off the foggy Maine coast rose to $6.35 million (with buyer's premium) at Christie's Thursday. "Off Shore" by Andrew Wyeth, painted in 1967, had a pre-sale estimate of $1.2-$1.8 million. From the collection of actor Mel Gibson and his wife Robyn, ...

Florida museum receives donated O'Keeffe

AP / May 20th, 2010

An anonymous donor surprised the Museum of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg with the gift of a 1930 Georgia O'Keeffe painting. “Grey Hills Painted Red, New Mexico" has been owned by private collectors and loaned to the Art Institute of Chicago and the Museum of Fine Arts Boston

Connecticut country home, pile of antiques on the block

/ May 19th, 2010

In an American antiques circles, Litchfield, Connecticut, and its rural surroundings, is a favorite destination. Established dealers such as father-and-son Peter Tillou and Jeffrey Tillou are a mainstay in this classic New England town in the Northwest Hills. For those looking to settle into ...

Mel Gibson, Bernard Goldberg collections at Christie's May 20 sale

Christie's / May 18th, 2010

The major American art auctions and gallery events are underway in New York City this week. On May 20, Christie's will offer a $15 million collection of works by Maxfield Parrish, including his iconic "Daybreak." According to arts writer Lindsay Pollack, the Parrish cache comes ...

Fresh-to-market rarities at Thomaston Place weekend auction

Village Soup / May 18th, 2010

A canvas-on-panel fireboard depicting a fantastical Garden of Eden scene, by naïve Revivalist Erastus Salisbury Field (1805-1900), has been plucked for auction from a Brunswick, Maine, home.  This re-discovered piece of Americana, with a pre-sale estimate of ...

"Small but Sublime: Intimate 19th-century American Landscapes" opens

/ May 17th, 2010

Although known for their large-scale landscapes, Hudson River School artists created many alluring smaller pictures for the interiors of Victorian-era homes. These petite views of nature capture the awe-inspiring grandeur of the American landscape in a more intimate way than their bigger ...

SFMOMA patrons rocked 75th birthday bash

San Francisco Chronicle / May 17th, 2010

Nearly 1,200 glittering guests feted the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art's first seventy-five years on Friday. The art museum hosted 550 gallerists, museum directors, artists and art collectors at a $50,000-a-table private dinner and several hundred more patrons came for the late night ...

Major works from Minor collection bring $21.1 million

Bloomberg / May 16th, 2010

Part of CNet co-founder Halsey Minor's contemporary art collection was hammered down by Phillips de Pury & Co. Proceeds from the $21.1 million sale, the first of three auctions, which included 22 of his artworks, will go toward a $21.6 million judgment obtained in October by ML Private ...

Who's hot list

Wall Street Journal / May 16th, 2010

Monet, Renoir and Dali are among the artists who have weathered the recession well, according to the Wall Street Journal. New buyers, such as China's emerging wealthy elite, are stepping up to buy pretty pictures by the big names of Impressionism and early Modernists. "Before the crisis, people ...

John Haberle's delightful visual trickery

Philadelphia Inquirer / May 16th, 2010

Only about 40 trompe l'oeil paintings---images that literally "fool the eye"---are known by 19th-century artist John Haberle. The Brandywine River Museum is presenting about half of his meticulous, illusionist works, in a show augmented by the paintings of Haberle's contemporaries, such as ...

New antiques show this weekend in Boston 'burbs

Wicked Local / May 13th, 2010

Nearly 50 art and antique dealers will exhibit at the inaugural Wayside Inn Antiques Show, Friday through Sunday, in Sudbury, Mass. A portion of the proceeds from the show will be donated to the Wayside Inn Historic Site, the nonprofit corporation that oversees the sprawling 122-acre grounds ...

Jasper Johns' Flag sets artist auction record

ABC News / May 11th, 2010

Christie's sold Jasper Johns' iconic "Flag," from the collection of the late best-selling author Michael Crichton, for $28.6 million, an auction record for the artist. The sale continues today with more works from the Jurassic Park writer's 20th-century art trove. American art dealer Richard ...

"Remember the Ladies: Women of the Hudson River School"

Daily Mail / May 6th, 2010

“It is important to recast 19th century American women landscape painters no longer as the exception… but rather as exceptional,” says Nancy Siegel, a co-curator of a new exhibiton at Cedar Grove: The Thomas Cole National Historic Site, in Catskill, New York. Jennifer Krieger, managing partner ...

America's oldest hostelry hosts new antiques show

Community Advocate / May 6th, 2010

Longfellow's Wayside Inn in historic Sudbury, Mass., is holding its inaugural Antiques Show May 14 through 16. Nearly 50 premier antiques dealers from around the country will offer American art, American and European furniture, ceramics, silver, books, jewelry, folk art and more. American ...