Posted on 12/05/2004 11:14:11 AM PST by Lijahsbubbe
Fans of "The Antiques Roadshow" know the fantasy. A dusty artifact in an attic turns out to be collectible and valuable. Everyone goes home satisfied that the stock they place in a family treasure is justified.
Two Twin Cities siblings are living the dream, having recently learned that an 1860s painting that long hung over their parents' fireplace in Eau Claire, Wis., is worth between $1 million and $1.5 million — possibly more.
"It's really an awesome thing," said Bob Culver of White Bear Township about the painting by Albert Bierstadt. "This art world is something none of us is familiar with."
On Saturday, Culver and his sister, Mary Schuck of Stillwater, along with the family of their late brother, will sell a mountain landscape that the family has owned since 1930. The painting is being auctioned by Susanin's in Chicago.
Milwaukee art appraiser Janice Kuhn, who made the first professional appraisal of the work, notes the symbolism of Manifest Destiny: the rugged but open landscape there for the taking, the wagon train in strong light juxtaposed against the "noble savage" in fading light on the left side, passively observing their progression.
Interest is already high, said Shlomi Rabi, head of premier and specialty auction services for Susanin's. "It is absolutely spectacular," he said. "For one, the size of it is impressive and almost overwhelming."
The painting's size — 5 feet wide by 3 feet high — is one reason the family is parting with it. "When (mom) died, we needed to find a place to put the painting," Bob Culver said. "None of us had room for a big painting like that."
The painting has its roots in Eau Claire, where the Culver siblings grew up. When Bierstadt fell from fashion back East, he worked the Chicago-to-Twin Cities circuit, said Bob Culver's wife, Signet. Bierstadt longed to be in "the millionaires' circle," she said.
Many of his paintings ended up with Wisconsin owners, including Joseph Thorp, a lumber baron who purchased the painting for his Eau Claire mansion. When he sold the mansion, the painting went with it.
In 1930, Bob and Mary's grandfather got the painting in lieu of unpaid rent from the family of a deceased tenant. The painting was treated as a castoff and relegated to various attics and buildings in Eau Claire for the next 40 years.
"People didn't have any idea at that time that the painting had any value," Bob Culver said. "That painting really bounced around from one building to another for storage."
The frame, however, caught the eye of his father, Homer, who used it for a window display in his Eau Claire shoe store. The painting stayed in an attic.
In the early 1970s, Homer Culver asked an artist who was renting studio space above the store whether he'd heard of Bierstadt.
"He got excited and couldn't wait for Dad to pull the painting out," Bob Culver said.
Suddenly aware of its value, his father brought the painting home, where for years it hung above a massive flagstone fireplace amid spotlights. An art professor from the University of Wisconsin in Eau Claire regularly trooped students through their living room for a look.
But the family, which Culver confesses knew nothing about art, loved the painting for itself.
"It was beautiful," Schuck said. "I loved it. It was just a beautiful painting, and it was just perfect on that fireplace. It just brought the room together."
As their parents aged, they considered selling the painting, knowing their three children likely would do so after they died. But the children urged them to keep it as long as they wanted.
"Bob's dad took great pride in that picture," Signet Culver said. "They dearly loved that painting."
His father died in 1982, and after his mother's death in 1995, the family lent the painting to an art center in Oshkosh, Wis., where it was displayed until being shipped to Chicago.
The Culvers held onto the painting out of affection, but their timing was providential. Art collecting is back in favor, and values have skyrocketed.
Bierstadt's work is often exhibited with art by George Catlin and Frederic Remington. Sotheby's sold a Bierstadt landscape of Yosemite National Park in 2003 for $7 million, but the prices haven't fazed Bob Culver.
"By that time, we were accustomed to thinking of it as a masterpiece," he said.
The Culvers would welcome the money, which they'd use to restore savings depleted after a near-fatal car accident in 1997.
Still, they're sad to see the family masterpiece go. Bob Culver hopes to get professional photos of the painting that for so long dominated the landscape of his parents' home.
"We appreciated the realness of it," he said. "It definitely was a very fine piece of art. We enjoyed talking about it, to each other, and displaying it."
We have a large painting in our dining room painted in 1906 by a not so well know French impressionist. I hope that it is worth a lot someday.
There are people with metal detectors who would "Kill" for a copy of your map.If I lived in your state I know I would want one!
"We have a large painting in our dining room painted in 1906 by a not so well know French impressionist. I hope that it is worth a lot someday."
Which impressionist?
Maurice Taquaq. There is a museum I think a war museum in Paris with a lot of his work. He painted a lot of horses. Our painting is of 2 large gray dappled horses and 4 men standing in front of some barns. It is quite beautiful.
That really stinks. I was thinking about how much of the million or so they would get to actually keep when I first read the articles.
This tax system is sinful!
Be willing to bet it's worth more than you think! Have you done any research on it?
That is a real treasure. I love stories like yours.
Thank you!
I told you a million times....stop exaggerating!
I bought an abstract screenprint about a year ago at my local thrift shop for $7 that I just discovered is a Mondrian worth $2000! Not a bad return on a 7 buck investment!
Nice painting. I love that happy little tree off to the left there...
Art Lotto winner!
I found one in a museum that was listed in the "Rare Civil War Map" section but I was told it was only worth about $500. Something doesn't sound right about that to me. That's as far as I've researched it though.
What about the roll-your-own cigarettes. My grandpa never bought a store bought cigarette in his life. He was rolling his own right up until he died at 92. He was born in 1902 and probably started smoking when he was 8. :-) I've never smoked so I don't have a clue when cigarettes came into existance. Most of the shows I've watched about the war showed cigars though so you're probably right.
All I have to do is start talking and they wouldn't believe that. LOL Seriously though, there has been speculation that it is a Yankee map of the Southern States. I just can't figure out how my family came to have it. My great-great-great uncle that had the map lived in Chickamauga GA. near Chattanooga and Lookout Mountain. He moved to Chattanooga later in life and brought the map with him. It's a mystery we will never solve but that makes it even more interesting.
I know what you mean. Rockwell Van Gogh was one of my favorites too.
I hadn't thought about roll-your-own. Either way you really must get that map appraised. Check out the David Rumsey map collection. Lots of people would pay good money to have it.
Some people have all the luck!
You might try the history departments at one of the universitys there in Tennessee. Being as it's a Civil War item related to the state the value should be of interest to a collector as well as a historian.
tell me who and I'll look him up for you.
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