Playthings have always been an inseparable part of children’s lives. Antique toys unearthed during excavations give us a glimpse of playtime activities around the world. While yo-yos may be one of the oldest toys, clay animals, horses on wheels, and rattles were the favorite toys of ancient Greek and Roman children. Archaeologists even recovered a 2,000-year-old carved animal figurine near Stonehenge. Prehistory and history abound with toy treasures that speak about ancient people and the times they lived in.  Lot 85a, Large Syro Hittite Pottery Bull Pull Toy on Wheels, Ancient Near East, Syro-Hittite, Bronze Age, ca. 2nd millennium BCE. Sold for $2,490 Playthings cradled in the lap of civilization The settlements of the Indus Valley Civilization have some of the best-preserved toys. These give us a glimpse of ancient children and their pla...Read More

Not every minor artist toils in obscurity. Relegated down the ranks of 19th century American painters by history, William Russell Smith was an eminent artist in his day. He is important because his paintings preserve images of a young nation, his diaries record a host of painters and historical figures, and his life story captures much of the 19th century American experience. Lot 51, Russell Smith (American 1812-1896), oil on panel Village of Llanberis, Wales, signed lower left, dated 1860 Born in the damp smoke of Glasgow’s Industrial Revolution, Russell suffered a bout of scarlet fever that was to leave him deaf in one ear and plagued by migraine headaches. His father, born in a castle to its hereditary caretakers, and his medical student mother, from a family of academics, were social reformers who left the climate of increasing unrest a...Read More

The uninterrupted desire to experiment was, perhaps, Pablo Picasso’s greatest attribute. A changemaker de facto - before his sixtieth birthday, the artist had already secured his name in history as a revolutionary force. Having evolved through several periods of art, beginning with the co-founding of Cubism and onward through tireless decades of dimensional shifts on canvas, Picasso delivered unrivaled modernity through iconic strokes of monumental proportion. Unsurprisingly, his later years were no different, and based on the over 3,500 fired clay works he would create from 1946-1973, he was just getting started. Picasso painting a piece of his pottery in his Vallauris studio. (Photo by Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images) FINDING CLAY In 1946, while visiting the small coastal town of Vallauris in the south of France, Pablo Pic...Read More

Art lots to keep your eye on in Pook & Pook, Inc.'s May 21, 2021 sale include several paintings by members of The Philadelphia Ten artist group. Lot 20, Maude Drein Bryant oil on canvas country landscape. Estimate $2,000-$3,000 The Philadelphia Ten was the brainchild of ten women painters who had all trained in Philadelphia at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women (now the Moore College of Art and Design) and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in the early 1900’s. The group exhibited sixty-five times between 1917 and 1945. Over the years, composition of The Ten included twenty-three painters and seven sculptors, but their annual shows were mostly limited to ten artists whose work was shown in depth. Individual styles ranged within the group, but the greatest influence was that of Pennsylvania Impressionism, and the predominant ...Read More

Mesmerized by the magnificence of the jade stone, the Chinese Qianlong Emperor collected the most exquisite and exclusive assortment of jade objects of the Qing dynasty period. Legend tells that the emperor composed more than 800 songs and verses dedicated to his jadeite treasures. Scribes carved this literature onto jade artifacts, as was the practice with many Chinese rulers. Qianlong’s obsession with jade sparked a passion for jade jewelry around the world. After raw jade imports from Burma increased, this precious stone became a cultural passion among Chinese royal and noble families. A gigantic jade sculpture carved in the 18th century CE is a classic example of how the jade stone captured the Chinese imagination. Yu the Great Taming the Waters, which depicts a Qing landscape, required over seven years of work and illustrates China’s r...Read More

PHILADELPHIA, PA — Freeman’s is pleased to present Sylvia Shaw Judson’s Bird Girl, the highlight of its June 6 American Art and Pennsylvania Impressionists auction. This fresh-to-market work is one of the most recognizable American sculptures to ever appear at auction. Conceived in 1936 by the Chicago-based Judson, Bird Girl was cast by Roman Bronze Works in New York. One of four extant original bronzes, this iconic image is immediately familiar from Jack Leigh's haunting photograph used as the cover of John Berendt’s 1994 best-selling novel Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Sylvia Shaw Judson's, Bird Girl, Bronze. Coming up in Freeman's June 6 American Art and Pennsylvania Impressionists auction. This life-size statue of a nine-year-old girl holding a pair of shallow bowls in outstretched arms has been in the same private family col...Read More

Behind each maker is a method - a ritual pathway sought out to follow and propel their production forward: from the precise tools they’ve collected to the spaces they inhabit, right down to the very way they fix their coffee in the morning. Handmade objects come with layered origins, intertwined with the choices of the artisans who create them: sourcing, assembly, consumption, packaging - wash, rinse, repeat. Now, more than ever, the way objects are made, bought and sold, are having real time implications on the environment. Climate change is upon us and we must start considering how we partake or refrain. Perhaps, with the reinforcement of positive, creative examples we can better mimic the methods of the artisans who’ve taken their green methods and traced them down right to the last scrap and seed. From April 24 - May 1, Bidsquare is ple...Read More

Daniel Garber’s painting is an idyllic moment of country life, a milk wagon on a rustic lane. The view across the road from his house, in fact. Peaceful, but this tranquility belies the effort and technical mastery from which it was born. Garber worked both as a plein air and studio painter, starting a work outdoors, continuing to paint in the studio, slowly building up the detailed surface, and then returning to the outdoors at the right time of year and day, as long as conditions held. He would rework a painting until he was satisfied, even if it took months. Lot 85, Daniel Garber, oil on canvas titled The Mary Maxwell House (Milk Wagon), signed lower left, retaining its original Harer frame. Estimate $200,000-$300,000. Coming up at Pook & Pook, Inc, Bud & Judy Newman Collection on April 23. Pennsylvania artist and art dealer Peter Rudolp...Read More

With the Asia Week events just wrapping up in the USA, there are still a few more important Asian Art themed auctions coming up on the block. Freeman’s in Philadelphia will be offering their important Asian Arts sale on April 8th. Historically, the Freeman’s Asian art auctions features hundreds of lots of artwork from China, Japan, Korea, the Himalayan region and India. This time, they chose to have a much smaller sale consisting of only 138 lots, thus emphasizing quality over quantity. Their focus is specifically in the categories of Chinese porcelain and ceramics, furniture, paintings and textiles. Lot 12, A Chinese carved and underglaze red "Dragons and Waves" vase, Meiping Yongzheng six-character mark and of the period. Estimate $150,000-$250,000 The star of the auction is lot 12, a Chinese carved and underglaze red “Dragons and Waves” ...Read More

For the second year in a row, Bidsquare is proud to virtually host the MassArt Auction - a highly anticipated, annual event made fully accessible, online, through two main events: the Live Auction, which will be held on Saturday, April 10 at 8:00 p.m. ET, and will once again be conducted by Karen Keane, auctioneer and CEO of Skinner, as well as, a Timed/Silent Auction catalog, with online bidding open from March 27th-April 11, 12pm EDT. Both the Live and Timed Auctions will be exclusively available via Bidsquare, register here to participate. For over three decades, the MassArt Auction has served as the College's largest annual fundraiser and New England's biggest annual contemporary art auction. This signature event features an extraordinary array of artwork that continues to attract the most discerning collectors. MassArt Auction proceeds...Read More