Traditional Art Scoops Contemporary for a Change

Jeanne Schinto | November 15th, 2012

The show’s coproducers, Robert Four (on left) and Tony Fusco.

An Early Snow by Walter Launt Palmer (1854-1932) was painted in 1887. The 22½" x 26½" oil on canvas was offered for $445,000 from Avery Galleries. Richard Rossello said it had been exhibited at the Chicago World’s Fair.

Boston-based Colleene Fesko, an art and antiques appraiser and broker. Behind her is Gray Day by Alex Katz (b. 1927). The 22 1/8" x 72½" color silkscreen from a 1992 edition of 75 and 12 artist’s prints was priced at $38,000 from Hal Katzen Gallery, New York City.

Dealers Howard Shapiro (right) of Davenport & Shapiro Fine Art, East Hampton, New York, and Stephen Foster of Stephen Foster Fine Arts, Washington, D.C., are shown relaxing toward the end of the gala in Foster’s booth.

Boston, Massachusetts

“One of the things that happened this year is that traditional art stole the show,” Tony Fusco said on the Monday after Thanksgiving in a phone conversation about the Boston International Fine Art Show, which he coproduces with Robert Four. “By and large, traditional really carried the weight. For a couple of years, contemporary ran away with it. This time, the ones who I got the best post-show reports from were traditional art dealers.”

Held on the weekend of November 15-18, 2012, at its usual place, the Cyclorama in the city’s South End, the show attracts a fairly consistent group of approximately 40 exhibitors who collectively bring a vast range of material in a wide range of prices, from under $1000 to over $1 million. That the inclusive formula works is no longer in question after 16 years. Yes, this venue can accommodate the audiences for old and new art, realist and surrealist, and everything in between, priced high and low. The question that remains is why traditional was so successful this year.

“I wish I knew why, because then I could unlock that little secret,” said Fusco. It may be that people are looking for alternative investments, he speculated. “We know that the stock market continues to go up and down like a yo-yo, and maybe people are thinking, ‘We should buy something that we can love while it gains value, something that we can appreciate while it appreciates.’”

One of the galleries that did particularly well was Hawthorne Fine Art, New York City and Irvington, New York. On the night of the gala preview, I noticed a red dot quickly appeared alongside a small George Inness landscape. After the show, managing partner Jennifer C. Krieger wrote in an e-mail: “We sold six paintings, total, at the fair. We sold four Hudson River school paintings, one of which was by Susie M. Barstow, who was featured in the Remember the Ladies exhibition [of female Hudson River school artists] I co-curated at the Thomas Cole National Historic Site [in Catskill, New York]. She was one of the pioneering women who trekked through the White Mountains to find her painting subjects. We also sold two Hayley Lever works depicting Massachusetts subjects. I tried to bring to the fair works that depicted New England scenery and would be especially relevant to its audience. It was a great show.”

Another New York City-based dealer, Debra Force, who, for the fifth year in a row, brought a stellar American lineup, sold two paintings, one in the six figures. A third New York gallery reportedly sold eight, one for what was believed to be more than $700,000. Fusco said, “That dealer brought the same painting last year. He talked and talked about it all year long with these clients, who asked him to bring it again, so they could see it once more, and they finally made their decision.” Fusco added that the gallery has “a good following here in Boston. They’ve been doing the show for many, many years, and they work very hard to get their clients here.”

Tom Veilleux of Portland, Maine, brought one of the best selections of strictly 20th-century American art. His selection included a bust of a woman by Elie Nadelman, works by William Zorach and Marguerite Zorach, and a painting by Margarett Sargent, whose biography, The White Blackbird, was written by her granddaughter poet Honor Moore in 2009. “The show was very good for us,” Veilleux wrote in an e-mail, noting the sale of a Charles Burchfield watercolor and a drawing by sculptor Robert Laurent. “And we have interest in a number of other things,” he added. “We also bought several significant pieces from other dealers at the show and met some new clients. All in all, a very successful Boston show.”

Martha Richardson of Boston’s Newbury Street, who has done the show every year since its start, sold two works by John Wilson (b. 1922) and a third one of his a few days later, as a result of follow-up. She also sold two other artists’ works at the show, including a 1930’s watercolor by Hilda Belcher, whose estate her gallery now represents.

Jeffrey Cooley of Cooley Gallery, Old Lyme, Connecticut, responded to our e-mail about his results this way: “We had a decent show, selling a wonderful Frances Houston, a little Clement Drew, and a modest little A.T. Hibbard. Won’t be retiring soon as a result, but certainly pleased!” All three sales were to new clients.

A New England-based dealer reportedly told Fusco that he’d had his best Boston show ever but wouldn’t confirm it for print. “I don’t like to brag about sales when others have none. I’ve been there too,” he e-mailed. “You could write that you saw lots of red dots and amplify, based on your own observations.”

The fact is, though, there weren’t “lots” of red dots. As the Donna Summer song goes, the dealers who come to this Boston show work hard for their money, and no one takes anything for granted, especially not Fusco and Four.

“I was thrilled that the show was after the presidential election,” said Fusco, who, with Four, coproduced the Ellis Boston Antiques Show in the same space on the pre-election weekend of October 19-21, 2012. (See M.A.D. January, 2013, p. 24-C.) “Before the election, the waters were really muddy, and the week immediately following the election was sketchy too. People were wondering, ‘Are we going off a [fiscal] cliff?’ The stock market did a big slide before the art-show weekend. And we were like, ‘Oh, come on. The election’s over. Now what’s going on?’”

As we all wait to see what the economy will do next, follow-up will inevitably occur for at least some dealers. As Fusco said, “What I’m thinking is that in the next couple of weeks people will be getting those calls asking, ‘Can I get it shipped to me by Christmas?’”

For more information, call (617) 363-0405 or visit the Web site (www.fineartboston.com).

The Depot by John W. McCoy (1910-1989), 24" x 19", oil on panel, priced at $12,500, from Clarke Gallery, Newburyport, Massachusetts. McCoy was the son-in-law of N.C. Wyeth, having married his daughter, Ann. This painting was recently acquired from the McCoy/Wyeth family, said Peter J. Clarke.

Cliffs at Mount Desert by Alfred T. Bricher, circa 1870, 13 7/16" x 11 7/16", oil on canvas, priced at $87,500 by Questroyal.

Along the Shore, Lockwood de Forest (1850-1932), 1876, 12¾" x 18", oil on paper laid down on canvas, priced at $26,000 from Cooley Gallery.

Study of Rocks by Samuel Lancaster Gerry (1813-1891), 10½" x 15¾", oil on canvas, was priced at $6500 from Hawthorne Fine Art. It is one of a series of six New Hampshire scenes, said Jennifer Krieger.