FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Josh Chait
310.285.0182
josh@chait.com

Dinosaurs Find New Homes and Flee Beverly Hills!

View Sale

Beverly Hills, May 21, 2006 - IM Chait Gallery/Auctioneers had one of their most successful auctions ever; selling 258 lots of dinosauria, gems, minerals, meteorites, Natural History and even an authentic Egyptian mummy head to dealers, collectors, novices & museums from all over the world. The sale booked over $1,000,000.00 in total revenues!

Attended by over 100 people in the room, nearly 300 people bidding live-on-line and another approximately 100 by absentee and telephone bidding, there was a fevered pitch all afternoon.

Lot #35, a large museum mural entitled “Life in the Eocene” recovered from the American Museum of Natural History in New York City; where it was displayed for 25 years, sold to a local collector for $10,800.

Lot 35 sold for $10,800

The room started buzzing when the first of the gold nuggets lot 69, was sold. A Northern Australian example, weighing 39 troy ounces sold for $36,000.

Lot 69 sold for $36,000

The rarest of the gems offered that day were from Minas Gerais, Brazil. Lot #96 the blue Indicolite Tourmaline sold for $45,000, five times its high estimate. Lot #97 the green Tourmaline crystal, better know as “The Emerald City” sold for $57,000, nearly double its high estimate.

Lot 97 sold for $57,000

Lot #202, one highlight of the auction, was an authentic Egyptian mummy head with very strong Provenance, selling at $30,000 to a local collector.

Lot 202 sold for $30,000

Everyone in the audience though, was waiting to get to the fossils. Beginning with lot #218, an 8’ high Cave Bear skeleton (the largest ever offered at public auction), hammering down to a bidder on the telephone at $28,800 against the room. Shortly after, lot #223 a Wooly Mammoth tusk, 7 ˝’ long, sold to a buyer in the room for also $28,800.

Lot 218 sold for $28,800

Lot #225 was arguably one of the most extraordinary objects in the sale. An extremely rare “pregnant” Icthyosaur, which looked remarkably similar to a modern day Dolphin. This virtually complete 190 million year old aquatic reptile had been pregnant and one could see the bones of the unborn fetus on the interior. Selling at $120,000, some considered that price a bargain due to the rarity and investment value

Lot 225 sold for $120,000

One of the most important fossils in the auction was the cover piece lot 251, an extremely rare Protoceratops skull from Central Asia from the Late Cretaceous Era. This dinosaur was an ancestor of the Triceratops and came from the estate of a well know Texas Collector. It sold for $144,000, nearly three times its high estimate, to a collector in the room. The bidding was fierce with a private collector & two museums on the telephone getting outbid by the local collector!

Lot 251 sold for $144,000

IM Chait once again brings to life and to the general public, glimpses and treasures from the past which can be owned in the here and now. Public interest in this auction had been extremely high with several local and national television stations doing feature spots running for several days prior to the auction, making the IM Chait Gallery/Auctioneers not only the Premier Auction House in Beverly Hills, but once again setting new records for Natural History.

Last year IM Chait sold one of the most important and well-preserved specimens in recorded history of “the Great American Fossil” an extremely rare saber-toothed tiger skull from the La Brea Formation sold at auction (Sunday, May 22, 2005) for an astounding $282,000.00. This lofty price tag is second only to the 1997 sale at auction of Sue, the 60 million year-old fossil of a Tyrannosaurus Rex which sold for 8.3 million dollars.

I.M. Chait Gallery/Auctioneers is located at:
9330 Civic Center Drive
Beverly Hills, CA 90210.

For more information please contact (310) 285-0182 or visit www.chait.com