Triumphant Return
Scottsdale Art Auction’s annual sale returns to Arizona with top works from Taos and throughout the West.
Just three months after its monumental white glove sale for the Leanin’ Tree Museum, the Scottsdale Art Auction is back April 7 for its 14th annual sale, once again making top Western, wildlife and sporting art available to bidders. With the tremendous success of the Leanin’ Tree sale, the auction partners—brad Richardson, Jack Morris and Michael Frost—are feeling a renewed sense of momentum coming into another sale.
“The success of Leanin’ Tree was wonderful. Not only did we sell 100 percent, we sold more than $7.5 million when we had hoped to [sell] about $5 million. It far exceeded expectations and it really is leading us into the April sale,” Richardson says. “We’re hoping that the interest and the sale results are a good sign of things to come for the market and the items we’re bringing to the auction block.”
The April sale will feature nearly 400 works spread across two sessions, the first of which will have 128 no-reserve lots. The second session, where many of the auction blockbusters are likely to appear, will feature top works from some of the biggest names in Western art. The lots are carefully curated by the three partners. “Michael and Brad and I have conference calls and we look at every single piece we’re considering. These calls typically last two or three hours, but as we get down to the sale, they can last as long as five hours,” Morris says. “We’re selective with the work because we want the quality to be as high as possible.”
Highlights in this year’s sale include an Arizona landscape from Hudson River School painter Thomas Moran, whose Solitude, The Coconino Forest, Arizona is expected to fetch $400,000 to $600,000. “The Moran is coming out of a collection that acquired the piece from Thomas Moran and it’s been in the family ever since. We have two from Moran, including one from Mexico and this Arizona scene,”