Going, Gone Auction Gallery’s debut Modern auction on June 9 found favor with buyers who played it “safe,” investing in the big names.
Auctioneer Tom O’Connor had a loyal following at this event from the trade, many of whom know him from his days auctioneering in New Jersey. New clients found the new location a short and easy hop from Manhattan.
Given this was their first foray into the Modern market, O’Connor was pleased with the results.
Consistent with what one hears regarding sales at the big auction houses, buyers seemed to be playing it safe, investing in “big” names. The sale had a fair number of absentee bids and phone bids, but by far the largest component was online bidding.
The top lot of the auction was a Jean Dubuffet tempera on paper, “Palmier et Arabe,” from 1948 that came with good provenance. The work attracted heavy bidding online and on the phone, with the heaviest action from Europe. In the end, a Belgian dealer won it for $29,375.
A Picasso earthenware dish depicting a vase with flowers and leaves, signed Madoura, also triggered heavy online bidding, with the dish doubling its low estimate to fetch $1,880.
Furniture offerings were led by a Phillip & Kelvin Laverne round dining room table with patinated top achieving $18,800. Other highlights included a set of eight Nakashima rope chairs, 1956, that attained $8,100, just over high estimate; a Frank Gehry corrugated cardboard coffee table, 58 inches long, at $2,225; an unusual Bernhard Rohne acid-etched credenza and matching mirrors for $2,240; and a T.H. Robsjohn-Gibbings / Widdicomb lounge chair that realized $1,058.
A Panton cone chair with a blue seat did $880, while an Alvar Aalto tea trolley in laminated birch with wicker basket and white ceramic tile top brought $978.
Other iconic pieces included a Louvre lamp by Henningson that went out within estimate at $2,468, a 30-light Sputnik hanging chandelier from Lightolier for $2,115 and a 4-foot-long post-Modern glass topped cocktail table with twisted chrome base that sold for $1,880, well over its estimate of $200/400.
Among the second generation Abstract Expressionists was an oil by Seong Moy (Chinese American) titled “Café Harbor” that measured 10 by 25 inches and sold for $1,350 and a 1961 oil painting from “Helios” Hosiasson (Ukrainian French). The latter painting bore a label from the Martha Jackson Gallery, discoverer of such major expressionists as Joan Mitchell, Sam Frances and Karel Appel, and went to a New York City dealer for $2,650.
Peggy Dodds, a New Jersey magic realist artist, was represented in the sale with four oil paintings. The top lot of the group depicted fantasy harlequin figures and a birdcage with canary, and fetched an above-estimate $2,470.
A popular local artist, Nathan Hoffman, had three small 1946 paintings on board of such local scenes as the Coney Island Beach with the Parachute Jump in the background, Brighton Beach and the like. The Coney Island work went for $620.
Rounding out the art offerings was a small, 5-by-5-inch, work by Rolph Scarlett, a geometric abstractionist and one of the first to show at the Guggenheim. The work brought $580.
All prices reported include the 17.5 percent buyer’s premium.
For the upcoming year, Going, Gone Auction Gallery is planning to do major antiques shows around the country and “to-the-trade” sales at its showroom, while gathering Modern art and furniture for its 2010 auction.
For more information, www.ggauctiongallery.com or 718-393-3888.
