By Carter B. Horsley The magic name this auction season has been "Whitney." The season got off to a big bang with the sale of "Garçon avec pipe," by Pablo Picasso, which had been consigned by the Greentree Foundation from the collection of Mr. and Mrs. John Hay Whitney (see The City Review article) and sold for more than $104 million, a new world auction record for any work of art. The Whitneys not only collected Impressionist and Modern Art but also American paintings and several have been consigned to this auction, most notably "Robert Louis Stevenson and His Wife," by John Singer Sargent (1856-1925), Lot 10. The Sargent portrait of the famous novelist and his wife is one of the most famous paintings not only in Sargent's oeuvre but in the history of American art. Painted in 1885, the oil on canvas measures 20 ¼ by 24 ¼ inches. It is a startling composition with the author walking towards the viewer's left while staring at the viewer and his wife seated at the viewer's right and looking to her left. The picture, moreover, is quite abstract. The author is a vertical and the wife is a bright almost circular cocoon at the right. The middle of the picture is dark and the foreground space is undetailed. Despite the relatively somber palette, the figures and the composition are very elegant. One senses one has momentarily distracted the figures who are gracious enough to go on with their "business." Describing it as "perhaps the best known and most widely recognized of the striking, informal portraits John Singer Sargent began painting in the early 1882, the catalogue provides the following commentary: "It was one of the Whitney's favorite paintings and, though it was requested for inclusion in numerous exhibitions, they were reluctant to part with it for long periods of time, such was their enjoyment of living with this unique painting. Robert Louis Stevenson and His Wife dates from a period in Sargent's career when he spent much of his time away from his studios in Paris and London working at the artist's colony at Broadway, a picturesque village in the English Cotswolds. The resultant paintings are imbued with an impressionistic vitality and spontaneity lacking the formal commissioned portraits that had earned the artist his reputation until that point. Robert Louis Stevenson and His Wife is the second of three portraits Sargent painted of the Scottish author. The first, an endeavor of 1884, now missing and most likely destroyed by Stevenson's wife Fanny, was not to the artists's liking. In Robert Louis Stevenson and His Wife Sargent realized his notion of the writer in motion and conversation. A third portrait of 1887, now in the collection of the Taft Museum, Cincinnati, Ohio. It was commissioned by Charles Fairchild, a Boston banker, for his wife, an admirer of Stevenson's work. Sargent painted Robert Louis Stevenson and His Wife while visiting Bournemouth, a resort town on the coats of England south of London, where Steven and his wife Fanny lived at Skerryvore, a house inherited from Stevenson's father and named after a lighthouse the family firm built in Argyll, Scotland. Sargent likely met Stevenson through Henry James or R.A.M. Stevenson, the writer's cousin who also studied painting with Sargent in Paris..." The catalogue entry also provides a quotation from Stevenson about the painting:
"Sargent was down again and painted a portrait of me walking about in my own dining-room, in my own velveteen jacket, and twisting as I go my own moustache: at one corner a glimpse of my wife, in an Indian dress, and seated in a chair that was once my grandfather's but since some months goes by the name of Henry James's, for it was the novelist loved to sit adds a touch of poesy and comicality. It is, I think, excellent, but is too eccentric to be exhibited. I am at one extreme corner: my wife in this wild dress, and looking like a ghost is at the extreme other end: between us an open door exhibits my palatial entrance hall and part of my respected staircase. All this is touched in lovely, with that witty touch of Sargent's but of course it looks damn queer as a whole." Sargent gave the Stevensons the painting as a gift and Stevenson's wife wrote to her mother-in-law that "It is lovely, but has a rather insane appearance, which makes us value all the more. Anybody may have a 'portrait of a gentleman' but nobody ever had one like this. It is like an open box of jewels." The lot has a conservative estimate of $5,000,000 to $7,000,000. It sold for $8,800,000 including the buyer's premium as do all results mentioned in this article. There are two other wonderful "Whitney" Sargents and they also are of very, very high quality.
