Ebay Dealer Valuations

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So often we see antique dealers on Ebay value a masterpiece for almost nothing. The prime example this year was the 17th Century whale-bone Paikea comb. However, sometimes dealers price items astronomically. Currently, there is a Buy It Now for $1950 on a coin-silver American comb, which is a lovely piece. It has an eagle, the American flag, and the carving is set off by two tulips. Beautifully themed, but $1950? The theme does not supersede the material and the comb’s lack of provenance.

If documentation could prove a First Lady of the United States wore that particular comb at an historical event, it would attract American history collectors. A bigger market might find a buyer at that price. But without such a once-in-a-lifetime connection, I’d pay around $200 for the patriotic theme, even though it was on coin silver. I’m interested in other opinions on value. What would you pay?

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For more scholarly research, please examine

The Dazzle of the US a multimedia presentation by The Creative Museum

The Comb, by Jen Cruse

Hair Combs: Identification and Values by Mary Bachman

Isidor Kaufmann Painting: The Newlywed

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Isidor Kaufmann was born in Arad, Hungary (now Romania), in 1853. Leaving for Vienna to study art in 1876, his assimilated Jewish clients coveted their commissioned portraits. Viennese Jews looked down upon their fiercely religious, backwater brethren in the shtetls, so it is ironic that Kaufmann is best known for his realistic portraits of shtetl rabbis in Poland, Russia, and Hungary c. 1890. Their stony gazes reveal the fight to keep their dying culture alive.

Kaufmann chose realism in the middle of Gustav Klimt’s “Vienna Sucession,” the Austrian version of Art Nouveau. Emperor Franz Joseph I owned “Der Besuch des Rabbi” (Visit of the Rabbi), which now hangs in the Kunsthistorisches Museum.

However, he also painted his daughter Hannah when she got married. One of those portraits is going on sale at Sotheby’s on December 14, 2011, with an estimated value between $250,000 and $350,000.

This is the second one. Look at her kipah, or wedding hat.

Attached to the masterfully ornate fabric is a hand-made seed-pearl tiara. There is a circular center, above which is a spray of seed pearls, shaped into individual hearts, and attached to the top. To the side, a chain of hearts reaches the front-sides to hold the kipah in place. One of the chains of pearls becomes a border around the bottom. Hannah’s parure is completed by pearl earrings and a five-tiered seed-pearl necklace.

Even though he probably painted his daughter in Vienna, her gaze is as fierce as the shtetl rabbis’. Perhaps she knew she was defending a culture, which would be threatened by extinction, too.

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For more scholarly research, please examine

Rabbiner, Bocher, Talmudschuler: Bilder des Wiener Malers, Isidor Kaufmann, 1853-1921 (German Edition)

Isidor Kaufmann art prints: Portrait of a Rabbi and Girl with Flowers in her Hair

Tevye’s Daughters: Collected Stories of Sholom Aleichem

Creative Museum: Newspaper article in La Charente Libre

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As we take our steps from the online world to the real one, newspapers notice, too. La Charente Libre of Cognac, France, wrote an article on the Creative Museum‘s Tete a Tete exhibition at the Musée d’Angouleme on November 5th.

Everyone from around the world :-), please say hello to Catherine and Joel Olliveaud. What I see in this photo is Joel looking at the Creative Museum’s headdress with his photographer’s eye. Catherine, you are beautiful!

The article tells the story of a collection, which is really the story of a family, who had a serendipitous epiphany. They saw a few combs in their grandmother’s wardrobe and devoted their lives to her legacy. Coincidentally, many combs are made to pay homage to ancestors, so that gives added poignancy to the Creative Museum.

From the article: “The idea of ​​the museum came to me after the organization of the exhibition ‘Chinese and Japanese Hair Ornaments’ at the Oisellerie Castle in La Couronne, France” said Catherine Olliveaud. “Many people told me that these objects were worthy of museums like the Musée Guimet in Paris. It gave me ideas. The advantage of the virtual museum is that it is accessible to everyone everywhere.” The Creative Museum has visitors from 97 countries.

Ebay: Kingfisher Hair Pin and Margot de Taxco Mexican Hair Comb

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This stunning Manchu hair pin with every kingfisher feather in place, superb-quality jade, and coral branches sold for $800 on E-bay, October 28, 2011. The pin was in perfect condition. Look at the back: the intricacy of how each stone and feathered piece is set, as well as long tines, seal the deal.

Also on E-bay is a beautiful pair of hair combs and matching bracelet by Margot de Taxco. She was an American, Margot Van Voorhies Carr, who came to Taxco, Mexico, in 1937 and married Antonio Castillo of Los Castillo. In 1948, she divorced and set up her own workshop. These pieces feature gold-washed half balls surrounded by silver scrolls, are marked, and are in superb condition.

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For more scholarly research, please examine

Chinese and Japanese Hair Ornaments by The Creative Museum

Margot Van Voorhies: The Art of Mexican Enameled Jewelry

Creative Museum: Haute Couture Mercedes Robirosa comb

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Mercedes Robirosa was one of Yves St. Laurent’s favorite models in the late 1960’s and 70’s. Laurent chose Robirosa to model the Mondrian dress, which is in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum’s Costume Institute.

After her modeling career, Karl Lagerfeld hired her to design jewelry for Chanel. Four years later, she went out on her own.

The newest acquisition of The Creative Museum, this comb came from her Karl Lagerfeld period. It was designed for one of his haute couture fashion shows.

Hammered brass swirls surround a turquoise-glass stone. Your eye never loses interest in the swirls’ asymmetrical nature. The comb is a great sculpture in its own right. It is signed, original, and in perfect condition. The intelligence behind these purchases are what differentiates a collection from a museum, and what makes The Creative Museum great.

