From fine folk art to an appealing assortment of Americana, Stella Show Mgmt Co.’s return to the Piers during Americana Week was a triumphant one. The Americana & Antiques @ The Pier show, absent from the mid-January scene here last year, was eagerly welcomed back by buyers and dealers alike.
Americana took front and center at the show at Pier 92, with a sprinkling of Modern, textiles and fashion thrown in for good measure. One of the first dealers buyers came across was Mark Morris, Wadsworth, Ohio, whose booth at the head of the center aisle showed a tramp art chest with 15 drawers that came out of Cleveland, and an oil on canvas painting of the Reed’s Ferry train station in Merrimac, N.H., signed and dated 1909.
Neverbird Antiques, Surry, Va., featured a striking and rare table rug by Hannah Lunt Hale (1827‱849) of Newbury, Mass., executed in the 1840s, and signed on the reverse. The dealers said this is the earliest signed example they have seen. Other standouts included a rare and very early Lancaster, Ohio, sampler, 1798, that was made five years prior to Ohio’s statehood; two Shaker samplers, and a framed, autographed piece of music by Ignacy Jan Paderewski, who came to America in 1902 for a year and performed some concerts. This was said to have been presented to an African American server who had been given a ticket to a concert by her employer.
A folk art carved wooden figure of a woman with one hand upraised, titled “Goodbye Honey,” by Frank Finney, who is better known for his bird carvings, was also offered here.
B. Hannah Daniel Antiques, Athens, Ala., sold a hooked rug depicting two horses on a farm that was made from hemp, silk, wool and cotton, circa 1902‰4. She also offered a Pennsylvania hutch table with a flip-down top for seating in a lovely green paint and a Southern hunt board, circa 1820.
Robert Perry, Orchard Park, N.Y., featured a large American flag that took up most of one of his side walls. The flag, with 38 stars, came out of New England and dates to 1876. The dealer also had on view a couple of fine hooked rugs and a two-tier iron store display that held potted flowers at one time.
Worden Select Objects, Burr Oak, Mich., was getting lots of attention for the eight or so pairs of whimsical angel’s wings in a white mesh fabric embellished with golden stars and a gold paint trim, likely from a children’s pageant, that the dealer displayed around her booth, but equally interesting were two leather back braces that hung on a wall.
Eye candy in the booth of Paula Rubenstein, New York City, included a game wheel that was about 6 feet tall and a selection of colorful Native American textiles with geometric designs.
On display front and center at Mary and Josh Steenburgh, Pike, N.H., was a Nineteenth Century spike harrow that had been found in a barn. Also offered was a massive late Nineteenth Century apothecary cabinet in birch with glass doors and a funky gear assemblage with three iron gears, dating to the late Nineteenth Centuryarly Twentieth Century.
Judith and James Milne, New York City, featured an early Nineteenth Century drafting table with an unusual sculptural iron base, a trade sign from a golf course of a female golfer, circa 1950, as well as a hooked rug showing a folky house and autumn leaves, circa 1920, and several Nineteenth Century game boards in original paint.
Sweden Plus, Nantucket, Mass., offered an oil on board of a sailboat and wharf, signed A. Gregory Ritter, as well as a still life of fruit by a Swedish artist named Kallstenius, in 1929, and a Swedish pine swing leg “slayboard” or drop leaf table in great blue paint, circa 1800′0.
A Nineteenth Century carved wooden American fashion doll was a highlight at David Drummond and Bruce Rigsby, Lititz, Penn. The doll reportedly took first place at the World’s Fair in 1955 or 1957 in the primitive doll category. The dealers also had a fine grouping of Native American baskets, some California, some Pima and some Plains, circa mid- to late Nineteenth Century.
Judith Racht Gallery, Harbert, Mich., displayed a four-blade wood propeller, circa World War I, along with an ornate inlaid wood game board by Norm O’Connor, a firefighter-woodworker in Washington State. The board had inlays of stars, horses, a musical instrument and other shapes. The frontispiece was an early booth-high painting that hung on the back wall of a nude woman with a horse and a fawn pug.
Lawrence Jeffrey Estate Jewelers of Litchfield, Conn., featured dazzling necklaces and suites, mostly in gold and diamonds, by the likes of Hermes, David Yurman, Tiffany, Cartier and Hammerman Brothers.