Lot 7 is a beautiful watercolor and pencil on paper by Sargent of "Madame Roger-Jourdain. It measures 12 by 22 inches and was executed circa 1883-5. It has an estimate of $1,000,000 to $1,500,000. It sold for $2,696,000. It is, according to the catalogue, "an elegant and sensual watercolor depicting Sargent's Parisian friend and neighbour, Henriette Roger-Jourdain, daughter of the artist Henri Moulignon. She lived with her husband, Joseph, also an artist, along the Boulevard Berthier, adjacent to Sargent and other 19th Century luminaries, including painters, composers and poets. Ever a stylish couple, the Roger-Jourdains acted a s frequent hosts and art patrons and were entranced in the artistic milieu of Paris in the 1890s. Madame Roger-Jourdain particularly captured the imagination of those around here, inspiring musical compositions and portraits alike. Giovanni Boldini, who took over Sargent's studio on the Boulevard Berthiker in 1886, painted his Portrait of Madame Roger-Jourdainin 1889." Gabriel Fauré dedicated "Aurore" to Madame Roger-Jourdain in 1884.
The third "Whitney" Sargent is Lot 18, "Venetian Loggia," an oil on canvas that measures 28 ¼ by 31 ¾ inches. It has a modest estimate of $3,000,000 to $4,000,000 given its size, its painterliness and its marvelous composition. It sold for $5,608,000. "Stylistically and technically, Venetian Loggia belongs to the extraordinary series of pictures of Italian women stringing beads or strolling leisurely in the courtyards of old palazzi Sargent painted during his two Venetian sojourn as.The majority of these Italian paintings also share compositional elements, such as the artist's treatment of space, steep recession and unconventional cropping, all of which are evident in the two Venetian interiors in the collections of the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Instituteand the Carnegie Museum of Art. A luminous palette or rich whites, grays and black dominates Venetian Loggia, creating a sense of mystery and exoticism that is punctuated by the intense accents of red and pink scattered throughout the composition. The contrasting tonalities of light and dark found in the richly painted black areas of the model's shawl and the open doorway silhouetted against the lighter hues of the background reveal the impact and continuing assimilation of Sargent's close study of Velasquez, whose paintings Sargent had copied at the Prado in Spain a few years earlier." The Sargents may be the stars of the auction, but there are important highlights including several works by Maurice Prendergast (1858-1924) and a fine Albert Bierstadt.
The auction has a very lovely pair of watercolors by Prendergast, Lots 21 and 22. Lot 21 is entitled "The Band Concert, Luxembourg Gardens." It is the front-cover illustration of the catalogue and measures 16 by 7 ¾ inches. It is dated 1893. Lot 22 is entitled "Bal Bullier, Latin Quarter." It is the back-cover illustration of the catalogue and measures 15 ¾ by 7 ½ inches. It is dated 1894. Each work has an estimate of $600,000 to $800,000. Lot 22 is perhaps the lovelier, or at least the livelier of the pair and the dancing girl combines the ebullience of Lautrec in an early Picassoesque setting. Lot 21 sold for $579,200. Lot 22 failed to sell.
Another Prendergast is Lot 35, "The Seashore," a stunning oil on canvas that measures 24 by 35 inches and was painted circa 1918-1923. It is a very strong oil with a rich palette and has an estimate of $1,000,000 to $1,500,000. It failed to sell.
The "Whitney" provenance clearly worked its magic on the three Sargents, but did not carry over to all the auction's lots. Nonetheless, prices were very high for many lots and appeared to mark a new plateau in the American paintings market.
Lot 58 is a stunning, medium-size painting of "El Capitain, Yosemite," by Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902). An oil on canvas that measures 18 by 24 inches, it was executed in 1864 and has an estimate of $1,000,000 to $1,500,000. It sold for $1,912,000. Despite some crackling, the painting has the hallmarks of a great Bierstadt," strong composition, fabulous light, interesting cloud formations and great technique. Bierstadt can be uneven but at his best, as indicated here, he is sublime. What is incredible about him and Church is that present-day photographers might have to spend months to witness the incredible skies recorded by the painters and then might miss it even with their high-fangled equipment as sunsets change very very quickly. Their ability to capture the quintessential sunsets was remarkable. Another Bierstadt is Lot 79, "The Wetterhorn," which is dated 1857. Bierstadt studied in Europe and painted numerous scenes in the Alps before returning to the United States and making trips out West in the early 1860s. Many of European scenes are excellent and display Bierstadt's best techniques, but tend to be overshadowed in the American art market by the "grandiloquence" of his great Western scenes. This lot, which has considerable craquelure, has an estimate of $150,000 to $250,000. It sold for $332,800.
