THE COLLECTOR’S EYE : Art, Antique Carpets, Decorative & Ethnographic Arts, including property from GlaxoSmithKline LLC AUCTION February 24, 2013 | 11AM EXHIBITION February 21 - 23 | 10AM-5PM Daily 4700 Wissahickon Avenue | Philadelphia, PA 19144 | 215-438-4700 | www.materialculture.com Property from the Collection of GlaxoSmithKline LLC One of the exceptional pieces brought detractors of American craft by winning to auction by GlaxoSmithKline is a the First Prize Gold Medal at the Rookwood Vase from 1900, decorated Paris Exposition Universelle in 1889. by Kitaro Shirayamandi with gorgeous Japanese artist Kitaro Shiryamandi was chrysanthemums for Rookwood invited to come to Ohio to create for the Pottery. Maria Longworth founded company in 1887, and the vase up at the Rookwood Pottery Company in auction on February 24 is a spectacular 1880 in Cincinnati, Ohio, inspired example of his artistry. In excellent by Japanese ceramics and under- condition and gleaming with golden glaze French pottery. Rookwood was and cream chrysanthemums against the first American company to gain a dark background, the hand-painted international admiration for ceramics earthenware piece–produced in 1900– from the United States, surprising measures a massive 18 by 9.5 inches. LOT 18 for designing the Diamond and Bird As is seen on some but not all of Bertoia’s chairs for the Knoll furniture company, sounding sculptures, the rods are capped which became icons of modernist with metal cylinders to accentuate the furniture, and for his “Sonambient” movement initiated by a hand or puff of sound sculpture. When he began air. Bertoia had renovated an old barn exploring tonal sculpture in 1960, he was on his estate in Bally, Pennsylvania and already well-known for his sculptures assembled 100 sounding sculptures into and installations, but his innovation in the acoustically-perfected space, where creating sculptures that generate their he recorded eleven albums featuring the own otherworldly music has come to be sonorous, sometimes haunting, tones his hallmark. A winner of awards from the of his sculptures. Also showcased at this American Institute of Architects and the sale is another of Bertoia’s sculptures, American Academy of Letters, Bertoia has “Wheat Sheaves,” which measures 45” installations in public institutions around high on a 10” x 10” base. the country, and in the permanent collections of museums such as the Brooklyn Museum, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Honolulu Museum of Art, and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and the Smithsonian LOT 21 American Art Museum, both in Washington D.C. The Two works by renowned Italian- “Sonambient” sculpture (lot 21) American sculptor and designer Harry at auction features sixteen rods Bertoia (1915-1978) come to auction of beryllium and copper, metals from the GlaxoSmithKline collection. which were some of Bertoia’s Bertoia studied at the Art School of the favorites for tonal sculpture, set Detroit Society of Arts and Crafts, earning into a tall rectangular pedestal. a scholarship to the Cranbrook Academy He never made the same piece of Art, where he studied under Bauhaus twice, enjoying the varied depth architect Walter Gropius, amongst others, and timbre of differently-sized and became friends with designers rods; this sculpture measures Florence Knoll and Charles and Ray approximately 30” height, on a Eames. He is perhaps most famous 27” x 9“ x 9” pedestal, 57” overall. 2 LOT 20 Another highlight of the Art, the Museum of Modern Art, GlaxoSmithKline holdings is the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Sheila Hicks’ “Double Prayer Rug,” Centre Pompidou, Paris, and the made in 1970 at the Atelier des Rhode Island School of Design Grands Augustins in Paris. One Museum. In 2011, an important of the world’s most preeminent retrospective exhibited at the fiber artists, Hicks (American, Addison Gallery in Andover, b. 1934) is influenced by the Massachusetts, the Mint Museum Bauhaus traditions of her painting in Charlotte, North Carolina, and instructor at Yale University, the Institute of Contemporary Art Josef Albers, and her study of in Philadelphia. “Double Prayer Pre-Columbian textiles. Hicks Rug” plays with the tradition relates in a 2004 interview with of textile, introducing woven the Smithsonian Institution, sculptural elements. Hicks created “Textiles had been relegated to a series of ‘Prayer Rugs,’ featuring, a secondary role in our society, as this one does, a flat weave at to a material that was either top, from which wrapped pile functional or decorative. I wanted projects into space in a cascade to give it another status and show of tassels. The shape formed by what an artist can do with these the pile echoes the niche pattern incredible materials,” an aim she of a classic prayer rug, and in has unquestionably achieved. the case of this unique “Double Her works, which often fuse Prayer Rug,” a doubled niche. abstract sculpture with weaving, Constructed of silk, linen, cotton are held in the permanent and gold thread, this innovative collections of museums such piece measures 80 x 60 inches. LOT 25 as the Metropolitan Museum of LOT 26 at Handarbetes Vanner Weaving School Museum of American Art in Washington, and the University College of Arts, D.C. She has received numerous awards, The GlaxoSmithKline offerings include Crafts and Design in Stockholm, and including the American Institute of another piece of significant fiber art, her work responds to Sweden’s rich Architects Craftsmanship Medal (1973), a tapestry entitled “Flower Field,” by textile tradition. Using Swedish yarn and Sweden’s prestigious Prins Medal Helena Hernmarck. Born in Stockholm, and Swedish looms, she creates large (1998). In 1996, she became a Fellow of Sweden, in 1941, Hernmarck is one of the tapestries, frequently in relation to the the American Craft Council, and in 2000, finest artists working in tapestry today. public or private space for which they are she was elected the Swedish American of In contrast to Hicks’ abstract, multi- commissioned, or to the natural world of the year. “Flower Field” (68 x 131 inches) dimensional creations, Hernmarck’s the local community. Her work is in the is woven in silk and wool and depicts tapestries are frequently pictorial, collections of the Museum of Modern wildflowers of lilac and deep purple in a sometimes pulling three dimensions Art and the Metropolitan Museum green field. in a trompe l’oeil of a two-dimensional of Art in New York, the Los Angeles weaving. Hernmarck studied her craft County Museum of Art, and the National 3 This 19th century Italian oil Pittara’s paintings frequently painting, depicting a young depict livestock or horses, full woman and a cow in a pastoral of expression and bathed in setting, is the work of Carlo sunlight, or delicate human Pittara (1836-1890). Pittara first figures in the landscape’s trained under Swiss landscape sweep—or, as in the case of this and animal painter Charles painting, the two together. The Humbert, then with Giuseppe young woman appears to have Camino. In 1860, he travelled to stopped for a moment below Paris, encountering the work of the curving branches of a tree Corot and the Barbizon school, while the cow grazes beside before settling in Rivara, in her; her red headscarf supplies Italy’s Piedmont region. Here, an a splash of color to the rich association of painters drawn green of the trees and earth. to plein air landscape painting, Pittara’s signature is evident in centered around Pittara, became the painting’s lower right. The LOT 15 known as the School of Rivara. work of oil on board still boasts Painting directly from nature, the its original gilt frame, and comes Rivara School characteristically to auction from a Main Line portrayed the landscape with Philadelphia estate. luminous, dominant color. Prince Twins Seven-Seven depicts the procession to a (Nigeria,1944-2011) is one shrine. The central figure is a of Africa’s most famous chief, the horsetail whisk he contemporary artists, and carries signifying his authority, his fame has garnered him bearing a calabash on his dozens of exhibitions in many head with gifts to the deity. To countries around the world. the right, a musician carries a His work is in major museums, drum, and the crowd behind including the Museum of follows the three figures in Modern Art in New York, the the foreground towards the Smithsonian Institution, the shrine. Their emptied homes, Philadelphia Museum of Art, seen at the top of the frame, the Museum of Modern Art- show the place from where -Georges Pompidou Center they came; in Prince’s work, in Paris, and the Houston position in the frame signifies Contemporary Arts Museum. distance, with objects at the In 2005, he was designated bottom of the frame being UNESCO Artist for Peace. closest. The scenes that Prince Prince and his work were also depicts, and many of the the subject of a major book, elements of his own personal “Prince Twins Seven-Seven: mythology, are drawn from the His Art, His Life in Nigeria, His artist’s profound connection Exile in America,” written by to traditional Yoruba beliefs. Henry Glassie and published The Yoruba cap on the head in 2009. Intricate in both style of the drummer, and on and cosmology, his works several of the followers in are detailed at every layer, all the background, marks this evocations of the forces, the procession as one of Yoruba impulses and narratives of his people. The painting, which complex worlds. This painting dates to the 1980s, bears the of ink, watercolor, acrylic and artist’s signature in the lower oil on cloth, glued to board, right. LOT 32 4 LOT 83 This authentic old Mexican dance mask is a rarity in a sea of contemporary copies of this traditional art form.