More on Treasures
Yes, indeed, the Internet is really, really great…
Ahem.
I found out more about that signed and numbered print. Turns out that it’s really a poster of a specifically commissioned commercial piece. To quote the artist’s wife:
The sand painting poster was commissioned by Germaine Monteil Cosmetics to promote the colors in their line back in 1975. We went to Minnesota to participate in the promotional activities – free poster with purchase!
It appears to me that you’ve got a collector’s item since there aren’t many artists signing — and numbering posters. But David didn’t know what he was supposed to do as he sat behind the table in the cosmetics area — Think I’d call it creative doodling and he was great at that.
Which is kinda cool, and makes it the second commercially commissioned piece I’ve got that was abandoned and ignored in later years. I have an artist’s proof of a print by Kenneth M. Freeman that I picked up at a Native American art store in NJ. When I moved to AZ, I discovered that he and his studio weren’t far away, so I emailed him and ended up driving up there with pictures of it to show him.
Mr Freeman told me all about it when he saw it, how it was a proof of one of 5 paintings commissioned by an oil or energy company in NJ back in the late 1970s (which tracks because the owner of the store who sold it to me said he’d had it for at least 20 years, and no one ever looked at it). That store owner sold it to me at a low price because he was moving locations and clearing out items, and because I’d been a good art customer with him over the years, and the artist said it was worth at least 10 times what I paid for it.
So it is a cool thing or a crazy thing that I keep discovering rare works of art that no one wanted for years?
