Lot 27
ALFRED JOSEPH CASSON, O.S.A., P.R.C.A.
Additional Images
Provenance:
Estate of Lurena S. Button
Roberts Gallery Limited, Toronto
Simpsons-Sears Limited
Private Collection, Missouri (by descent)
Note:
In the early 1960s, Sears, Roebuck and Co. and its Canadian counterpart Simpsons-Sears Limited set out to make fine art readily available to the general public. Heading up the initiative was famed celebrity Vincent Price – who, unbeknownst to most, studied art at prestigious academic institutions including Yale University and the University of London. Mr. Price was given authority by the company to acquire works of good quality – both by purchase and commission – that would then be placed on offer to patrons of the store. The first exhibit and sale of “The Vincent Price Collection of Fine Art” took place on October 6, 1962 in a Sears store in Denver, Colorado. Visitors to the sale were invited and able to purchase original works by contemporary artists and old masters including Rembrandt and Whistler. By the time the American program ended in 1971, more than 50,000 works of art had been ushered into homes by way of the program.
This painting was gifted to the owner’s father-in-law, James Wilson Button Senior, former President of Simpsons-Sears Limited, directly from Vincent Price himself in commemoration of the initiative.