1953 Rita Hayworth Still Life Oil Painting
GUEST: My father's brother was a private secretary to Rita Hayworth and Burt Lancaster. Between movies, there was a lot of spare time and so Rita Hayworth took up oil painting. Self-taught, of course. This was one, uh, that she gave to my uncle. It was done in 1933.
APPRAISER: It's a oil on canvas.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: It's a lovely still life with fruit. And she kind of signed it just with her initials...
GUEST: Initials.
APPRAISER: ... uh, lower right and dated it 1953. The date you thought might be 1933.
GUEST: Someone said that because the five and the three look a lot-- that she was just a very good... (chuckles) signer.
APPRAISER: Right, good point, good point. In 1933, Rita Hayworth would have been 15 years old. And she wasn't even on contract with the studio yet.
GUEST: Mm.
APPRAISER: It's unlikely that that was the case.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: '53 makes more sense because she was right in between, uh, movies and doing a lot at the time. It would have been a perfect time for her to be relaxing and painting.
GUEST: And that would be the same time with Burt Lancaster. Because they were the three of them.
APPRAISER: Correct, Burt Lancaster, Rita Hayworth, at that time, the '53 would have been the sweet spot for, for their film careers.
GUEST: Mm-hmm. Yes.
APPRAISER: And this person, if-if I hadn't known anything about it, I would say, fairly talented, probably an amateur weekend painter.
GUEST: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: But the fact that we know it's Rita Hayworth is pretty cool. (chuckles)
GUEST: Yeah. Yeah.
APPRAISER: So Rita Hayworth is actually one of my favorite, uh, actresses from the Golden Age of Hollywood.
GUEST: Mm.
APPRAISER: She was really started off as a dancer and then had contracts with some different studios in the early '30s. Had a memorable pinup photo taken of her by Life magazine in 1941, which was probably on 90% of the G.I.'s, uh, footlockers back in the day.
GUEST: Yeah. (chuckles) Right.
APPRAISER: And then a very memorable movie that did really well was Gilda. She had some difficulty with the studio later... late... in the late '40s. Took a bit of a break and then came back kind of in the early '50s and had a long and wonderful career. Because she was so memorable and because she has this Golden Age presence is why folks would be interested in this. Just like Frank Sinatra, Red Skelton, Winston Churchill, even George Bush, who-who took on painting. This kind of stress relief during their career or after their career. Honestly, she didn't do a lot of these. And she probably gave most of them to friends and family.
GUEST: She did.
APPRAISER: Because I couldn't find any really on the market. But clearly this wasn't a one-off. Conservatively at auction, it's something like $2,000 to $4,000.
GUEST: I see. Wow, well, that's more than we thought. (both laugh)
APPRAISER: You know, it's the power of celebrity.
GUEST: Yeah. More than I knew about it. I assumed she was probably a better actress than a painter. But that was...
APPRAISER: (laughs) Um, I think that's safe to say.
GUEST: (laughs)
$2,000 - $4,000 Auction
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Understanding Our Appraisals
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