Marion Kavanaugh Wachtel Oil
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APPRAISER:
I wonder if you could tell me something about your painting that you've brought here today.
GUEST:
Well, I really don't know too much about my painting. I was wishing you could tell me something about it, because I had picked it up at the church bazaar. I happened to at one time been in Canada, Lake Louise, and enjoyed the vacation very much. And when I looked at it, I thought, "Oh great, this is a picture of Lake Louise," that it's just sort of memorable for me to have a picture of Lake Louise.
APPRAISER:
Yeah, it looks very much like Lake Louise.
GUEST:
A friend of mine came over and read the signature and she said, "That's a known artist!"
APPRAISER:
Marion Kavanaugh Wachtel was trained in the Art Institute of Chicago under William Merritt Chase, one of America's most famous Impressionist painters. She came out to work with the Santa Fe railroad to paint murals for them, and that brought her to the West Coast, where she met her husband, who was also an artist. And she painted a great deal up in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California. And she lived until 1954, but she was also one of the few California female Impressionist painters. This painting is a wonderful example of it. It's bright, it's very colorful. What did you pay for this painting when you bought it at the church bazaar?
GUEST:
You wouldn't believe it. I think I paid something like four or five dollars.
APPRAISER:
There's been a tremendous rise in California Impressionist paintings in terms of the market price, and this would probably be worth about $30,000 to $40,000 today. So I think it's kind of marvelous that you were able to...
GUEST:
Oh my gosh, no!
APPRAISER:
Yeah, she was a good artist, and very few...
GUEST:
Wonderful! Well, I liked it because it, you know, as I said, it's cheerful and it's outdoors, and it will look very nice to have in the living room. I still can't believe it!
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