Rafael Osona's
AUCTION NEWS
The better blog for bargaineering


photos courtesy of Terry Pommett, Boogy at Low Beach, AAN

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We thought hard; imagined a weekly e-newsletter.
We've launched the first two,
and it seems you're pleased with our fledgling efforts.
Rafael Osona's
AUCTION NEWS

Watch for it  - Wednesdays


Carolyn Buckingham's first day


What you said  "I've bought and sold three houses on Nantucket. I furnished - and unfurnished! - them all at Osona's."

"Terrific web page. Not too little, not too much. Just right.  Conveys the Osona message."  

"My girlfriend loved her South Sea pearls so much she wore them to the Oscars - all alone, in her living room, watching the awards on the TV!"

"Just thought I'd write to say, GREAT JOB with the newsletter. Makes me even more impatient to get back to the island for the auctions!"

 
"I enjoyed it immensely.  I have loved the work of the Beers for quite a while and like seeing what you have at your auctions online."
 
"Please put me on your e-mail list. I would love to hear your news!"

And FODORS wrote about us too!  Rafael Osona Auctions and our good friends, Vis a Vis were picked as "Fodor's Choice" "for good shopping on Nantucket." 



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Link to Auction News Archives





                                                                                                                                                                              

Rafael Osona's
AUCTION NEWS

An Apt Advisor for Deaccessioning
                                                                                                                                                                            
Always Seeking Fine Consignments
we evaluate and appraise single objects and entire estates
(how to consign)





Saturday, June 27th

9:30 a.m.

NEXT AUCTION
Antiques    Fine Art    Jewelry
(link to our website for highlights)

                                                                                                                                                                              

more June 27th Auction highlights


A  spectacular, Stephen Swift, bench-made,cherry corner cabinet 














Among several works by Andrew Shunney
to be offered on
both June 27th  & July 4th,
"Red Rose," (detail pictured above) 7" x 10"
will be offered June 27th.  (more)


For the child in all of us, (and an especially useful diversion during the rainiest summer on record!) a grouping of 19th & early 20th c. play toys.


And here's a very, very special painting by Jan Pawlowski,"Frenchie's Bench"




2009 Calendar
Watch the AUCTION PHOTO GALLERY come to life!
Click on descriptive text under photos for details
Click on underscored  dates for further details as they become available.


  Memorial Weekend Auction           May 23
  Antiques & Accessories
                                          
 
  Estate Tag Sale                      June 12&13


  Hospice Benefit Auction               June 14
   at Galley Beach

  Antiques & Accessories                June 27

  Fine Antiques & Accessories         July   4

Lightship Basket

July 10            Nantucket AIDS Network   
                        20th Anniversary Benefit Auction   

July 11   John Austin Estate Art Collection                                         Antiques & Accessories   

July 18                Antiques & Accessories  

July 18                           Artists' Association   
                                               Benefit Art Auction   

July 26             Nantucket Lightship Basket                                Museum Benefit  Auction  
                                   at Great Harbor Yacht Club  



Americana, Continental,                  Aug.  1
Fine Art & Maritime Auction
and the Lloyd Day Collection

Fine Antiques & Accessories            Aug.  8

Antiques & Accessories                       Aug. 15

Nantucket Boys & Girls Club          Aug. 15
Summer Groove Benefit Auction

Antiques & Accessories                  Aug. 22

Antiques & Accessories                  Aug. 29

Equestrian copper engraving


Sept.   5
      Labor Day Weekend Auction  

  Antiques & Accessories    

Sept. 19                Antiques & Accessories  
Oct.  10         Columbus Weekend Auction 
Fine Antiques   

Oct.  11   Artists' Association of Nantucket  
Wet Paint Sale   
Nov. 28               Thanksgiving Weekend   
Antiques Auction   

Dec.   5                            Christmas Stroll 
                                                  Antiques Auction   



The John Austin Estate Art Collection

Rafael Osona's
AUCTION NEWS
The must read manifesto



from our collection of South Sea pearls

PEARLY GIRLS

There's a growing sorority on Nantucket. Have you joined?  It's a knowing sisterhood with a certain proclivity for good pearls, and good value. 

Born during the month of June? Then pearls, my dear, are your birthright!! Margarita,  Margaret, Peggy, Marjorie, Margot, Maggie, Gretchen, Gretel and Rita - you should not be least among the sisters. Your given name is derived from the ancient Greek, "pearl." 

