19th-Century Folk Art Pastel of Dartmouth College
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GUEST:
It's a folk art painting I acquired many years ago, and I know nothing about it. It was at an estate sale, and I walked in, and this was on the wall next to the stairs, and I thought, "Yes, I have to have that."
APPRAISER:
Now, how long ago was this estate sale?
GUEST:
About at least… ten to 15 years.
APPRAISER:
Okay, do you remember how much you paid for this?
GUEST:
$25.
APPRAISER:
Well, this is a wonderful early 19th century rendering of an early campus. It looks New England to me just by virtue of the buildings. It's pastel, charcoal, and sand on paper.
GUEST:
Oh!
APPRAISER:
And so you get a little bit of the shiny glitter will show through of the sand.
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
And usually, these works are in charcoal, they're black and white, and this is worked in beautiful, brilliant color. The buildings are a little... they're quite well done, but they're probably a little bit out of perspective. The condition is fabulous, it's a very large piece, and many times, we don't have… we don’t have a photograph of these structures as they appeared at this time, maybe 1820, 1830…
GUEST:
Oh, my.
APPRAISER:
Something like that. If this were to come to auction, if we don't know where this place is, if it's an unidentified academic setting, academic landscape, I would say an auction estimate would be $3,000 to $5,000. If we identified this location, and I do believe we could with a little bit of time, you've got an $8,000 to $12,000—
GUEST:
Oh, my!
APPRAISER:
--Estimate on this. It's a wonderful, wonderful piece. It was such a treat!
Appraisal Details
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Value can change: The value of an item is dependent upon many things, including the condition of the object itself, trends in the market for that kind of object, and the location where the item will be sold. These are just some of the reasons why the answer to the question "What's it worth?" is so often "It depends."
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