Word: offing
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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"The whole scene is slightly crazy," said Leslie Waddington, a leading London dealer who attended the sales-and observed that few of the offerings were of premier quality. "It's public insanity."
No sale in years has come closer to craziness than Sotheby Parke Bernet's Auction 4290 in Manhattan on Oct. 25. It took only three minutes and 45 seconds to gavel down Frederic Edwin Church's The Icebergs for $2.5 million. That was the third highest bid ever...
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Sotheby Parke Bernet's 4290 was a landmark sale: the prices realized at the auction will serve as reference points for years to come. Thus in the hierarchy of cash a relatively obscure artist by world standards ranks, for now at least, above any Dutch old master, any English...
Nor are high prices limited to paintings. Earlier this year auctioneers gaveled record prices for a French snuffbox ($150,000), a Roman glass bowl ($1.9 million), an American weather vane ($25,000), a Louis XV marquetry cabinet ($1.8 million), a Fabergé hippopotamus cigarette lighter ($55,000), a book of...