LOS ANGELES, CA.- Bonhams & Butterfields’ December California and American Paintings & Sculpture Auction set more than 20 auction records during the Winter Sale in December 2004. In total, the sale generated nearly $5.3 million, confirming the auction house’s position as a leader in sales of Californian and American art.

Commenting on the auction, Vice President and Fine Arts Department Director, Scott Levitt said, “the true significance of this auction is not in the quantity of sales, which at $5,289,000 is noteworthy, but in the individual quality of the works sold. The winter auction included uniquely American artwork of great historical significance and considerable artistic beauty.” Bonhams & Butterfields has played the leading role in establishing and developing the market for California paintings. This market has become nationally recognized and continues to be a strong collecting category.

Two records were set in the L.A. saleroom for paintings created by “The Society of Six.” This was a group of Northern California artists who joined together in 1917 in a social and artistic exchange to create a uniquely American interpretation of European Modernism. Their work was characterized by vivid colors, semi-representational forms and echoes of Impressionism with a distinctly American accent. Still Water Cove, Monterey, painted by August Gay in 1929, set a world record for his work and sold for $76,000, well above its estimated value of $20,000 - 30,000. The 1929 oil had been exhibited at the Monterey Peninsula Museum of Art.

White Houses, Danville, 1920, painted by Louis Siegriest was estimated at $40,000 - 60,000 and also sold for $76,000, the highest dollar amount ever paid at auction for a painting by the artist. Siegriest was the youngest member of the “The Society of Six” and the last to pass away. White Houses, Danville, was painted when he was only 21-years old, and shows clear suggestions of Impressionism fused with more modern, semi-abstract forms. The painting is significant not only for its beauty but as a signature work in a pivotal period in California Modernist art.

Bonhams & Butterfields generated strong sales for more traditional American art as well. The Olden Times, Morning, painted by Jasper Francis Cropsey, sold for $270,250, well above estimate, and the auction’s top lot. Painted in 1859, the work depicts an imagined landscape from Medieval Europe. Scot Levitt called the painting an “interesting and unusual work. Whereas many American painters used European forms to depict American scenes, Olden Times, Morning, uses a style that is very American, to depict a scene that is both European and imaginary.”