Posted 8 years ago
SpiritBear
(813 items)
I saw two pastel portraits at a thrift store I frequent. I liked them, but not at 15 dollars each. I rarely spend $10 on any single item at a thrift store, let alone two.
As such, I passed them up. Later in the evening, they crossed my mind again. I decided to research 'antique pastel portrait' on e-Bay and clicked Sold Listings. I was surprised that pictures of dead, unrelated, often unidentified people sell for so much. It seems that, the more colour and background, the more the price-- not necessarily influenced by the quality of the work.
I'm also going to make another post of 'his wife', as I'm calling her. I picked up two of these. LOL. She has a tag with someone's modern, sloppy hand-writing saying who they are, plus the price tag the dealer put on them.
I opened them both up. The man is done on good-quality card-stock, while the woman is done on deteriorating canvas with damage. She had nothing marked on hers, but as you can see, he has a lot of markings.
Anything useful for identification or age? I'm thinking early 1900s?
For those who deal in these, I was wondering if enlisting the help of our college's art-students to touch up some damage would negatively impact value? I am sure they could match up the pastels.
As Pastel is basically a solid version of Oil Paint, I'm putting it in Paintings.
Not sure if photo two is broken on your side also, with the big line through it?
See his 'wife' here:
http://www.collectorsweekly.com/stories/220987-pastel-portrait-id-help