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For more scholarly research, please examine

Yves St Laurent by Frances Muller

The Yves Saint Laurent-Pierre Berge Collection: The Sale of the Century

Hair Combs from the Parthian and Sasanian Empires of Ancient Persia

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The Parthian Empire existed in Ancient Persia from 247 BC – 224 AD. It is also called the Arsacid Empire after Arsaces I of Parthia, the Parni tribal leader who conquered what is now, modern-day Iran’s northeast region. At its height, the Parthian Empire stretched from the Euphrates in south-eastern Turkey to eastern Iran. Because its territory included the Silk Road trade route between the Roman Empire and the Han Empire of China, the Empire became a center of world commerce.

It was succeeded by the Sassanid Empire (224-651 AD), which was considered to be equal in power to Rome. The Sassanids also invented the word, “Eran,” which later became Iran. It was the last pre-Islamic Persian empire.

Its art was multicultural, encompassing Persian, Ancient Greek, and regional traditions. These two Parthian pieces, a hair comb and pin, come from the Reza-Abassi Museum in Iran. The jewels are carnelians.

On this gold coin, you can see the Sassanid Emperor Shapur II wearing a crown.

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For more scholarly research, please examine

The Art and Archaeology of Ancient Persia: New Light on the Parthian and Sasanian Empires

Forgotten Empire: The World of Ancient Persia

Decline and Fall of the Sasanian Empire: The Sasanian-Parthian Confederacy and the Arab Conquest of Iran

Ebay: Chinese Ivory Export Comb

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Someone is selling a beautiful Chinese ivory comb made for export to the Victorian market, c. 1890. It has a lotus flower in the middle, with beautiful scroll work. Stylistically married on top are balls of the Peigne Josephine. You can tell it’s Chinese by the shape of the bottom bridge and tines underneath the decorative tiara. Lovely piece. I have my hair comb payments tied up until April of next year, so someone under 5 feet tall will not be bidding. ;-) We’ll see what happens at the end of the week! :-)

Another beautiful example of a Chinese ivory export comb comes from The Creative Museum. Two dragons or griffins are having a conversation.

Here is mine.

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For more scholarly research, please examine

The Comb, by Jen Cruse

Le peigne: Dans le monde, by Robert Bollé

Chinese and Japanese Hair Ornaments by The Creative Museum

Italian Papal Tiara

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In Latin, it is known as the Triregnum. The crown of the Roman Catholic Pope has three jeweled tiers, but is rooted in Byzantine and Persian design. In fact, the word, “tiara,” is Persian.

The bottom crown appeared in the 9th Century. Jewels were added when the Popes attained political power in the Papal States of Italy. In 1298, Pope Boniface VIII added a second layer to assert that spiritual dominion had precedence over civil authority. Pope Clement V was the first to wear the triple tiara with the cross on top and gold strips, c. 1314.

On the left, Pope Innocent III (1198-1216) wears an early papal tiara, juxtaposed with Pope Pius IX’s ornate version (1846-1878).

At Sotheby’s, an Italian model, which never belonged to any pope, will be auctioned off on Nov. 4. 2011. It has no cross and is made of gold, seed pearls, and gems. Date: c. 1840. Estimated Value: $15,000 to $25,000. The leather case stamped Marcus & Co., New York.

However, when preparing for his coronation, Pope John Paul II was asked if he would like to wear a papal tiara and answered, “This is not the time to return to a ceremony and an object considered, wrongly, to be a symbol of the temporal power of the Popes. Our time calls us, urges us, obliges us to gaze on the Lord and immerse ourselves in humble and devout meditation on the mystery of the supreme power of Christ himself.”

A great man teaches us that a tiara can be more powerful in its absence than in its presence.

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For more scholarly research, please examine

Tiara by Diana Scarisbrick

Royal Jewels by Diana Scarisbrick

Crowns, including: Crown (headgear), Papal Coronation, Crown Jewels Of Ireland, Tiara, Imperial Crown Of India, Iron Crown Of Lombardy, St Edward’s … Holy Crown Of Hungary, French Crown Jewels

Love and Responsibility by Pope John Paul II

Henri Gillet Hair Comb

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Henri Gillet used Art Nouveau designs to make lithographs, which were used as wallpaper from 1900 to the 1920’s. On one of them, he designed a horn comb. If it were ever made, I’d imagine the flurry of leaves to be plique-a-jour enamel. This lithograph is part of the Album de la Décoration, edited by A. Calavas and printed in Paris c. 1900.

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For more scholarly research, please examine

Design Motifs of the Decorative Twenties in Color by Henri Gillet

Henri Gillet. Le Voleur d’instants

Bird of Paradise Ceremonial Headdress from Papua New Guinea

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A colleague of Charles Darwin, Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) spent a decade writing The Malay Archipelago. The Land of the Orang-utang and the Bird of Paradise.

Europeans were mesmerized by the red bird of paradise, as it reminded them of a lost Eden. Wallace wrote extensively on how he used native contacts to kill them, or rather to get specimens for study.

Unlike the kingfisher, Paradisaeas are not extinct. Here is a rubra and a minor in all their glory.

Tribal leaders feathered this ceremonial headdress from the wings of the red bird of paradise, cockatoo, parrot, and pigeon. It was acquired by the National Museum in Papua, New Guinea in 1906.

For parents who might show this blog to their children, they can reassure them that Kevin from the movie, “Up” was a Kelenken, an extinct prehistoric bird, who lived 15 million years ago in Argentina. No one made headdresses out of Kevin, so we can all breathe a sigh of relief. :-)

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For more scholarly research, please examine

Ethnic Jewellery and Adornment by Truus and Jeremy Daalder