The April Highwaymen Market Blog
For a late weekend in the start of the “slow season”, there was a lot of activity in the past two days!
The Kelvin Hair Gallery Opening:
The weekend started off with the opening of Kelvin Hair’s new gallery in Ft. Pierce. Billed as the “Biggest Highwaymen Event Ever” in all of the advertising for the opening, it was a solid, well attended event, but I’m not sure it was the biggest Highwaymen event ever held ! The opening had a feel somewhat like the Jetson event held every year in January – but certainly not as big as the Jetson event.
Three original Highwaymen artists were in attendance (Arnett, Black, Lewis), along with about 8 legacy artists, several cast members from the upcoming Highwaymen film, and an appearance by famed Highwaymen author Gary Monroe. I would characterize the opening event as crowded, successful, and fun. It seemed that everyone sold well. I didn’t count sales, but I can say that Curtis Arnett came with 4 paintings, and they were all sold within 10 minutes. The Gallery itself seemed to be selling about half a dozen paintings (my best guess), and I think everyone there sold at least a couple of paintings.
One point of note, … it seemed to me that the Gallery opening siphoned off a good number of people from the Manor Auction, being held that same day. I believe that many people planned to come to the gallery opening early, and then leave for the auction. That may have been the plan, but many of those people seemed to stay at the gallery because it was a fun time, fueled by some good pizza and drinks that later came out, resulting in many people not leaving as planned. I don’t know if they went to Manor late, or they just went home, but the Manor sale was not what it used to be.
In any case, congratulations to Kelvin for a fine event, a good looking gallery, and a successful gallery launch. It’s nice to see the Highwaymen world expanding in Ft. Pierce. With the Highwaymen museum set to open sometime in the near future, and the relocation of Florida Art Auction from Vero to Jupiter, but now also to Ft. Pierce last month, it seems like the Highwaymen center of gravity is moving a bit south from Vero Beach.
The Manor Auction:
The Manor Auction this month was described to me by several of those in attendance, as “lighter than usual”. The gallery was not full, and the auction results this month clearly were not as robust as previous months. It seems to have been a combination of three factors:
- The competing gallery opening clearly was a much bigger draw.
- It cant be ignored that traditionally, April is the month that the seasonal slowdown
starts to kick in, and - The offerings this month at Manor were fewer than normal, and I would characterize them as more common, commodity style paintings. That is not to say they were poor paintings … just that they were the kinds of paintings that the market is getting saturated with, and there was not really anything great or unusual to get the market and buyers excited.
The auction had 51 Highwaymen paintings being sold. That compares with 60 paintings being auctioned in March, 70 in February, and almost 80 in January. It’s actually a good thing that the quantity is declining because almost everyone I speak with says the market is softening because of the large number of paintings that Manor is pushing into the market on a monthly basis. No matter how much enthusiasm there is on the part of collectors, there is a physical limit to the number of average paintings that they can keep buying every month ! So the decline in quantity is a good thing.
At the same time, while there were a few high prices (discussed below), the overall data on the Highwaymen paintings was not strong.
As I have mentioned last month, I have gone back to tracking paintings against their low estimates as a measure of success in an auction. Trying to move to the industry standard of the midpoint between High and Low estimates was a futile exercise with 80+% of the paintings not reaching that midpoint level. There is no doubt that the high estimate numbers are nothing more than a Wishlist, with the auction house trying to pump up prices. But the market is the market, and market prices prevail.
In this auction, total “Low Estimates” were $186,850 (compared with $202,600 last month). Total Hammer Prices realized were $162,850 (compared with $215,325 last month). Last month hammer prices exceeded Low Estimates by 6%. This month, total hammer prices were 13% below the low estimate target prices.
There were 6 paintings out of the 51 offered that passed and did not sell (12% of the auction) – a surprising high number of paintings that did not reach a reserve, typically set at 80% of the low estimate. Further, 23 of the 51 paintings did not reach their low estimate target. A weak result.
So what sold well and what didn’t in this auction ? ….. Lets start with the positives.
- A very attractive Chico Wheeler with a target estimate of $2,000 hammered at $3,700. Recently it seems that the better performing artists were the traditionally lower priced artists. Chico Wheeler, Rodney Demps, RL Lewis all seem to be having their moment and doing better than expected at auctions.
- I suppose it’s possible to say that the Harold Newton that hammered at $28,000 was a success. It’s certainly a big number, but it didn’t reach its low estimate target of $30,000. This was a good painting, but in my opinion, not a $28,000 painting at only 22×28 inches. On the other hand, its an early canvas board work so I know the prices are higher than they would be if on upson. The painting is good, but I’m not sure its $28,000 good. At the same time, the next piece in the auction (16×20 on Masonite), estimated at $10,000-$15,000 – didnt sell. Not really a surprise at that estimate.
- The two Robert Butlers did well – both surpassing their Low target estimate by more than 50% each. As I commented in my blog last month – Butler is also still showing consistently strong prices, whereas most of the better Highwaymen painters have seen a softening.
- As I also mentioned above, Rodney Demps is on a clear uptick ! A few months ago, no one would have imagined that 2 paintings by Demps would hammer at $2,500 and $2,700 ! Last month a Demps hammered at $5,000 at the March Rennick auction. Smart collectors should start snapping up quality paintings by Demps, but only when the quality is tops, as Demps certainly has his share of low quality paintings as well.
