On Thursday, February 11, Swann Galleries will auction the Jerome Shochet Collection of Signed Historical Photographs, which includes those of U.S. presidents, writers, artists and other important historical figures from the 19th and 20th centuries.
Highlights of the sale include presidential portraits, Civil War and World War II era photographs, and portraits of literary figures, musicians, as well as inventors and scientists, according to a Swann Galleries press release.
Presidential highlights include one of the earliest signed images of any president, a boldly signed carte-de-visite portrait of John Quincy Adams, dated approximately 1825 (Estimate: $6,000 to $9,000). Carte-De-Visite photographs were small albumen prints mounted on cards 2-1/2 by 4 inches.
Also of special note is a seated portrait of Abraham Lincoln by Alexander Gardner, signed “A. Lincoln,” estimated at $40,000 to $60,000. A rare, unusually large portrait of Chester Arthur, inscribed to John Jameson of Amherst, Massachusetts ($10,000 to $15,000), a photograph of Theodore Roosevelt and his Cabinet in Washington, signed by the president and nine others in the image, dated 1906 ($10,000 to $15,000) are also up for auction.
Highlights of the sale include presidential portraits, Civil War and World War II era photographs, and portraits of literary figures, musicians, as well as inventors and scientists, according to a Swann Galleries press release.
Presidential highlights include one of the earliest signed images of any president, a boldly signed carte-de-visite portrait of John Quincy Adams, dated approximately 1825 (Estimate: $6,000 to $9,000). Carte-De-Visite photographs were small albumen prints mounted on cards 2-1/2 by 4 inches.
Also of special note is a seated portrait of Abraham Lincoln by Alexander Gardner, signed “A. Lincoln,” estimated at $40,000 to $60,000. A rare, unusually large portrait of Chester Arthur, inscribed to John Jameson of Amherst, Massachusetts ($10,000 to $15,000), a photograph of Theodore Roosevelt and his Cabinet in Washington, signed by the president and nine others in the image, dated 1906 ($10,000 to $15,000) are also up for auction.
In addition, there are signed portraits of Presidents Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, Herbert Hoover, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon, Harry Truman, Franklin D. Roosevelt, William H. Taft, Woodrow Wilson and more.
Civil War highlights include a Mathew Brady carte-de-visite of Elmer E. Ellsworth, the first notable casualty of the war, who died while removing the Confederate flag displayed in Alexandria, Virginia ($4,000 to $6,000), along with a signed and inscribed group photograph that belonged to George Armstrong Custer, who is shown with the officers under his command and their wives in Fort Lincoln, North Dakota, dated November 1873. On the mount below the albumen print, Custer identified each person, and on the reverse he noted the location ($25,000 to $35,000).
Choice World War II photographs include an image of Winston Churchill and 43 other attendees of the May 1944 Dominion Prime Ministers’ Conference, signed by Churchill and others in London ($10,000 to $15,000); and a very rare photograph of Generals Dwight D. Eisenhower and Douglas MacArthur seated side-by-side in a limousine during Ike’s May 1946 visit to Tokyo, signed by both ($20,000 to $30,000).
Among literary figures are a self-portrait of Lewis Carroll dated 1875, inscribed to his sister ($2,000 to $3,000), a rare signed and inscribed photograph of Robert Lewis Stevenson ($7,000 to $10,000), and a standing portrait of Oscar Wilde ($4,000 to $6,000).
Featured photographs of musicians include a portrait of Johannes Brahms gazing out a window, inscribed in German, “with warm regards,” dated approximately 1894 ($4,000 to $6,000), a large image of Antonin Dvorák, signed and inscribed in Czech in 1893, when he served as Director of the National Conservatory of Music in Omaha, Nebraska ($8,000 to $12,000).
Among photos of notable inventors and scientists is a photo postcard signed by Wilbur and Orville Wright standing with a group of people at a horse track in Le Mans, France, the site of the first flight of the Wright brothers in Europe, dated approximately 1909 ($5,000 to $7,500). Also of interest is a standing portrait of Nobel Prize winner Ivan Petrovich Pavlov in Boston, 1929 ($3,500 to $5,000).
The auction will begin at 1:30 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 11. Lots will be on public exhibition Saturday, Feb. 6, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Monday, Feb. 8 through Wednesday, Feb. 10, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Thursday, Feb. 11, from 10 a.m. to noon.
Swann Galleries is located at 104 East 25th Street, New York, NY 10010. For more information about the sale, please visit www.swanngalleries.com.