Bob Smith Antiques, Montrose, Penn., showed an ochre grain painted miniature chest, possibly a salesman’s sample, dating to the first half of the Nineteenth Century, and a rare example, most likely from Pennsylvania. It had one central drawer over three.
Smith also featured a rare pair of fanback Windsor side chairs from a maker whose forms are as yet unpublished, but, according to the former owner, attributed to a Shepardstown, Va., maker, though Smith believes a Baltimore attribution is more likely. The chairs have dropped tablets below the seat and centralized medallions on the front stretcher and are in untouched surface. One chair is in an oxidized Windsor blue, the other is in Spanish brown.
One Good Eye Antiques, Binghamton, N.Y., showed a circa 1840 painting of cows at a stream, while Antique Prints & Papers, Highland Park, N.J., featured a collection of framed or matted house building plans from Scientific American Architects and Builders Edition , the dealer’s specialty, circa 1883‱902.
Giving a peek into the sign of the times, The Back Roads Collection, Sea Cliff, N.Y., flanked its booth with a pair of eye-catching trade signs. On the left side wall was a two-sided French sign, “Barbier,” that probably hung at a barbershop, while the right wall was graced with a two-sided tin sign, “Shoe Repair Shine.” An early pond boat that had been found in Mount Desert Island, Maine, and had been under water for years, was also offered.
Sandbrook Antiques, Flemington, N.J., featured a circa 1850 stoneware pitcher with floral decoration in cobalt, embossed band and brown Albany slip decoration on the interior, probably from New York State, while Adelaide, New York City, offered several large movie-making lights and vintage film reels.
New York City dealer Art & Industry Ltd’s booth lent this Americana show a welcome touch of Modern and industrial with a gleaming, cherry-red torpedo scooter, shown being driven by a vintage wooden mannequin. The booth espoused that “bigger is better” with an oversized yellow martini glass and a tennis racket that was more than 6 feet long. A collection of vintage televisions, radios and telephones (some made of Legos, others with a clear plastic frame, the better to see the colorful inner workings) was also on view. Seating standouts here included a Lucite ribbon chair, circa 1960s, and a wonderful Eames child’s stool.
Folk art vied for attention at Scott Bassoff, Sandy Jacobs Antiques, Swampscott, Mass., which showed a great folk art painting, “Morning in Millerville (100 Structures),” an acrylic on board by Joseph Brant, mid-Twentieth Century; as well as a fabulous coastal New England schoolgirl sewing table, circa 1800‱820, with a silk sewing bag. The top of the table depicts a seaside town within an oval cartouche surrounded by a double cornucopia of roses, leaves and other flowers.
Also offered was a pair of a portraits by Ammi Phillips, of a man and woman, each pictured with a book, circa 1840, and a wonderful appliqued trapunto folk art mat, dated 1887, with motifs of hearts and vines surrounded by birds, fish, a cat and a house with shutters and a door that opens.
D.R. Wyant Antiques, Cassopolis, Mich., offered antique sporting items from a grouping of ten leather football helmets to a display case filled with 12 large softballs. Shortly after the show opened, sold tags appeared here on a stone birdbath, a “Lumber” trade sign and a 1921 print of a Foehl Special automobile.
TOJ Gallery, Annapolis, Md., featured North Carolina artist Stacy Lambert’s contemporary folk art works, “Little Red Riding Hood” and “The Princess and the Frog.” Another standout was Carol Gentithes’s “Famous Pugs” pug with a pottery head and a porcelain body that was decorated with pugs portrayed as historical figures and flowers.
Furniture standouts at Christopher Evans Antiques, Waynesboro, Penn., included an 1800‱820 blanket box in green paint made of six solid boards that had one buyer interested enough to look underneath and take measurements, as well as an early to mid-Nineteenth Century Pennsylvania dry sink with old red and yellow paint, and a folky two-part Dutch cupboard with vibrant grain painted decoration over oak. A 1-gallon stoneware cream pot with a folky cobalt slip-trailed fish, likely New York origin, was eye-catching.
Stella’s next Pier event will be The Pier Antiques Show March 13‱4 at Pier 94. For information, 973-808-5015 or www.stellashows.com .
