Ralph Goings Oil Painting, ca. 1964
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GUEST:
Well, my parents bought it, um, in 1964. When I was growing up, I thought it was actually a picture of my mother, but the story is that it's from a newspaper advertisement for Serta Perfect Sleeper. And so this was the lady in the advertisement waking up on the mattress, and having a nice stretch, and feeling so good about the morning. And at some point, I realized it was also a little bit kind of creepy and weird that she's having this dream about the Cossacks coming to rape and pillage, and she's got this little smile on her face. And I guess my stepmother wasn't real sure about it, either, because she didn't really want it in the bedroom. And so my dad took it to the hallway of the office where he worked, and there was a portrait artist that came into his office, and saw it hanging there and said, "You know, that's really very valuable. "And if you'd like to sell it, I will sell it for you, and I'll keep half the proceeds and give you half." Rather than do that, Dad brought it home and put it in the garage. I happened to be going by the house one day just a few years ago, and, and he was talking about how he needed to clean out the garage, and we went out to take a look and he said, "Do you want this? No one else wants it." And I said, "Of course I want it." One family member found out that I had it and was a little upset, because they felt that it's a valuable painting and I shouldn't just get it. So my dad gave each of the siblings a check for $12,000, and gave me a letter of ownership saying, "I value this painting at $12,000, and I'm giving it to my daughter." And so I ended up with it, and my husband won't let me hang it in our bedroom. Um, and so it's in the guest room and just a beloved piece of my childhood.
APPRAISER:
Well, Ralph Goings is known more as a Photorealist. This is one of his earlier works, in the early '60s, when he was doing more figural works. His Photorealists is what people really want.
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
And they go well into six figures for the paintings.
GUEST:
Wow.
APPRAISER:
This one, because it's that early, and because figural, it's not always the... It's not the prized one, but it's certainly worth more than what your dad wrote a note for.
GUEST:
(laughing)
APPRAISER:
Right now, I'd put an insurance value on this at $75,000.
GUEST:
Oh, wow. Okay. Then it definitely made up for the fact that I spent as much on the carrying case that I brought it here in as my parents spent on it when they first bought it back in '64. That's amazing.
APPRAISER:
How much... How much did they spend?
GUEST:
$300.
APPRAISER:
That's great.
GUEST:
Yeah.
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