Giovanni Boldini, Italian (1842-1931). "Whistler Asleep", drypoint on Van Gelder Zonen paper, 1897. Edition of approximately 30.

It’s an 1897 work by the “Master of Swish”, Giovanni Boldini (1842-1931), whose elegant portraits of Verdi and Robert de Montesquiou are instantly recognizable.  It depicts his friend and colleague James Abott McNeill Whistler, a man whom we will not trouble to introduce

Whistler, the story goes, was having his portrait painted by Boldini.  He found the sessions fatiguing, and so one day paused for a power nap on the sofa in Boldini’s studio.  While he was asleep his industrious friend captured him in this masterful drypoint.

Drypoint is an intaglio printmaking technique in which the artist scratches an image directly into the surface of a metal plate with a needle or some such instrument.  The burr raised by this process produces the characteristic rich blacks and slightly blurred lines.  The downside is that the burr quickly deteriorates under the pressure of the printing press, making only small editions practical.

We think only about thirty impressions of this portrait were printed, all on Van Gelder Zonen watermarked paper.  Needless to say this is a rare and important work which, after a bit of spiffing up, will be given pride of place in our booth at the Darien Antiques Show.

What do I mean by good? Well, I don’t mean museum pieces at one-percenter prices. But I do mean things like simple, well-designed, bench-made pieces of American and English furniture, such as candle stands, tea tables, chairs, and case-goods; or 18th and 19th century flint glass goblets, decanters, and compotes; or attractive and useful articles of Chinese export or European porcelain; or perhaps an original painting, or an early drawing or print. All of these things are to be found in my shop at moderate prices—that is to say at prices comparable to those of vastly inferior modern equivalents, a night out, or—the very worst of all, in my opinion—an accretion of sorry yard sale and “antique mall” rubbish, gradually picked up for a few dollars here and there.

Don’t throw your money away. Don’t mistake cheapness for value, don’t privilege quantity over quality, and don’t assume what’s new is necessarily better. Buy a fairly priced, well-made antique from a reputable dealer. You’ll never have occasion to regret it.

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This is a sack back, a very popular form in the 18th century of which many examples have survived, but this is the first ever to come into the shop. The turnings and boldly modeled seat are especially pleasing. The black paint is not original, but is old enough to exhibit some very attractive wear. The design of the stretcher is somewhat unusual. New England, likely Connecticut or Massachusetts, c 1780.

A transitional fan back windsor side chair, scraped down to reveal old white over blue paint. Probably Connecticut or Rhode Island, c. 1800.

The bamboo turnings are characteristic of late windsor design and help us date this chair somewhere around 1800, but the shield seat and the shape of the crest are earlier features, making this a transitional chair. The form of the ears and the lower leg turnings suggest that it was probably made in the Connecticut / Rhode Island border region.

The technique of lustre decoration is an old one, possibly dating as far back as Roman Egypt, but most of the pieces typically available on the market today are of early 19th century English origin.  Many of the Staffordshire potteries made lustreware, skillfully employing metallic oxide glazes to mimic silver, copper and gold.  Sometimes the entire object was thus treated; sometimes the metallic decoration was applied more sparingly using a resist technique.  Most of the pieces I get into the shop are made either of earthenware or soft paste porcelain.

A partial tea set of English soft paste porcelain with pink lustre decoration, c. 1820.

This partial tea service has just come in.  The body is a soft paste porcelain, and the pinkish gold metallic lustre of the decoration was achieved by painting the wares with a gold oxide before firing. In the days before garish artificial illumination these must have reflected the soft glow of candle and firelight very pleasantly. Pink lustre teacups are occasionally to be found, but the two plates pictured are somewhat less common survivors.

I’d heard this (or something to that effect) back in college, when Jean-Michel Rabate in one of his riveting digressions from literary theory brought it up in class one afternoon.  Thus forewarned, and having long since disabused myself of the notion that rare and important art objects go often unrecognized, I didn’t head off the other day to a local auction expecting to buy a real Corot for about the price of an iPhone.

In fact, Corot was far from my thoughts as I sat through the sale.  What I’d really gone there for (and eventually won) was a late 18th century corner cupboard.  Having gotten that out of the way I was in a bold mood when the little landscape was put up.  It had made an impression on me at the preview; a muted picture not much bigger than a snapshot, depicting a pair of browsing cattle in a copse of trees.  There was a stream, some mountains, an intriguing gleam of orange on the horizon, the suggestion of a recumbent figure.  I liked it and jotted down the lot number in my notes.  I had simply assumed that it was one of the legion, anonymous, competent landscapes knocking around, so when the auctioneer announced that an inscription on the reverse attributed it to Corot I was naturally intrigued.  A few moments later it was mine.

Is it right?  Marco Grassi, the distinguished conservator and European painting authority (who coincidentally once found an unrecognized Corot at auction himself), took a peek at the two photos you see here and was inclined to think not, but nonetheless he has graciously offered to examine it in person. 

More to come when more is known.

Upstairs, before. Note the dusty rose wallpaper and coordinating pink ceiling. Kind of looks like a kitschy New England-themed bordello.

Upstairs, after. Off-white walls, simple early 19th century furniture sparsely placed.

Revealing the original wide-plank floors in the attic foyer. They were hidden under linoleum. Beige linoleum, or course.

Spring is ushering in big changes around here. I’ll soon be expanding the retail space to the upstairs front rooms of this c. 1840 Greek Revival farmhouse and intend to outfit the rest as living space, thus decreasing my morning commute. Unfortunately, most of the second floor is stuck in the early 80s. The previous owner’s decorating credo seems to have been if it can be beige it shall be, and he shared that era’s deeply regrettable enthusiasm for wallpaper.

When I first began correcting the downstairs at the end of last summer I had grand ideas of creating a polychrome period interior; a blue room, a red room, a green room. But as I put my plans into effect I realized at once that I’d made a mistake, and that a modest vernacular structure such as this one responds best to simple treatment. Unfortunately I wasted 10 gallons of paint and earned myself some funny looks from the otherwise bizarrely cheerful people at the local hardware store, but getting it right was the only important thing.

So that’s what I’m doing upstairs…paring things down. And a house with superb period features like this one wants little else.

Less than a year ago I was a harried drudge in a monster corporate law firm.  I listened in on testy conference calls during which such fascinating matters as Ash Disposal Agreements and errant signature blocks were discussed.  I organized rooms-full of documents ever so neatly, carefully ensuring that the contents of each file were legibly labeled and securely clipped.   I endured a good many unpalatable luncheon buffets.  And, no matter where I was or what I was doing, I faithfully attended my Blackberry if it started winking its malevolent little red eye at me.

Economic conditions being what they are, I was obliged to give up these pleasures and have now started life anew as an antique dealer in the small town of Clinton, Connecticut.  How will this venture turn out?  Your guess is as good as mine.  Follow along and find out….