Case Auctions – Two-Day Fine Art & Antiques Auction
Jan. 25 (9am ET) & 26 (1pm ET)
Knoxville, TN
www.caseauctions.com

KNOXVILLE, TENN. — Case Auctions’ Winter Auction, set for January 25-26, features more than 1,200 lots in categories ranging from Seventeenth Century European religious paintings to a collection of Picasso ceramics and Southern regional furniture. The wide array is no accident.

“As we celebrate our company’s 20th year in business, we know we owe a lot of our success to the diversity of categories in our curated, semiannual, high-lot-count auctions,” said company president John Case. “A bidder may be drawn in by a piece of jewelry but also bid on a painting or historic document. And they know whatever they go home with will be well researched, vetted and outstanding.”

One of the categories for which Case has become best known is African American art. This auction is highlighted by a carved limestone sculpture of a lady wearing a bustled dress by William Edmondson, a Nashville native who in 1937 became the first Black artist to have a solo exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art. This auction also offers silver gelatin prints of Edmondson taken and signed by Louise Dahl Wolfe, the photographer credited with introducing Edmondson to MoMA curator Alfred Barr, plus other Dahl Wolfe photos from the estate of her husband, the artist Meyer Wolfe. Meyer Wolfe’s own art available in this auction includes a pencil drawing of Edmondson at work, and a series of 14 American Regionalist lithographs chronicling Black life in Nashville during the Jim Crow period, with titles like “Red Eye’s Hall,” and “Vanderbilt Waiting Room.” The former portrays dancing couples in a Blacks-only night club while the latter depicts Black patients waiting to access care in a segregated doctor’s office. Wolfe created only 25 copies of each print, meaning they appear on the market very rarely, often selling to institutions. This sale marks the first time the 14 images have been auctioned at the same time, although they are being offered individually.

Both Beauford Delaney and his younger brother Joseph, Black artists from Knoxville who each created their own distinct artistic identities outside the South, are represented in this auction: Beauford by a brightly colored abstract watercolor and Joseph by an oil portrait of a nude woman. There is also a vibrant “story quilt” depicting a dancer by textile artist Phyllis Stevens and an Aaron Douglass drawing of Carnegie Hall at the Tuskegee Institute, where he briefly taught.

Other American fine art standouts include a large hunting dog in landscape scene by Louisiana-born and Parisian-trained sporting artist Percival Rosseau and a monumental (6 feet tall by 9½ feet wide) painting depicting the sixth day of creation by Tennessee/Missouri artist Carl Gutherz.

Works associated with Pablo Picasso figure prominently in the auction, starting with a collection of six 1950s Picasso Madoura ceramic objects from the estate of composer Norman Luboff, including a Femme lamp and pitcher, a Tete de Femme pitcher, a Corrida Fond Noir platter, Sujet Poisson fish pitcher and a Toros plate. This auction also offers two significant Picasso-signed lithographs: “Football” (1961) and “Le Cavalier,” or “Mousquetaire a la Pipe” (1968). Other important Twentieth Century works on paper include two Helen Frankenthaler signed abstract lithographs; a Norman Rockwell 1977 collotype, “The Connoisseur”; two Thomas Hart Benton signed lithographs and an original poster from the groundbreaking 1913 New York Armory Show, an event credited with ushering in the Modern art era in America.

The auction also features a large selection of European religious paintings from the Fifteenth through Eighteenth Centuries from the estate of New York artist, conservator and collector Vlaicu Ionescu (1922-2001), and a collection of Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century European art collected by Robert Jones.

Works by self-taught artists include a Howard Finster wolf cutout and bottle; two Edgar Tolson carved wood figures and two Minnie Adkins folk art quilts, along with paintings by Helen LaFrance and Clementine Hunter and works by Raymond Coins, Sultan Rogers and J.L. Sudduth.

More than 100 lots of jewelry add sparkle to the auction, including a GIA-graded ring with central 3.72 carat diamond (clarity VS2, color I) flanked by ten vertical baguettes in a platinum setting; an Andre Harvey and Donald Plywell 18K gold sea turtle necklace and earrings; an Art Deco platinum, diamond and sapphire necklace; jade and emerald jewelry; and several designer pieces.

Silver lovers can build an elegant table from a variety of options including a 343-piece set of antique Schofield Baltimore Rose sterling flatware and a European 335-piece set of Neoclassical style .800 silver flatware (service for 24) retailed by Bruckmann & Sohne circa 1930. More than two dozen other flatware sets are available in patterns, including Reed and Barton’s Francis I; Kirk’s Repousse; Georg Jensen’s Acorn; and Towle’s Old Master, along with single place settings in the Tiffany patterns English King, Saint James, Persian, Olympian and Wave Edge.

Case’s gallery is at 4310 Papermill Drive.

The live auction begins Saturday, January 25, at 9 am and Sunday, January 26 at 1 pm; online, absentee and phone bids will also be accepted.

Preview appointments may be made on the company’s website through Friday, January 24, when a public preview will be conducted from 10 am to 6 pm.

For information, 865-558-3033 (Knoxville), 615-812-6096 (Nashville), 423-251-1320 (Chattanooga) or www.caseantiques.com.

Two-Day Fine Art & Antiques Auction – Knoxville, TN Jan. 25 (9am ET) & 26 (1pm ET)
COMPLETE CATALOG & ONLINE BIDDING INFO: WWW.CASEAUCTIONS.COM
1200+ Lots, featuring property from fine Southern estates and private and institutional collections. Previews by Appointment.
Buyer’s Premium: 20% Floor, 22% Phone/Absentee (Cash/Check/Certified Funds) TN Licenses #7344 and #6045
Meyer Wolfe Oil, Exhibited
Percival Rosseau Oil, 40″ x 24′
Beauford Delaney WC
William Edmondson
Albert Paley 1 of 2, 10ft. H
Collection of early Italian paintings
Snuff Bottle Collection
Mary Lee Abbott Oil
Sir Francis Crane, After Van Dyck
1913 Armory Show Poster
Ralph A. Blakelock oil, “Up the Hudson”
Picasso 1961 Litho, “Football,” signed
Norman Luboff Estate Collection of Picasso Ceramics
Picasso Signed 1968 Litho
Decoy Collection
Andre Harvey
Meiji Lacquer Cabinet
Zofia Stryjenska Original Watercolor
Large Selection Estate Jewelry & Silver
Attr. Wm. John Huggins, “Battle of Trafalgar”
Antique Rug Collection
Joseph Delaney Oil
Monumental Renaissance Revival French Ormolu Clock and Garniture
Miniature of Princess Mary
Singing Bird Automaton Clock
3.59 ct. dia., VS2/H