 

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PEARL BASICS

1. Natural or cultured?  Freshwater, Akoya, South Sea and Tahitian pearls these days are pretty much all cultured.  Natural pearls? Over fished and endangered. There might be one single harvestable natural pearl in every 100 bivalves, and only one in ten of those are of good quality.                                                  pearl farm, Tahiti

 2. "Every grain of sand" is a title/lyric from Bob Dylan. Sand's got nothing what so ever to do with culturing pearls. Each pearl begins with the insertion (nucleation) of a tiny piece of mantle from a sacrificed mollusk (fresh water pearls) or a small bead of mother-of-pearl. (South Sea and Tahitian)

 3. It's natural! The oyster secretes layers of nacre around the insertion.  It's the depth of nacre - the layers are like growth rings on a tree - that determines luster and value.

 4. The big difference: multiple insertions can be made in each mussel for freshwater pearls. The salt water variety gets just one bead inserted per oyster.

 5. One pearl. Five years. South Sea and Tahitian oysters that are at least  2 years of age may be cultured, with nacre development lasting another 2-3 years before the pearl is harvested.

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 6. Remember Mikimoto? They're the folks who set the standards for Akoya pearl culture back in the early 1900's, when cultured pearls became coveted by the rich & famous!  Pearls came to symbolize classic beauty, purity and love.

Spotting the best pearls is easy!

Look for luster, brightness and as near a perfectly smooth finish as your budget will allow. Salt water pearls have more value than fresh water. Larger South Sea and Tahitian pearls (11-18mm) with thicker nacre took 2-5 years longer to form,  which is reflected in the value.  Always look for carefully matched strings; in both color and shape.

 

Did you know? Pearls are "calcerous concretions" that develop in the soft tissue of a living animal. Calcerous concretions are produced by a variety of animal types, gastropods, squid, octopi, snails, worms, anthropods - even humans! The human version of a "pearl" is a kidney stone.


 In Julius Cesar's day in the Roman Empire, pearls were valued so highly that just one pearl could fund an entire war!  Hmmm,  a sisterhood with a proclivity for good pearls. Here? Well, Nantucket has always considered herself a sovereign state! And there never was any holding back those petticoat row girls!

NOTE: Each week, the topics discussed in The Must Read Manifesto will be archived on line in the AUCTION NEWS Archives(link)
Nantucket Artists

Geraniums, oil on canvas, (30" x 40")
According to the estate, this was Andrew Shunney's last painting;
to be offered at auction on July 4th. (link)

Andrew Shunney (1916-1978)

Born in Attleboro, Massachusetts, Shunney studied at the Rhode Island School of Design. He later took up residency in Manhattan, where he attended the Art Students League, and studied under Yasuo Kuniyoshi.  In 1946, Shunney benefited from a four year period of "master criticism" under Diego Rivera,  a Master who disliked the term "pupil" and wanted no disciples.  Still searching, Shunney next headed for Paris, hoping for inspiration in the work of the French Impressionists.  There he painted the streets of Paris, and the landscapes of Honfleur and Cannes. Before leaving France in 1950 he received an invitation to exhibit in the prestigious Salon d'Automne.

Andrew  Shunney's signature style is very much a product of an exceptionally fertile period in Western - and particularly, in American - modern art history.  He was a disciplined colorist whose preference for thick impasto applied with a palate knife, invoked a surreal abstraction to minimalist compositions.

From the early '50's until his death, Andrew Shunney and his life-partner Charles Maguire wintered in Palm Beach, where Shunney was represented by the Palm Beach Galleries. They summered on Nantucket, where he first kept a studio on Straight Wharf, and later joined his peers, Ralph Cahoon, Polly & Bobby Bushong, Roy Baily, Irmgard Arvin, Nathaniel Benchley, Elizabeth Saltonstall and Mary Sarg-Murphy, at George Vigouroux's Lobster Pot Gallery.  By 1971 Shunney had earned a one man exhibition at the Hammer Galleries in NYC. His was an uncompromising quest for his own artistic voice, a distinguished career; a relevant body of work. (more)

NOTE:  Each week, the biographical material on Nantucket Artists will be added to the AUCTION NEWS Archives  (link)

 

the Benefits  of Friends

 

"I do not wish to treat friendships daintily, but with the roughest courage. When they are real, they are not glass threads or frost-work, but the solidest thing we know."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson




Hospice Benefit at Galley Beach                photo by Gene Mahon

Charlene Thurston, Director of Hospice Care of Nantucket, with Gail & Rafael
during the auction/gala on June 14th.
A "solid" evening indeed!



We hope to see you at the preview Thursday and Friday, 10-5

Auction, Saturday, June 27th

9:30 A.M.

American Legion Hall
21 Washington St., Nantucket, MA


photo: Low beach Bougy

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Rafael & Gail Osona         photo by Cary Hazlegrove


AUCTION NEWS
is a publication of
Rafael Osona, Nantucket, MA
copyright 2009
all rights reserved

 produced by
Carolyn Walsh

www.NantucketAuctions.com
21 Washington Street, Nantucket, MA 02554   508-228-3942    [email protected]