In the mid-Nineteenth Century, Plains Indians embarked on a transition from painting on rock and hide to embrace paper as a medium for their pictorial histories. They drew on ledger paper and sometimes in autograph books supplied by Eastern explorers, tourists, military figures and agents. Such was the case with an album of Plains Indian pictographs that sold for $34,365, nearly triple the estimate, at Skinner’s September 26 sale of American Indian and ethnographic art.
The 22 detailed images of Lakota Brule warriors on horseback were drawn by tribal artists in pencil, colored pencil and ink sometime before 1881. The images were contained in an autograph album produced by the E. Freeman company in Central Falls, R.I., belonging to Elizabeth King Fales and were described in notes in her elegant hand. Fales was the daughter of a Rhode Island leather manufacturer and mining engineer, a descendant of Massachusetts colonial governor William Bradford. Before her 1886 marriage to Joseph W. Freeman, her travels took her to the Black Hills in the Dakota Territory where she gathered the pictures. A photograph of “Lizzie,” as she identified herself, with Freeman is included in the album, which was dated December 25, 1881. The album, accompanied by a family history of descendents of Governor Bradford of Massachusetts, descended laterally in the family.
Described by department head Douglas Diehl as “a fine piece of Americana,” the album sold to a Western collector, who will permit it to be placed online so that it can be viewed widely.
Plains Indian objects were among the most desirable of the sale. A rare Plains Indian carved gunstock club from the late Nineteenth Century set with three butcher knife blades marked “Lamson and Goodnow Mfg. Co. Patent March 6, 1860,” and decorated with brass tacks sold for $35,550. The club came from a Midwestern collector whom Diehl said has “very good taste and very fine things.”
A Lakota Plains Indian beaded and quilled buffalo hide rifle scabbard from the 1870s that was fringed deeply and banded with red trade cloth sold for $23,700. Diehl said that he had appraised the scabbard on the Antiques Roadshow about six years ago when he had estimated it at $15/20,000. In a reflection of the times, he estimated it this year at $10/15,000.
Deaccessioned by a New England historical society, a Lakota Plains buffalo hide pipe bag with brilliantly colored beading and quilled, with bead tabs and quill wrapped ties and decorated with two American flags, a bison, a horse and geometric devices sold on the phone for $21,330 to a Western collector of beadwork material.
A Northwest beaded cloth and hide bandolier bag from the Tahltan of British Columbia was beaded with abstract animal devices and brought $15,405. A Kiowa Southern Plains dispatch bag of beaded commercial leather with hide fringe sold for $11,258. The beading design had a graphically compelling abstract facial aspect.
A pair of Northeast and quilled cloth and hide moccasins from the mid-Nineteenth Century with beaded silk covered cuffs with floral devices and borders had some condition issues and sold for $4,740. Diehl said that restoration would double the price.
Bringing $8,295 in the gallery was a Lakota Central Plains beaded hide and cloth cradle. The beading was executed in geometric patterns on a white ground, and the cradle had bead and hawk bell danglers. A Lakota beaded saddle blanket with panels of geometric designs on a white ground with bright blue vertical bands sold for $4,444, and a 26½-inch Lakota ash effigy pipe carved with a crane head, elk, star and moon brought $4,148. A Cheyenne beaded hide pipe bag drew $4,444 from a phone bidder; fetching a like price was a Southern Plains Kiowa leather and hide belt set comprising a Strike-a-Lite, a whetstone case and an awl case, all of which were beaded with geometric designs on a medium blue ground.
The same bidder paid $5,036 for a Plains hide tipi cover from the late Nineteenth Century that was paint decorated with two mounted warriors in long feather bonnets and carrying society staffs. An Internet bidder claimed a Southern Plains Comanche model cradle of hide with rawhide mountings for $2,370.
A Northwest Coast rattle carved and painted in the form of a stylized raven with a shaman engaged in transference with a frog fetched $9,480. The 10¾-inch rattle belonged to William Albert Kelly, the first teacher sent by the US Bureau of Education to Alaska, where he was supervisor of government schools, and descended in his family. Proceeds of the sale will help support a family cruise to Alaska.
