One had to squint in reading the tiny caption beneath the watercolor drawing by the great English painter Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) illustrated on page 149 of a Christie’s catalogue in mid-April of this year. The tantalizing caption read: “actual size.” But was this true?
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Sales at the old and venerable auction houses of Sotheby’s and Christie’s are often a sort of eulogy, celebrating the life and times of a prominent individual as glimpsed through an art collection. The marketing and promotional rumblings that attend such sales, especially if involving a very famous name, can be noisy and theatrical. And the public exhibition has to be dramatic and dazzling. After all, the auction house is mounting a major production, with special lighting and design of the sort one might associate with a Broadway show.