This auction of exceptionally scarce, museum-quality Old Master through 20th-century prints offers
examples from the entire history of printmaking, ranging from Dürer and Rembrandt to Renoir and
Whistler, Cadmus and Hopper, and Picasso and Miró.
Swann remains the only U.S. auction house to devote regular sales to Old Master prints. Among the
extraordinary impressions to be offered are Rembrandt’s
Christ Healing the Sick: The Hundred Guilder
Print
,
circa 1649, a bright and strong lifetime impression of the second, final state, still printing with burr;
and van Gogh’s only etching,
Homme à la Pipe: Portrait du Docteur Gachet
, 1890,
an intimate portrait of
the doctor who taught the artist etching and administered to him in the final weeks of his life.
Select highlights from this auction will be on view at Swann’s International Auctioneers partner
Artcurial, in Paris October 4 through 8.
OLD MASTERTHROUGH MODERN PRINTS
OCTOBER 31
ALDINE IMPRINTS & EARLY PRINTED BOOKS FROMTHE LIBRARY
OF KENNETH RAPOPORT
OCTOBER 23
Swann is pleased to offer Aldine Imprints and Early Printed Books from the Library of Kenneth
Rapopor t, featuring 100 books from the Venetian press of the scholar-publisher Aldus Manutius
and his successors. This is the most extensive selection of Aldines to appear at auction since
the mid-1990s. Included are three incunables, nine Greek editiones principes, and 47 first Aldine
editions of works by classical and later authors, many in contemporary fine bindings. Par ticularly
notewor thy are Aristotle,
Organon
, 1499;
Epistolae diversorum philosophorum, oratorum, rhetorum
,
1499;
Petrarca,
Le Cose Volgari
, 1501;
Euripides,
Tragoediae septendecim
, 1503;
Plato,
Omnia Platonis
opera
, 1513;
Galen,
Librorum pars prima[-quinta]
, 1525;
and Castiglione,
Il Cortegiano
, 1528.
Among the non-Aldine highlights are
Le Bible en Francoys
,
Lyon, 1547, in a contemporary Parisian
binding made for Marcus Fugger; and Chevallier,
Alphabetum Hebraicum
,
Geneva, 1566.
Theocritus, et al.,
Idyllia
,
with contemporary hand-
coloring,Venice, 1495/96. $40,000 to $60,000.
AFRICAN-AMERICAN FINE ART
OCTOBER 18
Sale highlights include a collection of Henry Ossawa Tanner oil studies for
Biblical paintings, including
Christ and Nicodemus
, 1923;
The Flight into Egypt
,
circa 1916-22; and
The Good Shepherd
,
circa 1917, obtained from Grand
Central Art Galleries by the current owner more than 40 years ago. Also
offered is a fine drawing study in conté crayon and charcoal for Tanner’s
Head of Christ
.
Paintings by Eldzier Cortor are incredibly rare at auction, and this sale boasts
two. His large, figurative
Classical Composition No. 4
,
circa 1973, is the day’s
top lot, and
Tête-à-Tête
,
oil on canvas,1934, is one of his earliest known
works. Also featured are paintings by Norman Lewis, Robert Duncanson
and Hughie Lee-Smith; CharlesWhite’s 1953-54 pen and ink drawing
Songs
of Life
;
and a Romare Bearden collage,
Girl in a Garden
, 1972.
Eldzier Cortor,
Classical Composition No. 4
,
oil on canvas, circa 1973. $200,000 to $250,000.
Left: Vincent van Gogh,
Homme à la Pipe: Portrait du Docteur Gachet
,
etching, 1890. $60,000 to $90,000.
Bottom Left: Rembrandt van Rijn,
Christ Healing the Sick:The Hundred
Guilder Print
(
detail), etching, engraving, drypoint & burin, circa 1649.
$150,000 to $200,000.
