Jaune Quick-to-See Smith Monotype, ca. 1970
GUEST: My parents bought this, I believe, in the early '80s from a gallery. Uh, it was either down on Larimer Square here in Denver or in Santa Fe, I'm not sure which. And it's been hanging in place of pride in our living room ever since, um, the house I grew up in. It's been a constant presence in my life, you know, as a child. And it's just such a beautiful piece of work, and we're just really very happy. Mom had a great eye for art.
APPRAISER: Her name is Jaune Quick-to-See Smith. She was born in the 1940s in Montana.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: She's a Native artist of French Cree, Shoshone, and Salish blood. So you mentioned this is, was purchased by your parents. Do you remember how much they paid for it?
GUEST: I don't know, and my father doesn't either, unfortunately, so...
APPRAISER: (chuckling) Okay.
GUEST: He just said it was, you know, they, they spent some money, but.
APPRAISER: It's an original artwork.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: It's a print...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...but it's a monotype print…
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: ...which is a-a process that you take a painted surface and lay it down on paper.
GUEST: All right.
APPRAISER: And then if you do it a second time, you get sort of a more ghostly image. And this is a ghost image.
GUEST: Hm. Okay. All right.
APPRAISER: So this is the second time they've applied the wet paint to the paper...
GUEST: All right. Okay.
APPRAISER: ...and then pulled it away. And then she accentuated it. You can see paint applied in the dotted areas.
GUEST: Okay, yeah.
APPRAISER: And then other details. It's a double, uh, matted frame...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...so I really can't tell what kind of paper it's on.
GUEST: All right.
APPRAISER: But it could be in a-a really important, um, archival type of paper...
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: ...for this type of thing.
GUEST: Sure.
APPRAISER: And she signed it in pencil at the bottom. It's a very early work by her.
GUEST: Mm-hmm. Roughly ten years ago, um, she had, oh, I think, a workshop and an exhibition in the Loveland, Colorado Museum.
APPRAISER: Uh-huh.
GUEST: And she was there, and so my parents, Dad took a picture on his phone or his iPad and took it down with mom, and they met her. And they--
APPRAISER: That must have been exciting.
GUEST: Yeah. They-they were just so thrilled afterwards. But they said she just lit up, and she was so thrilled. She said, "That's really an early, early one of mine." She goes, "That's one of my first." And she was very pleased to see it, so.
APPRAISER: Yeah, it's probably from the 1970s. This is typical of the manner she works in.
GUEST: Mm-hmm
APPRAISER: She's an extraordinary artist...
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: ...that is now getting major recognition.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: Although this is original work of art, it's still considered a-a print. If this was come to market today, it would sell for between $30,000 and $60,000.
GUEST: Oh, wow. Okay. All right.
APPRAISER: Her pa-- her paintings have done, have jumped. They've gone into the six figures.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
$30,000 - $60,000 Auction
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