Auction of Russian & International Fine and Decorative Art

MANHATTAN, N.Y. - May 3, 2013 - PRLog -- The spring auction of Russian & International Fine and Decorative Art at Gene Shapiro Auctions will take place on May 18th, 2013 at 10 am. The sale will feature a wide selection of art including rare books, militaria, Fabergé, porcelain, bronzes, enamels, and paintings ranging from the seventeenth to the twenty-first centuries. A special emphasis will be placed on Eastern Orthodox icons and modern and contemporary Russian fine art.

With over 70 icons and religious works of art, most of them presented on the market for the very first time, the selection will appeal even to the most discerning collectors. A large group of icons featured in the sale was acquired by a pair of young American sisters in the late 1920s during their clandestine travels to post-Revolutionary Russia. Having been brought out of the Soviet Union at a critical time just as ancient churches and monasteries were being taken over by the government and converted to Anti-Religious museums, these icons stand at the crossroads of Russia’s ancient and modern history. One of the highlights from this set includes a 19th c. image of Mother Mary in a metal filigree oklad, Pokhvala Bogoroditsi (otherwise known as In Thee Rejoiceth) (lot 9). Another standout lot is the beautiful image of the Virgin, a Russian icon of the Dormition of the Virgin Mary, from the 18th c., in a splendid chased and repoussé silver oklad adorned with turquoise cabochons (lot 45).

The sale will also include a variety of rare antique books, among them a deluxe edition of Theodore de Pauly’s influential tome, Description ethnographique des Peuples de la Russie (lot 74).  Published in 1862 on the occasion of the one-thousandth anniversary of the foundation of the Russian Empire, de Pauly sought to present the vast diversity and traditions of its people in this beautifully illustrated volume.  Another encyclopedic publication, A. V. Morozov’s complete four volume set Catalog of my Collection of Russian Engraved and Lithographed Portraits, contains the likenesses of Russia’s most illustrious personalities from centuries past. One of only five hundred copies, this lot presents a rare opportunity not to be missed (lot 75). The auction will also include the historically significant three volumes of Trudy vserossiiskago sezda khudozhnikov v Petyrograd Dekabr 1911-Yanvar 1912, featuring the first-ever publication of  Wassily Kandinsky’s seminal essay “On the Spiritual in Art” (lot 76A).

The auction will also feature a large selection of decorative art, including a stunning silver and ivory samovar by the workshop of Paul Ovchinnikov (lot 277). Among the offerings will also be beautifully crafted objects such as a delicate ivory and tortoiseshell snuffbox with a carved profile of Empress Catherine the Great (lot 326). A piece of particular interest is the gold and enamel cigarette case set with a white sapphire, designed by the head Fabergé workmaster Henrik Wigström (lot 310), famous for creating most of the Imperial Easter eggs.

Connoisseurs of nineteenth and early twentieth century fine art and bronzes will find much to be pleased with, including an exceptionally rare sculpture by Evgeny Lanceray of an Arabe tué, son cheval immobilisé près de lui, depicting a highly detailed grieving steed bent over his fallen master (lot 133). One of the main highlights of the auction, a spectacular painting of a Russian winter by Konstantin Kryzhitsky will be sure to impress even the most discerning collectors (lot 140). Gene Shapiro Auctions has situated these pieces amidst the works of such important Russian, Eastern European, and Caucasian artists as Georgy Gabashvili, Martiros Sarayan, Alexis Gritchenko, Grigory Gluckmann, Stepan Kolesnikoff, Mstislav Dobuzhinsky, and Aleksandr Golovin.

The works of Nonconformist and contemporary Russian artists will be represented by such key figures as Vladimir Yakovlev, Alexander Tyshler, Evgeny Mikhnov-Voitenko, Dmitri Plavinsky, Anatoly Zverev, Eugene Rukhin, Komar + Melamid, Mikhail Chemiakin, and Leonid Purygin among many others. In his monumental canvas Two and a Cat with Lemon, the master of color, Oleg Tselkov, has once again succeeded in putting the viewer in a trance-like state (lot 222).

The full collection of 354 lots will be on view during the weeklong preview period when the gallery will be open 10 am - 6 pm daily from May 11th to May 17th, 2013, as well as by appointment. The sale and preview will take place at the Gene Shapiro Auctions LLC Upper East Side headquarters, located at 506 East 74 Street, New York, NY 10021.