Page 237 |
Previous | 7 of 132 | Next |
|
small (250x250 max)
medium (500x500 max)
large ( > 500x500)
Full Resolution
|
This page
All
Subset |
Loading content ...
Odyssey to an Authentication:
A George Caleb Bingham Colorado Landscape
BY NELSON A. RIEGER
Editors' Introduction
The State Historical Society of Missouri is pleased to have the
opportunity to be the initial exhibitor of an important landscape
painting by Missouri's most famous nineteenth-century artist, George
Caleb Bingham. The owner of the painting, Nelson A. Rieger, has
written this account of his research to identify the artist. Because of
space limitations, the following article is an abridged version of the
original manuscript. The editorial staff has made only a few grammatical changes in the narrative, trying not to alter the flavor of the
original composition. Research material, mentioned in the article, is in
the possession of the author. Mr. Rieger, a former banker and college
professor of management, currently manages his own Enterprise Investment Company. In addition to his art interests and community
service commitments, he is an avid hiker with his Labradors and a world
traveler.
Maybe this all began . . . when I was a teenager . . . back at the
close of World War II. . . . My mother, an antique collector encouraged
by my father to indulge in her compulsive collecting, opened an antique
shop to sell off lesser pieces as her collecting led her to finer, more
desired pieces. Through an increased allowance, I was soon enlisted to
help. I hitched a little one-wheeled trailer to her car early each Saturday
morning and drove through the southwestern Ohio countryside to the
farm auctions. There she would buy enthusiastically, and I would be
instructed to carefully load her precious "prizes" for the drive back
home. Some would be for her burgeoning household collection and
many more for her growing antique shop inventory.
Many years later, when I settled in Colorado Springs, it seemed
quite natural to visit the region's well-known Ross Auction House and
peruse its weekly sales, including numerous estate collections containing
antiques from all periods and, frequently, early regional oil paintings
and watercolors.
October 30, 1978—one hundred years after George Caleb Bingham
and his new bride, Mattie, sold a large Pikes Peak painting to a buyer
in Kansas City—I attended the weekly Ross Auction. This particular
237
Object Description
| Title | Missouri Historical Review, Volume 85 Issue 3, April 1991 |
| Volume | 85 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Month | April |
| Year | 1991 |
| Publisher | The State Historical Society of Missouri |
| Publisher-Electronic | The State Historical Society of Missouri |
| Rights | Copyright The State Historical Society of Missouri, 2008 |
| ISSN | 0026-6581 |