NEW YORK, NY.- On May 16, 2014 Shapiro Auctions will hold a two session auction, featuring Russian Fine and Decorative Art at 10am, and American and European Art at 2pm. The sale will present a diverse selection of works by masters celebrated on the world stage from antiquity to the present.

The Russian Fine & Decorative Art portion of the auction will feature a number of rare icons, including a large early 17th century icon of Saint Nikolai Mozhaisky brought over to the United States in late 1920s during a critical time, just as ancient churches and monasteries were being taken over by the government and converted to Anti-Religious museums (lot 8, est: $22,000-27,000). Icons brought over by the two sisters, Adelaide and Helen Hooker were kept in esteemed family collections, including that of Blanchette Ferry Hooker Rockefeller, a major benefactor of the Museum of Modern Art, where she served as president from 1972 to 1985, and John D. Rockefeller III.

The fine art portion of the Russian sale will likewise feature important pieces by modern Russian masters, including three works by Isaak Levitan, and a spectacular painting, The Dreamers of Ortachala by the Georgian master, Lado Gudiashvili (lot 47, est. $100,000-150,000). The auction will also include multiple works by Pavel Filonov, among them a large work on canvas, completed during his student years, circa 1905 (lot 49, est: $100,000-150,000).

A pair of exceptionally rare monumental ormolu-mounted cut crystal vases created by the Imperial Glass Factory in the 1820s, probably for members of the Russian Imperial Court for the Easter or Christmas holidays will be featured in the auction, as well (lot 193A, est: $80,000-100,000).

The American and European portion of the auction, which starts with lot 500 at 2pm, will feature multiple works by members of the Hudson River School, including paintings by such artists as Jasper Francis Cropsey, and Joseph Morviller who epitomized the region’s magnificent forested mountains in his Autumnal Sunrise (lot 536, est. $10,000-15,000). An early work by the master painter of the American West, Albert Bierstadt, depicting a grouping of graceful ungulates grazing in the Swiss Alps, Chamoix (lot 520, est. $20,000-30,000), will also be among the offerings.

The European vein of the landscape tradition, as represented by the French Impressionists will be in the auction, as well, with a delicate watercolor of the Fontainebleau Forest by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (lot 523, est. $15,000-20,000). Another luminary of the Impressionist movement, Camille Pissarro, will be represented in the auction with a gouache and pastel composition Travailleurs des champs, Pontoise (lot 524, est. $700,000-900,000) depicting peasants working in a field; created during a critical period for the artist, the work was executes as Pissarro was transitioning from landscape to figure painting.

Shapiro Auctions will showcase further explorations of the figure, as represented in the work of Giovanni Boldini, Europe’s most in-demand portraitist at the dawn of the 20th century. Renowned for his luscious portraits of society women, his 1871 painting of a woman in a tricorn has undeniable presence (lot 529, est. $60,000-70,000) masterfully captured and highlighted by the artist. The American realist painter Richard Maury, too, elevates the everyday, as exemplified in his interior-set portrait, Elena (lot 559, est. $15,000-20,000), filled with captivating domestic details and soft light.

Not to be missed are the three colorful, sun-drenched paintings by Nicola Simbari, including The Wall (lot 607, est. $7,000-9,000), and the stark 1962 abstract composition by Al Held, AF 7 (lot 617, est. $8,000-12,000).

The full selection will be on view at the Shapiro Auctions in New York, at 506 East 74th Street, during the week-long preview from Saturday May 9th to May 15th, 10am-6pm, as well as by appointment. A full catalogue of is now available on www.shapiroauctions.com.