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Norman Rockwell (1894–1978)
Jeff Raleigh's Piano Solo ("'Oh Lord,' Jeff said prayerfully, 'I wish Alice was here. Oh, I wish she could hear this…'") (The Virtuoso)
oil on canvas
28 ¾ x 22 ¾ in. (73 x 57.8 cm.)
Painted in 1939.
$1,200,000-1,800,000
Christie’s announces its American Art sale on May 18 will present a selection of highlights ranging across the genre from the Hudson River School and art of the American West, to American Illustration and Modernism. The sale will directly follow the 10am live auction Fields of Vision: The Private Collection of Artists Wolf Kahn and Emily Mason which features works from Georgia O’Keeffe, Richard Diebenkorn, and Lee Bontecou among others. The exhibition is open by appointment at Christie’s Rockefeller Center galleries May 15-17.
The American Art sale is highlighted by Norman Rockwell’s Jeff Raleigh’s Piano Solo (“‘Oh Lord,’ Jeff said prayerfully, ‘I wish Alice was here. Oh, I wish she could hear this...’”) (The Virtuoso) which was painted at the precipice of his mature career and published as an illustration for Edmund Ware’s short story “Jeff Raleigh’s Piano Solo” in the May 27, 1939 issue of The Saturday Evening Post (estimate: $1,200,000-1,800,000). Jeff Raleigh’s Piano Solo embodies the realism, engaging character studies and nostalgic optimism of Rockwell’s best works. Inviting the viewer to also watch in awe as the virtuoso mesmerizes his audience at the piano keys, with help from complex compositional design, the present work beautifully communicates the splendor of the universal language of music in a dynamic and innovative fashion.
Other standout highlights include N.C. Wyeth’s powerful composition The Guardians, a fusion of Illustration and Western art (estimate: $600,000-800,000), and Winslow Homer’s seaside figural watercolor Startled from the collection of Dr. and Mrs. Irving Levitt, which likely depicts the beach at Coney Island and closely relates to a watercolor of the same title in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art (estimate: $600,000-800,000).
The auction boasts a strong selection of works by the American Modernist Milton Avery, led by his whimsical large-scale painting Startled Goats (estimate: $400,000-600,000) and elegant Sleeping Nude (estimate: $300,000-500,000). Additional modern highlights include Frozen Lake, Alaska by Rockwell Kent(estimate: $300,000-500,000), which hails from the important collection of Kent’s patron J.J. Ryan, and a 1936 oil by Jackson Pollock, Untitled (Landscape with Tree to Right) (estimate: $300,000-500,000), that relates to his period studying under Regionalist artist Thomas Hart Benton and demonstrates the emphasis on movement and gesture evident even within his early work.
From the 19th Century, the sale includes a beautiful selection of works by Hudson River School artists, most notably the work of Sanford Robinson Gifford in Lake Sunapee, New Hampshire (estimate: $300,000-500,000) and A Study of Hunter Mountain at Twilight (estimate: $200,000-300,000), as well as a handsome portrait of Alexander Hamilton by Eastman Johnson (estimate: $100,000-150,000). John Frederick Kensett’s Study on Long Island Sound at Darien, Connecticut has prestigious provenance including the Amon Carter Museum of American Art and extensive exhibition history such as the Whitney Museum of American Art (estimate: $150,000-250,000).
