ART IN MOTION
52
LEFT: Reliquary guardian
fi gure (detail).
Kota-Obamba, Gabon.
Wood, brass, copper. H: 54 cm.
Probably collected before 1910 by
Hubert Antoine Bure (1867–1935).
Ex Leclere auction, Marseilles, 1994
(consigned by Bure’s family); Alain
de Monbrison, Paris.
To be offered at Sotheby’s, New
York, November 10, 2017,
est. $1,000,000–1,500,000.
RIGHT: Antelope dance
crest. Bamana, Ségou
Region, Mali.
Wood. Inagaki base. H: 78.7 cm.
Collected by Frédérick-Henri Lem.
Ex Helena Rubinstein, Paris and New
York (acquired from the above);
Sotheby Parke-Bernet, New York,
The Helena Rubinstein Collection,
1966; Harry Franklin, Los Angeles;
Sotheby’s New York, The Harry
Franklin Family Collection of
African Art, 1990.
To be offered at Sotheby’s, New
York, November 10, 2017,
est. $150,000–250,000.
LEFT: Forest spirit fi gure
(detail).
Ijo, Nigeria.
Wood, pigment. H: 218 cm.
Ex Ulrich von Schroeder, Zurich.
To be offered at Sotheby’s, New
York, November 10, 2017, EOR.
RIGHT: Reliquary guardian
fi gure (detail), attributed to
the Sebe Master.
Kota-Obamba, Gabon.
Wood, brass, copper. H: 54 cm.
Ex Loudmer-Poulain (Hôtel Drouot),
Paris, 1979; British Rail Pension
Fund; Sotheby’s, London, 1989;
Armand Arman, New York and
Venice; Alain de Monbrison, Paris,
1998.
To be offered at Sotheby’s, New
York, November 10, 2017,
est. $1,500,000–2,500,000.
In the background is a painting by
Damien Hirst, Beautiful, Pale Blue
with 2 Circles in the Middle Like
Glasses, It’s a Lovely One, 2001,
which will be offered by Sotheby’s,
Paris, on November 21, 2017,
as part of the Jacques Grange :
Collectionneur sale.
The Silver Collection
NEW YORK—Edwin and Cherie Silver spent some
sixty years assembling a connoisseur collection of art,
which they displayed to great effect in their mid-century
home, high in the hills above Los Angeles. Ranging
from Kota reliquaries to modernist art to a Northwest
Coast totem pole that was exhibited at the 1893 Chicago
World’s Fair, the Silver Collection long formed a
cornerstone of the Los Angeles art collecting community.
Sotheby’s has announced that the Silver Collection
will be offered in a series of auctions, the centerpiece of
which will be a dedicated single-owner sale of African,
Oceanic, Pre-Columbian, and American Indian art held
during the height of the New York auction season on
November 10, 2017. The auction is led by the aforementioned
group of Kota reliquary fi gures from Gabon
and the Congo. Assembled during the golden age of
American post-war collecting, the Silver Collection is a
time capsule of the caliber of artwork that was available
decades ago but is rarely found in the market today.
Selected highlights from the Silver Collection will
travel to Sotheby’s Paris in September to be shown during
the Parcours des Mondes art fair. They will be previewed
there from September 10–16 along with selected
works from the auction house’s December Paris sale
of African and Oceanic art. The exhibition will be held
at Galerie Aveline, located near Sotheby’s Galerie Charpentier
headquarters. The Silver Collection will return to
its hometown of Los Angeles for another exhibition at
Sotheby’s headquarters there October 16–18 and then
in San Francisco October 19–21. The collection in its
entirety will then be exhibited at Sotheby’s New York
alongside the marquee autumn auctions of impressionist,
modern, and contemporary art in recognition of the
historical connections and aesthetic affi nities these art
forms share, a relationship that the Silvers recognized
and lived with for decades.