Famous Artist’s Painting Bought for $50 Expected to Fetch Fortune
A thrifted painting purchased for just $50 turned out to be the long-lost work of a famous artist, and it’s now expected to fetch an eye-popping sum at auction, CTV News reported.
Allen Treibitz, an art dealer based in New York City, picked up the curious artwork at a barn sale. The picture depicts an oversized wooden bear atop a totem pole. In the corner is the signature of noted Canadian writer and painter Emily Carr, whose work was comparable to John Muir and Henry David Thoreau.
Although Treibitz was unaware of Carr’s reputation, he thought the portrait was “extraordinary” and snapped it up for a cool $50. “It stood out from everything else in that barn,” he recalled.
After examining the painting in more detail, Treibitz felt it might be worth much more than what he paid. He contacted Canada’s Heffel Fine Art Auction House, which confirmed his suspicions. “We were provided photos and there was no doubt in my mind that this was an exciting Cinderella discovery,” said David Heffel, the auction house’s president.
The painting will be auctioned off on Nov. 20 and is expected to fetch somewhere between $100,000 and $200,000, which will be quite a profit for Treibitz.
Heffel Fine Art Auction House
Carr painted the portrait, entitled “Masset, Q.C.I.,” in 1912 as part of her ongoing efforts to document the artistic history of British Columbia’s First Nation communities. The totem pole depicted is an Indigenous memorial post that once stood in the village of Masset. Experts believe that Carr gifted the painting to a close friend at some point in the 1930s, who hung it in the family’s barn where it remained until Treibitz bought it.
"Unfortunately, because of her modern Parisian post-Impressionist style, [the painting] was not well received locally," explained Gerta Moray, an art history professor at Ontario’s University of Guelph. "She could not then find a destination for it, either with the provincial museum or getting any number of public purchases."
Although its artistic merit may have eluded people at the time, Treibitz believes it’s one of the most striking items he’s seen in his career. “I see a lot of very interesting things, [but] this one is…the most significant thing I've ever found,” he marveled. “The fact that it was found and that it is back to its home place is very important."