Gary's Gainsborough

"Three hundred and fifty eight . . . nine . . . three hundred and sixty . . . three hundred and sixty . . . three hundred and sixty . . . fair warning . . . three hundred and sixty . . . are you all through . . . three hundred and sixty thousand dollars for this masterpiece by Thomas Gainsborough. . . ."

The auctioneer dropped his hammer and a boy trotted out behind the curtain to lift The Harvest Waggon off the stage and replace it with Frans Hals' A Young Cavalier. Sir Joseph Duveen had just bought the Gainsborough for a price that set a record for U. S. picture auctions. The painting, a large canvas into which the artist had put portraits of two of his daughters as well as a wagon, a team of horses and a broken shower of golden light, was indubitably the finest single piece offered in the sale of the collection that had belonged to the late steel tycoon, Elbert Henry Gary. The other 38 paintings raised the total price for the evening's auctioning to $1,154,650, the record* for a single sale; most of the paintings brought a little less than they were worth.

There were exceptions to this tendency, notably the high price of $52,000 which was offered for Jean-Honore Fragonard's glittering and beautiful self portrait, and the $16,000 brought by Josef Israels' pretty painting, Her Treasure. Rembrandt's portrait of the Marquis d'Andelot putting on his armor went to the John Levy Galleries for $86,000; A Young Cavalier, by Frans Hals went for one thousand less. The second highest price of the evening was the $90,000 for which Frederick Bucher bought John Hoppner's cool and charming portrait, Mary Anne, Lady Dashwood-King.

There were no pauses in the evening's bidding; the auctioneer did not embellish his tally with encouragements, most of the bidders knew just how much they were willing to pay and lost no time in getting to their limits. The sale started, at quarter to nine, with a little landscape by Frits Thaulow; at quarter past ten, after several fortunes and 39 pictures had changed hands, the last canvas was carried off the stage. A good Reynolds, one of the few that have the artist's signature, sold, in less than two minutes, for $55,000.

Furniture, tapestries, rugs, statues--these were sold at three other sessions of the auction of Judge Gary's collection. The last was by far the most spectacular; this brought the total for the entire sale to $2,297,763, the largest amount ever returned at a U. S. art auction. The most notable piece purchased on the last afternoon was a small marble bust by Jean Antoine Houdon; the head was that of a plump and imperious baby girl, the daughter of the artist. The woman who got the bust was later discovered to be a buyer for M. Knoedler & Co., who in turn were probably buying for Mrs. Edward Stephen Harkness.

Sir Joseph Duveen did not come away empty handed. For $106,000 he bought a royal Ispahan palace carpet and a marquetry boudoir table for $71,000. The Galleries of the American Art Association were crowded with notables, most of them watching dealers bid for them. Governor Alvan Tufts Fuller of Massachusetts bought a carpet. All of Judge Gary's things were "good," that is, authentic.

*Not the world's record for public art auctions; this is $370,000 which Sir Joseph Duveen paid for Lawrence's Pinkie, in England. The world's record price for a single painting was also paid by Sir Joseph Duveen; $850,000 for Gainsborough's The Blue Boy, which he bought direct from the Duke of Westminster.

It is estimated that it will cost Sir Joseph over $20,000 per year to keep The Harvest Waggon: interest on his money, insurance, etc.