Look what I found!

[The Night Owl]

Usually, the art I see at estate sales is garbage, but at the sale I was at today, a couple stunning portraits caught my attention. My photography does not capture the really exquisite brushwork...


Large image:img74.imageshack.us/img74/825/dudemy8.jpg

Large image:img74.imageshack.us/img74/3572/ladyyx1.jpg

One of the paintings is signed JH Witt 75. I'm assuming that the paintings are from 1875.


Large image:img74.imageshack.us/img74/9918/jhwittyh5.jpg

I would appreciate any information anyone has about this JH Witt.

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

1. john henry witt, maybe?

http://www.askart.com/AskART/artists/search/Search_Repeat.aspx?searchtype=IMAGES&artist=22991

[The Night Owl]

2. Wow! I think we have a match.

The signature on one of those works by John Henry Witt looks like the signature on one of the paintings I have. And, the time period seems about right.

Thanks!

[grasswire]

3. here's my uneducated opinion

The signature on your painting doesn't appear to be John Henry Witt, as shown in the painting below.

http://www.artnet.com/artists/lotdetailpage.aspx?lot_id=E48C3457E30565C805CB27931AEBEFA7


That said, I think you have a pretty good find, depending on what you paid for them.

Antiques Roadshow will be in Hartford in August.

[The Night Owl]

4. I don't know. Both signatures have a "W" which flares upward on the right but...

...I can't make heads or tails of the rest of the signature seen in the image on the Artnet site... the resolution is too low. I'll have to try to find more signature examples.

Anyway, I would be surprised if there were two portrait artists from the late 1800s named JH Witt. I mean, what are the odds?

[grasswire]

6. maybe someone is a subscriber to artnet here

You could find seven of his works and their value by subscribing.

I am ever the skeptic -- I have found it's better to be less optimistic in the beginning than to be disappointed.

Unless we were able to see similar works by your artist to the one that we KNOW is John Henry Witt -- bright, romantic outdoor scene that isn't a portrait of a named person -- we can't really even guess if your artist is John Henry Witt.

Thanks for bringing this puzzle to us. We all like to dig for answers.

[The Night Owl]

12. Yep. Even if the portraits turn out to be from an unknown artist, they are still...

...quite stunning and obviously the work of a talented and highly trained individual.

[Vinca]

5. You better sit down.

I have a 1999/2000 copy of Davenport's Art Reference & Price Guide. I think your paintings were done by John Henry Witt, 1840 - 1901 of New York. He did portraits of prominent people among other things. The price given for a 24 x 20 portrait back then was $3,575. Here's a gallery looking for his work - http://www.askart.com/askart/artists/search/inquiry_dealerwanted.aspx?ad=72639&searchtype=ART_WANTED&artist=22991

Congratulations!:party:

On edit: OOPS - looks like other people beat me to it.

[grasswire]

7. Witt's titles that sold recently at auction

Woman with a Fan

The Ohio River

Woman Crossing a Stream

The Naughty Puppy

Woman with Yellow Roses

Interior Landscape

A Portrait of a Young Girl Sketching

[grasswire]

8. another question

Are you sure these are oil paintings and not hand-colored photos?

Witt worked for a time to hand-color portraits taken by his brother, the photographer Michael Witt.

[The Night Owl]

13. The works are definitely oil paintings. If I hadn't cropped the one image, you would...

...be able to see that the paint is flaking off a bit near the bottom. Also, for whatever it is worth, the estate sale had them marked as oil paintings.

[grasswire]

9. the naughty puppy

[grasswire]

10. a post on a message board -- more confusion!

John Henry Harrison Witt

I have a portrait signed J. Witt, done in Ohio in 1865. It is of my great great grandmother Francis Mather, a descendant of Increase Mather of Massachusetts.
On the back is the artists name as follows: J. Henri Witt 1865

Could this be John Henry Harrison Witt, and if so, does anyone out there know more about him and how I might figure out if the paintings I have were done by the same artist? I am a portrait artist living in Denver, and in my opinion (as an artist) this is not your usual ho-hum portrait, which leads me to believe this could be the John Henry Harrison Witt that is listed on your website.

Thanks,

Tom Stimson

PS. My cousin in Golden, Colorado has a portrait of her husband by the same J. Henri Witt

[grasswire]

11. dealer in massachusetts

According to artnet, here's a dealer for Witt's work:

P.O. Box 1521
Newburyport, MA 01950
978-465-0494
[e-mail]
www.clarkegallery.com

[grasswire]

14. how big are they? (eom)

[The Night Owl]

15. I don't have the paintings with me right now, but I think they were both about...

...18"x16".

[grasswire]

17. did you buy them?

Or were you looking for research prior to purchase?

[The Night Owl]

18. I bought the paintings after only a few minutes of inspection for fear of someone else...

...getting them.

Anyway, I'm just about to head back to the sale. I'm going to see if I can find some information about the subjects in the paintings from the person running the sale.

[Duer 157099]

16. Wooooooooooooooow!!

You scored BIG!! :thumbsup: :applause:

(edit to add - ok, now I've read the whole thread - and it looks like a good mystery with clues out there, it's so fun to have at least some clues to work from)

Whichever Witt it turns out to be, still a great score imho

[The Night Owl]

19. Perhaps the subjects of the portraits were members of...

...the Bohemian Club.

B-)

[Duer 157099]

20. heheh, spoken like a true "Owl"

Hey you just never know right? Let us know what you learned from your return trip.

I've only been to a couple actual estate sales, so many people advertise what is essentially a garage sale as estate sales these days.

[The Night Owl]

23. At the sale, I found out that the last name of the subjects depicted was...

...Renton. The man depicted was a builder of some kind. I was told that he built the very house where the sale took place.

Another interesting fact...

Searching around on the Internet, I found out that J.H. Whitt patented a technique for stretching canvases...

http://www.google.com/patents?id=zlNrAAAAEBAJ
http://americanhistory.si.edu/about/pubs/harris3.pdf

Looking on the backs of my paintings, I can see that a wedging system is employed, but it doesn't look exactly like what is depicted in Witt's patent diagram. Of course, because the paintings are small, a complicated system like the one Witt patented probably wasn't needed.

So, I'm still hoping that Witt is Witt, but I haven't found anything to confirm that. Oh well... at least I'm having fun playing art detective.

[Vinca]

21. You haven't told us what you paid for them and I'm dying to know! nt

[The Night Owl]

22. Oops! You're right.

Each painting cost me $150, which I thought was a good price considering how refined they are.

[Vinca]

24. Wow - that is a good buy. Lucky you grabbed them when you did. nt