Doyle New York

THE first day of a Belle Epoque sale held by Doyle of New York on February 25-26 awoke what one might, with greater reason than most, term a sleeper – the remarkable piece of furniture, catalogued as “An Italian Baroque style Mahogany Bed”, seen right. The bed was part of the Woodruff collection, comprising stock from a former Hollywood business that from 1922-60 was a popular rental source for the film studios, but stock that for the past 40 or more years has been in storage in Oklahoma.

IT was not just Sotheby’s and Christie’s who were generating some exceptional prices for Old Masters in New York in the third week of January. The East 87th Street auctioneers Doyle’s (19.5/12% buyer’s premium) generated keen interest from TEFAF Maastricht exhibitors in the room when they included a moody Gottfried Schalken (1643-1706) canvas in their January 21 sale.

At just over $12m (including premium) US auction house Doyle New York made a significant contribution to the series of Asian Art sales held in Manhattan last week with their September 16 auction of the F. Gordon Morrill collection of Chinese porcelain. They found buyers for 82 per cent of the 115 lots, but far and away the star attraction was this large 141/2in (37cm) high Yuan dynasty blue and white pilgrim flask of c.1345.

On September 16, Doyle New York will sell the F. Gordon Morrill collection of Chinese and Chinese Export porcelain. Considered to be one of the last great collections of early blue and white Chinese porcelain still in private hands – the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston has described the Morrill collection as “equal in quality to the superb collection at the Ardebil Shrine in Tehran, Persia” – the archive was assembled during the 1960s and 70s, when many notable collections came onto the market.

PICTURES of dogs are big business as Bonhams’ & Doyle’s sale of Dogs in Art in New York on February 11 highlighted. And an artist frequently featured in these New York sales brought James Adam (15% buyer’s premium) of Dublin success on March 12.

A cased pair of gold and lucite cigarette boxes was given a full-page colour illustration in a catalogue produced by Doyle for an October 8 sale of jewellery, but I was a little surprised that no other attempt was made to bolster its association value.

A Pennsylvanian enthusiast’s lifetime collection of faux bamboo furniture will be up for sale later this month in New York when it forms the centrepiece of Doyle’s sale of furniture, decorations and paintings on September 25.

USA: THREE pieces of Tiffany art glass and a Tiffany-type lamp from the Handel factory – sold by Doyles of New York on June 5 and by Skinners of Boston on June 22 – are featured here.

This month sees New York auctioneers Doyle (15/10 per cent buyer’s premium) offering two significant separately-catalogued single-owner collections within the space of a fortnight.

US: OVERLOOKED in our recent report on the New York Old Master sales, this Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806) oil sketch for a much-admired, but now lost painting of The Visitation is worth putting on the record after it fetched an upper estimate $280,000 (£197,185) at the New York rooms of Doyle’s (15/10 per cent buyer’s premium) on January 24.

“Is the live auction dead?” was the challenging question before a panel discussion at the annual conference of the Appraisers Association of America in New York in which four major regional auction houses took part.

US: A DEFINITIVE piece of social history, designed at the peak of the ’60s, the Rudi Gernreich topless bathing suit was considered the ultimate symbol of permissiveness and provoked a rash of moral outrage.