Joint Auction Previews

Dallas, Great Falls, Los Angeles, Santa Fe

John Nieto (1936-2018), Rabbit (After Dürer), 1994. Serigraph, artist’s proof 20 of 45, 17½ x 22½ in. Courtesy Santa Fe Art Auction. Estimate: $500/700

Santa Fe, NM
Santa Fe Art Auction
March 13
Prints + Works on Paper

Santa Fe Art Auction hosts its Prints + Works on Paper sale this March, featuring an array of two-dimensional historic and contemporary works of art. The sale makes up a “wonderfully broad overview of works on paper, prints and multiples, both American and international, historic and contemporary,” according to Santa Fe Art Auction president Gillian Blitch. Included in the sale are woodcuts, lithographs, etchings, serigraphs and more, by such artists as Gene Kloss, Will Shuster, Howard Cook, Woody Crumbo, Fritz Scholder, Carl Oscar Borg and R.C. Gorman, to name a few. Blitch adds that among the highlights in the auction are a beautiful group of Janet Lipponcott monotypes and John Nieto lithographs.

The Prints + Works on Paper sale takes place March 13.

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Charles M. Russell (1864-1926), Thirsty. Watercolor on paper, 21 x 30 in. Courtesy C.M. Russell Museum.

Great Falls, MT
C.M. Russell Museum
March 19
Sealed-Bid Sale

Every March, the life and legacy of famed Western artist C.M. Russell is celebrated in Great Falls, Montana. Dubbed The Russell, the celebration comprises a series of events and auctions honoring Russell and his accomplishments to the Western art genre. Among these events is the sealed-bid sale, taking place on Russell’s birthday, March 19. The sale offers an opportunity for Western art fans to acquire phenomenal works of art as well as support the C.M. Russell Museum and its programming. Some big works in the sale are Russell’s watercolor Thirsty and his 1919 watercolor, gouache and pencil on paper titled High, Wide, and Handsome. Bidding closes at 6:30 p.m.

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LeRoy Neiman (1921-2012), The Eye. Oil on canvas, 24 x 32 in. Courtesy Heritage Auctions. Estimate: $100/150,000

Dallas, TX
Heritage Auctions
April 15
Illustration Art

Heritage Auctions is taking on an especially playful approach for its upcoming Illustration Art sale. Four works by American artist LeRoy Neiman will be a part of the April 15 sale, including The Eye (est: $100/150,000), which has the distinction of being one of the rare works that hung in two different Playboy Clubs, in London and Chicago over four decades. “In this time of social revolution [of the 1960s], Neiman captured glamorous snapshots of life with his brush. Nowhere is this more evident in his renditions of Playboy magazine covers as seen in The Eye,” says Heritage Auctions vice president Todd Hignite. “Unlike most of the Playboy covers, this deceptively modest and alluring cover captures the bold and flirtatious new world of the 1960s.”

Another work to keep an eye out for is Gil Elvgren’s Waisted Effort, Brown and Bigelow calendar illustration, February 1952. The oil is expected to bring in $40,000 to $60,000, and features the classic pin-up girl style emblematic of the 1950s.

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Maynard Dixon (1875-1946), Glory After Storm, 1944. Oil on canvas laid to artist’s board, 20 x 16 in., signed. Courtesy Bonhams. Estimate: $60/80,000

Los Angeles, CA
Bonhams
April 26, 10 a.m.
Western Art

Bonhams will hold its Western Art sale this spring, offering a superb grouping of paintings and sculpture by leading historic and contemporary Western and wildlife artists. Among those represented in the sale are Victor Higgins (1884-1949), Joseph Henry Sharp (1959-1953), Maynard Dixon (1875-1946) and Cyrus Dallin (1861-1944).

Dixon’s landscape Glory After Storm, 1944, is expected to be one of the top lots in the sale, estimated at $60,000 to $80,000. “Dixon painted a few examples of dramatic storm cloud paintings from his Tucson, Arizona, studio window overlooking the Santa Catalina Mountains as his health declined later in his career,” comments Katherine Halligan, Bonhams Western art specialist. “This is a particularly successful composition that showcases the artist’s strength as a landscape artist and desert colorist.” Another highlight is Sydney Laurence’s The Alaska That Was (est. $15/25,000), an oil of a boat situated at the water’s edge.

The Western Art sale begins at 10 a.m. Pacific Time. —