Francis Cadell was one of the four Scottish Colourists, a painter of Edinburgh interiors, Iona shorelines and poised women in black hats. When art teacher Helene Plotkin spotted an eyecatching canvas in White Plains, New York, in 1966, she didn't realize how far her $100 had gone. The signature was illegible and the label called it Portrait of Miss Don Wauchope. She hung it in the living room, where it survived decades of indoor football from her sons. But though Cadell died broke in 1937, by the 21st century, the art market had found his value.
Last year her son Barry decided to research it. AI helped decipher the signature, the BBC reports, and specialists at Lyon & Turnbull confirmed the work as Cadell's, identifying the sitter as May Easter, a favorite model. Retitled as Interior: The Lady in Black, it was painted in the 1920s at Cadell's Ainslie Place studio. It sold Thursday for £189,200, including premium. Plotkin, now 88, lives in Florida.
The best part of the story is that the $100 was a solid markup: Christie's had sold the same painting in London for just £21 (then worth about $60) months before Plotkin found it in Westchester, writes Lucinda Cameron.
[Lyon & Turnbull specialist Alice] Strang added: "How the painting ended up in a charity shop in New York so soon afterwards is a mystery but we are, as you can imagine, thrilled that this terrific Scottish Colourist work has returned to the city in which it was painted some 100 years later."
Now back in the city where it was painted, Interior: The Lady in Black's story is also that of the Colourists' themselves: works Cadell couldn't sell in his lifetime now routinely clear six figures. Pink and Gold fetched £250,200 in 2023, according to the Herald.
Painting bought for $100 in US charity shop sells for £190,000
Previously:
• Unopened copy of 1987 Nintendo game should fetch $10000 at auction
• Frank Frazetta's iconic Conan painting heads to auction
• Fabergé egg expected to fetch £20 million at auction