Moving on to the less than successful aspects of the Manor auction …..
- Two signed Alfred Hair paintings ( one at 24×36, the other 24×48) hammered at $3,500 and $3,600 respectively. For the artist who most consider to be the most important artist of the Highwaymen movement, these are disappointing prices.
- An Ellis Buckner 24×48 Poinciana on upson, with a target price of $10,000,did not sell. This painting was well overestimated. I advise collectors all the time that if they want a great Buckner in the $10,000 value range, they should focus on a painting on canvas. The Buckners excelled at painting on canvas. They went from early paintings on upson, directly to canvas. They almost never painted on Masonite. Canvas is the way to go. Both Buckner paintings in the auction were on upson.
- A very beautiful early Roy McLendon fire sky painting (24×36 on upson board) hammered for only $3,000.
- Two Johnny Daniels paintings both fared poorly. A jumbo 30×40 on canvas, with a Low target of $3,500, barely sold at its minimum reserve of $2,800. Another 24×30, with a target price of $2,000, did not sell, meaning it did not even receive a bid of $1,600. These were both nice paintings. A bargain to the buyer of the jumbo painting.
- No report would be complete without a few words on Sam Newton. Like other recent Manor auctions, this sale was dominated with paintings by Sam… (9 of the 51 paintings – 18% of the paintings in the auction). The market is having difficulty digesting the steady, monthly stream of these paintings. The paintings are generally good ! But economics 101 tells us that when the supply keeps going up, prices go down. Most of the Sam Newton paintings did exceed their Target estimates, but the estimates have clearly declined during the last 6-9 months. 7 of the 9 paintings had low estimates of $2,500 or less.
Overall, what is an average auction in terms of painting quality and prices ? By definition, half of the auctions are better than average, and half are not as good as average. I would conclude that based upon the criteria of painting quality and price results, this did not reach the level of being in the top 50%.
The Saturday Manor Auction was followed by
The Sunday Auction Wall Street auction:
This auction was really an enigma to me, and I expect others. The auction structure and results were so unusual, I’m not sure where to begin to provide an explanation. So lets start
with the facts:
- The auction had 35 lots of Highwaymen paintings.
- 27 of the 35 paintings passed (77%)
- 26 of the 35 paintings were by Al Black. 7 of the 26 sold. 19 passed
- Of the 8 paintings that sold, all did exceed their Low target estimate.
- The auction represented a total Low target value of $54,650. Hammer price totals were $8,300 (mostly Al Black sales).
In assessing the auction, the following questions come to my mind…
- Why have 26 Al Black paintings in one small auction ? I don’t believe any Highwaymen auction could find buyers for 26 Al Black paintings, unless the prices were exceptionally low … hence the3 large number of passed paintings.
- There were two very nice Roy McLendon fire sky paintings – both 24×36 on upson, with target prices of $4,000. I recall that at least one of them had a pre-bid of $4,000, so it is not clear to me why it did not sell. Both passed. A similar fire sky at Manor hammered at $3,000
- A 24×30 Johnny Daniels (on upson ?) with a target price of $2,000, did not sell.
It’s my understanding that most Highwaymen paintings sold at Auction Wallstreet are owned by the auction house. As such, they can decide their own minimum price levels for sales, and it seems would rather hold on to the paintings for future sales, than sell them for lower prices now. This is just my speculation, but it is an explanation for the large number of passed paintings. 8 of the Al Black paintings had a low estimate of $500. This would normally mean a reserve of $400 at Manor, and I am sure these paintings would sell at $400 ! So the fact that they passed would lead me to believe that the paintings did not reach a level of bidding acceptable to the auction house.
Auction Wallstreet also sells a large quantity of other antiques and collectibles. They are not dependent on Highwaymen sales as some of the other auction houses are, so they have more flexibility on what they will sell the paintings for. (Again – my speculation).
Conclusion:
Is the market softening, or are we just seeing fair prices for average paintings ? We are coming into the slow season (aka “bargain season”), so there could certainly be some softening. At the same time, the offerings of paintings at auction have been average at best. At the Kelvin Hair gallery event, Curtis Arnett sold 4 beautiful new paintings in 10 minutes. I saw a new RL Lewis painting right at the show opening that I really liked. I came back for it 5 minutes later, and I was told it was sold to the next buyer who looked at it after me ! So there is clearly demand for the right paintings. The problem in the market is that collectors are saturated with average paintings.
Coming Up:
While I expect the unrelenting stream of paintings at auction to keep coming, I did hear from Vero Beach Auction that they will be doing their next auction on Saturday, May 17 (online at LiveAuctioneers only). David at Vero has had consistently the best record of auction results tied to accurate estimates. His auctions are also smaller, producing better results. He has described this auction as “We have a great collection of paintings”. The auction listing will be on LiveAuctioneers later this week.
Florida Highwaymen Auctions has announced their next live auction will be held on June 14 – location to be announced shortly. They have a model where they list 10 paintings in their auctions (listed on LiveAuctioneers) every week leading up to the auction. The first 10 paintings will be posted later this week.
And finally, we are now entering the summer party season at The Highwaymen Collector – This Is It Café & Gallery in West Palm Beach. Our next fun event will be held on Saturday, June 7 from 4-8pm! See you there …..
Happy Hunting!, Mark Lerner 786-599- 5816
www.TheHighwaymenCollector.com MJL@TheHighwaymenCollector.com