Jackson’s Indiana Art Auction Results & Prices September 6th, 2015

Top Selling T. C. Steele Painting Sells For $65,000

The September 6th, 2015 Indiana art auction started off with an excellent 25" x 38" Theodore Clement (1847 to 1926) oil on canvas depicting a woodland pathway.  The painting was signed lower right and reached a high bid of $65,000.  Another Steele oil painting measuring 22" x 32" was not signed but had an estate stamp on the back of the painting. Due to the lack of a signature, the painting only reached a final sale price of $5,000.

Gustave Baumann Woodblock
Print $4,250

Offered to collectors of well-known printmaker Gustave Baumann (June 27, 1881, to October 1971), was a beautiful 10" x 12" colored woodblock print signed lower right, and 52 out of 125. Born in Magdeburg, Germany, Gustave's parents moved to the United States when he was 10 years old. At the age of 23, in 1904, Gustave returned to Germany to attend the Kunstgewerbeschule in Munich, where he studied wood carving and learned woodblock printing methods. Once he returned to the United States, he started creating woodblocks in 1908 while working as a graphic artist. His tie to Indiana art comes from the time he spent in Brown County as part of the well known Artist Colony. Moving to Brown County in 1910, Gustave produced a portfolio of colored prints titled "In the Hills of Brown," which won a gold medal for printmaking at the Panama Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco. He was also commissioned by the well known Indiana poet James Whitcomb Riley to create a series of prints for his book "All the Year Round," which was published in 1912. After closing his studio in Nashville, Indiana, he moved to Taos, New Mexico, around 1918, then on to Santa Fe, where he created his art for more than 50 years until his death in 1971. The print reached the lower end of the auction estimate of $4,000 to $8,000 with a final bid of $4,250

An exceptional painting by Francis Focer Brown (1891 to 1971), the Director of the Ball State Art department from 1925 until he retired in 1957. Brown attended the Southside High School in Muncie, In., and during the summer, he took a seven-week study course with John Ottis Adams (1851 to 1927). Brown attended the Herron Art Institute, where he studied under the Hoosier Group artist William Forsyth. Most of the work Brown created was in Tempera, Acrylic, Watercolor, Charcoal, and Pencil due to his wife and artist Beulah Brown being allergic to oil paints. Brown frequently exhibited at the Hoosier Salon, Western Art Association, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and the Indiana Arts Club.  Throughout his life, Brown experimented with his work and explored the boundaries of impressionism using a bold color palette.

Two paintings by George Jo Mess (1898 to 1962) sold for $700 apiece. The first painting was a winter village scene, measured "21 x "31, oil on board, and was signed lower right. The second of an autumn scene was smaller at 16" x 22", signed lower right, and was an oil on canvas. George received a scholarship at the age of 13 to attend the John Herron Art School. Once he graduated high school, he continued to attend Herron part-time while working at Western Electric, eventually starting a commercial art business with his brother. Once George married Evelynne, they started the Circle Art Academy and taught classes from 1927 to 1932 with a short break in 1929 when they both attended the Fontainebleau School of Fine Arts in northern France. Later in his art career, George took up printmaking after being taught the techniques by his printmaker wife. George was a member of the Indiana Artist Club and exhibited in the Hoosier Salon in 1926 and at the Carnegie Institute in 1930.

September 6, 2015 auction prices 

William McKendree Snyder, 16x21, O/C, SLR, landscape sold for $4,500
Harry Davis, 15x22, Mixed Media, SLR, Woodland Scene sold for $200
Harold Hancock, 24x36, O/B, SLL, "Lake Yellow Wood 1976" sold for $225
Harold Hancock, 24x36, O/B, SLL "Summers Promis" sold for $225
Gordon Fiscus, 24x30, O/B, SLR, Seascape sold for $100