A group of Kachinas had some interest. The most interesting to bidders was a Southwest Hopi example with extended arms and a case mask with painted eyes and a square frame extension on one side and a triangular extension on the other. Estimated at $1,5/2,000, it realized $7,703. A second Hopi example with a green case mask with a black and white beak, a yellow knob on the top and one pop eye sold for $5,036, five times the low estimate. Another Hopi example depicting Holi Kachina with a green case mask, a rectangular snout and pop eyes attracted $4,740. They sold to American and European collectors.
Native American baskets of note included several California examples. A Yakut coiled and polychrome bowl in bottleneck form with rattlesnake designs and vertical zigzag elements brought $7,110. A Pomo coiled bowl with flared sides and a triangle pattern and feathers, shell disc beads and white and clear seed beads was handsome and sold for $4,148. Another coiled bowl decorated with hourglass designs and stacked diamond devices fetched $3,851, while a Southwest Apache coiled basketry bowl that came from the collection of General John W. Heard had some damage, but exceeded its estimates when it sold for $3,437.
A Navajo transitional weaving from the last quarter of the Nineteenth Century sold for $5,036.
A Nineteenth Century Maori male figure was carved extensively and sold by telephone for $35,550. The 30-inch wood figure had haliotis shell inlay and a fine dark patina. It was collected by the Reverend Alfred Fairbrother, the New England Baptist missionary who lived in New Zealand in the 1880s. When the 1886 volcanic eruption at Mount Tarawera destroyed the village where he lived, Fairbrother was forced to leave, but not before the tribal chief presented him with several hand carved images, tools and weapons. The figure descended in the family and was consigned by a descendant.
Another carved wood figure from the Fairbrother collection was a 10-inch tiki that sold on the phone for $11,258. A Maori carved wood bailer, also acquired by Fairbrother, was made with a double handle with bird head finials and sold for $5,036. An impressive Maori carved wood billhook hand club, also from the Fairbrother collection, was carved with scrolls and a recumbent bird-head figure and sold for $4,740. A Maori carved whalebone fiddle head club from Kotiate, New Zealand, was pierced to accommodate suspension and sold for $4,760.
Carved from koa with several shaped native repairs, a 16½-inch Hawaiian calabash and stand that had been part of the Catherine and Ralph Metcalf collection realized $14,220 from an absentee bidder. The mid-Nineteenth Century bowl, with its careful butterfly repairs, had a compelling tactile quality that greatly enhanced its appeal. A Hawaiian carved koa wood poi bowl, also with butterfly repair, sold for $3,437, while a mid-Nineteenth Century Hawaiian tapa (bed cover) from the Kapa Moi was layered and retained some decoration and sold for $3,555.
The star lot of the pre-Columbian art across the block was a carved 51-inch limestone figure from the Huastec of Mexico that elicited a competition between several phone buyers and went to a Parisian buyer for $29,625. Dated from 1200 to 1500, the piece had been acquired in the 1950s from the Rhode Island collection of Fred Peck.
Pre-Columbian bidders were slightly more picky in their buying than observed previously.
A pudgy pre-Columbian pottery dog from Colima and dating from 100 BC to 250 AD went on the phone for $5,036. Another phone bidder paid $4,740 for a pre-Columbian Mayan pottery tripod plate, circa 550‹50, decorated with a dignitary seated on a jaguar skin dais wearing an elaborate headdress. A pre-Columbian carved stone bowl from the Cienaga culture of northern Argentina and dated from about 200 BC to 300 AD sold for $4,740. The black stone bowl was slightly flared around the rim and was adorned with two stylized feline forms.
Of the African works for sale, a carved wood headrest made by a Shona worker in Zimbabwe sold on the phone for $3,555. The Shona people are renowned for their beautifully adorned headrests. A Yoruba carved Ibeji doll in male form with beaded ornamentation sold online for $1,541.
All prices quoted include the buyer’s premium. For information, www.skinnerinc.com or 508-970-3000.