Paul Weber (1823-1916) is a fine early painter of the American West and Lot 96 is a very dramatic and fine oil on canvas, entitled "Cascading Waterfall." It measures 48 ¼ by 40 ¼ inches and is dated 1856. It has a very modest estimate of $40,000 to $60,000. It sold for $60,000.
John F. Kensett (1816-1972) is most admired for luminous coast and Lake George scenes but he did not always depict calm waters. Lot 61, "On the Coast, Beverly Shore, Massachusetts," is a very fine coast scene with dramatic breaking waves and a couple nestled close to some large rocks with several ships on the horizon. It was once in the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Frederick Woolworth of Maine. It has an estimate of $700,000 to $900,000. It sold for $988,000.
Lot 69 is a less dramatic but charming oval landscape by Kensett. Entitled "Landscape: Mount Chocorua from Conway, the oil on canvas measures 21 ¼ by 29 ¼ inches and is dated 1854. It has a conservative estimate of $60,000 to $80,000. It sold for $310,400. William Hart (1823-1894) is one of the early Hudson River School painters and Lot 95, "Autumn in New Hampshire," is a very charming, arched picture. An oil on canvas, it measures 18 by 14 inches. It has an estimate of $18,000 to $24,000. It sold for $22,800.
Lot 97 is a fine genre scene by Thomas P. Rossiter (1818-1871), oil on board, 20 ¼ by 26 ¼ inches. Entitled "Picnic above the Hudson (Picnic by the Lake)," it was executed circa 1862. A lovely picture of great charm, it has an estimate of $30,000 to $40,000. It failed to sell.
Lot 186, "In Memoriam of Giorgione," is an excellent oil on canvas by Guy Pène du Bois (1884-1958), who is the subject of an current exhibition at the Graham Gallery on Madison Avenue. It measures 16 by 20 inches. It has an estimate of $15,000 to $20,000. It sold for $45,000.
Lot 103 is a classic and nice marsh scene by Martin J. Heade (1819-1904). An oil on canvas, it measures 13 by 26 inches and was painted circa 1866-76. It has an estimate of $300,000 to $500,000. It sold for $489,600.
Lot 104 is a nice Lake George scene by Jasper Francis Cropsey. An oil on canvas, it measures 12 ¾ by 21 inches and was executed in 1866. It was acquired from the artist by W. H. Vanderbilt and was later in the collection of Cornelius Vanderbilt III. It has a modest estimate of $60,000 to $80,000. It sold for $204,000.
Lot 100 is a great and dramatic highly finished preparatory drawing for one of the most important paintings by John Trumbull (1756-1843), "The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker's Hill," which is in the collection of the Yale University Art Gallery. A sepia ink and wash on paper, it measures 5 ½ by 8 1/8 inches and was executed in 1786. It has a modest estimate of $15,000 to $30,000. It sold for $232,000!
Lot 128 is a superb oil on panel by Oscar Bluemer (1867-1938) entitled "American Night-Red Glare." An oil on panel, it measures 23 by 30 inches and is dated 1929. It has an estimate of $500,000 to $700,000. It sold for $904,000.
Lot 142 is a fine abstraction by Charles Sheeler entitled "Ballarvale Revisited. A tempera on board, it measures 15 1/4 by 14 1/4 inches and is dated 1949. It has an estimate of $200,000 to $300,000. It sold for $310,400.
Elliot Dangerfield (1859-1932) was an artist heavily influenced by Ralph Albert Blakelock, best known for his poetic moonlight scenes. Lots 88 and 87, "Grand Canyon, Moonlight," and "The Spirit of the Night," are excellent examples of his windy, romantic style. The former measures 36 1/2 by 30 1/4 inches and the latter measures 20 by 16 inches. The former has an estimate of $30,000 to $50,000 and the latter has an estimate of $10,000 to $15,000. Lot 88 sold for $36,000 and Lot 87 sold for $27,000.