This late Nineteenth Century Russian School oil on canvas of a man helping a soldier shave, 29 by 22 inches, framed, was indistinctly signed but sold for the sale’s highest price — $13,360 — to a buyer in Latvia ($1,2/1,800).
Review by Madelia Hickman Ring
EAST DENNIS, MASS — A Russian School painting of a man helping a soldier shave, with an illegible signature but thought to perhaps be the work of Sergei Alekseyevich Korovin (1858-1908) was the top lot in Eldred’s June 5 European Art and Antiques sale. Cheryl Stewart, the firm’s head of marketing, told Antiques and The Arts Weekly, “Competition was all online, with one bidder on our website and another on LiveAuctioneers; it came from a Newport, R.I., consignor and sold for $13,360 to a bidder from Latvia. Even without knowing the artist, there was an appealing quiet intimacy to the scene.”
Another international buyer — this time a Dutch one bidding online — prevailed against competitors to win, for $6,400, a Nineteenth Century Continental School wintry watercolor on paper landscape that was signed “A. Mauret.” The painting came from a New England estate Eldred’s has been selling and was the source of two gouache on paper paintings sold through the April 16 Discovery Auction conducted by Eldred’s subsidiary, Sandwich Auction House, that realized $110,500 and also found a buyer overseas.
Even decorative arts found favor in far-off lands: notably, a Sixteenth or Seventeenth Century 12-inch Turkish Iznik ceramic plate that came to sale from a New England collection. An old Christie’s sticker helped potential bidders overlook some large rim and foot chips and drilled holes, and a buyer in Turkey, also bidding online, won it for $5,440.
A small table, catalogued as a Nineteenth Century Burmese Anglo-Indian carved rosewood table that a trade buyer was selling with an estimate of $600/900 will be going to India, to an online bidder who took it to $1,664.
The furniture category reached its apex at $1,664, realized by this Nineteenth Century Burmese Anglo-Indian carved rosewood table that had extensive carving. It will be returning to India ($600/900).
Trade buyers were active bidders — and buyers — in a broad variety of categories. A 6½-by-4¾-inch watercolor portrait of JMW Turner, cataloged as “possibly Charles Martin” based on the presence of a label attributing the work to him, earned $4,800 from a trade buyer on the phone, while a Florida dealer, bidding on LiveAuctioneers, won an Eighteenth Century Continental School coat of arms in oil on canvas for $3,328.
The consignor of the coat of arms — a Cape Cod collector — was also selling an Italian bone and wood box cataloged as “in the style of the Embriachi Workshop, Nineteenth Century or earlier.” It found a new home with a Pennsylvania dealer, also bidding online, and also for $3,328.
A set of three Georgian sterling silver sweet meat dishes bearing the maker’s mark for Benjamin Laver and the London date mark for 1782, was consigned by a seller on the West Coast but it will be staying on the East Coast, with a dealer from New York and New Jersey, who helped push bidding to $3,072, exceeding expectations.
Going in the other direction was a set of Herend Rothschild Bird porcelain dinner service that was discovered locally but was purchased by a West Coast designer, bidding online, for $2,944.
These two English needlework portrait panels, worked in silk with small metal discs, were dated to the Eighteenth or Nineteenth Century and each measured 8½ by 11½ inches in their ebonized and gilt frames. An online buyer tripled the high estimate with their $2,432 bid ($500/800).
Capping the textile category with a $2,432 result was a lot of two Eighteenth or Nineteenth Century English needlework panels depicting King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria that came to Eldred’s from the same seller as the Herend dinner service.
A 109-piece sterling flatware service by Georg Jensen, in the Pyramid pattern, ranked third overall in the sale with a price of $6,400, came from Massachusetts and will be staying in New England.
Heywood Hardy’s (British, 1843-1933) hunt scene, executed in oil on canvas and measuring 16 by 23 inches in a 23-by-29½-inch frame, had been relined and had some light restoration but was otherwise in untouched condition; it sold within estimate, for $4,480, to an online buyer.
An oil on canvas of a male nude by Marcel Renee von Herrfeldt (French, 1889-1965) was also being sold by a Massachusetts; a private collector bidding online took it to $3,840 from a $400/700 estimate.
“The sale total was just shy of $195,000,” Stewart confirmed, adding that the next sale of European fine and decorative arts is “scheduled currently for January 2026.”
Prices quoted include the buyer’s premium as reported by the auction house.
For more information, 508-385-3116 or www.eldreds.com.
