NEW YORK, NY.- On October 16, Rago and Toomey & Co. present The Goldstein Family Collection, an exceptional range of important and rare Arts & Crafts furniture, lighting, and decorative objects, in tandem with complementary fine art. Emphasizing the movement's distinctive expression in Southern California, this collection assembled over four decades features masterworks by Greene & Greene, Dirk van Erp, Elizabeth Eaton Burton, Arthur and Lucia Mathews, Gustav Stickley, Tiffany Studios, Grueby Faience Company, Frederick Hurten Rhead, Albert R. Valentien, C.F.A. Voysey, Gustave Baumann, and several others.
The preeminent highlight is a dramatic, circa-1904 Greene & Greene pairing consisting of a library table and lamp from the Adelaide Tichenor House in Long Beach (est. $100,000–150,000). Other standout lots include a spectacular early Dirk van Erp and Eleanor Elizabeth D'Arcy Gaw table lamp (est. $70,000–90,000), a foliage-motif decorative writing table by Arthur and Lucia Mathews (est. $30,000–40,000), Gustav Stickely's rare early work cabinet (est. $15,000–20,000), lighting examples by Elizabeth Eaton Burton, and color woodcut prints depicting California locales by Gustave Baumann.
For collector Scott Goldstein, the appeal of California Arts & Crafts lay in its poetic response to the Pacific landscape, contrasting the disciplined geometry and functional simplicity of Japanese-influenced woodworking with the warmth of Western sunlight, native flora, and manually fashioned copper. Rather than being preserved in storage or display cases, the collection became an integral part of the Goldstein family's Los Angeles home, a 1912 Craftsman bungalow once inhabited by actor Will Rogers.
"If the artists could have witnessed this decades-long integrated environment," asserts Goldstein, as he anticipates a new generation of caretakers picking up the torch, "I believe they would all be pleased. These objects were, in a sense, active 'participants,' present for the changing seasons and a home built around that California ethos and the human hand."
Selections from The Goldstein Family Collection is on view from October 2 through 15 at Rago Wright's New York gallery space at 501 West 20th Street, weekdays from 11 am to 5 pm. The Goldstein Family Collection is a live auction in Lambertville, New Jersey, beginning at 11 am eastern on Friday, October 16. The auction accommodates advanced bids, telephone bidding, and in-person and live-online bidding.
