International Fine Arts Auction 2018-05-20
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 5/19/2018
EXTENSIVE COLLECTION OF NATURAL HISTORY SPECIMENS
This is a fine and varied cabinet collection of almost 300 mineral specimens, assembled over more than 30 years by an American connoisseur, and most with their original notated dealer's label. Almost all of the pieces are easily small enough to fit in the palm of the hand, but each is of high quality and, taken together, they make for a highly aesthetic and impressive survey of minerals from around the world, from Tasmania to Norway, the United States to Russia, the Orinduik Falls of Guyana to Durham in northern England. The collection includes numerous quartz specimens of various types, most of bijou size, from Japan twins to beta quartz, dark smoky quartz, in colors form clear to red to green, and several examples with fantastic inclusions. Then there are spessartine garnets, boulder opal cabochons, Herkimer diamonds peeping from their rocky matrix; a large (almost 10" tall) and dramatic Chrysanthemum stone from China; a rainbow obsidian with a perfect heart in its patterning; an exquisite tiny trapiche from Columbia; a quartz and marcasite matrix from Honshu Island, bright orange, blade-like crystals of wulfenite in shimmering druzy calcite, rubies, topaz, sapphires, natural copper, crystalline gold, and countless others.
Among the most interesting and attractive is a quartz specimen of exceptional clarity, partitioned internally by a thin horizontal layer of rock. Below this bisection, the quartz is water white and clear, but above it has taken on a rich smoky hue, and is filled with masses of golden needle-like rutiles. Then there is a vivid golden shard-like calcite crystal on a bed of silvery sphalerite, typical of the famed Elmwood Mine in Tennessee. Even the more commonplace specimens impress on an aesthetic level, such as a small desert rose, comprising four roundels in a square, each of attractively uniform size and patterning.
In addition to the minerals, the collection includes specimens of petrified wood, a fossil palm slice, coprolites, a fossil crab from Italy, and some specimens of Baltic amber, one of which contains a large cricket, frozen for all eternity in its golden prison. This last specimen is amongst the few larger pieces of the collection, measuring 8 3/8 inches long, but most of the pieces measure less than 4 inches, a first-rate cabinet collection in terms of quality and variety.
NOTE: A comprehensive inventory list, as well as images of individual pieces, will be available upon request.
$5,000 - 7,000\n