GUEST: So I acquired this poster at an estate sale in New Jersey about three years ago, and I got it for $175. I love the image of it. It reminds me of early Art Deco.
APPRAISER: You're a poster collector, right?
GUEST: I am, I got hooked on collecting Art Deco posters through the Keno brothers, actually.
APPRAISER: Wow, that's kind of unusual. That would be like somebody getting you hooked on furniture through me, but okay!
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: I guess that works. So what do you know about this image?
GUEST: I tried doing some research on it, and even looking up Brunelleschi-- I assume he's Italian-- and then other than... Trouville was a resort in France, I believe.
APPRAISER: That's exactly right. So Umberto Brunelleschi was a very famous graphic designer and artist. He was Italian-born, but he lived most of his life in France. He did incredible work for some of the most prominent and luxurious Art Deco fashion magazines of the era, including the "Gazette du Bon Ton," which is one of the most famous. He also designed costumes for two of the most famous theaters in Paris, the Folies Bergeres and the Casino de Paris, so he was really involved in fashion, he was really involved with the Art Deco movement, and his illustrations were wildly popular. Now, one thing about this poster that I find very interesting is that Trouville is a French seaside resort.
GUEST: Right.
APPRAISER: But this poster was printed in Italy. Why would a French resort use an Italian printer? And, to be honest, I don't know the exact answer for that, but it turns out that the Italian printing house did have an office in Paris, and I think that because Brunelleschi was such a famous Italian-born artist living in France, that the Italians hired him and used their French distributor for the poster. It's a little unusual, to be honest, but I find that very fascinating. Brunelleschi did not design that many posters. He's mostly known for his illustrations in magazines, for his book illustrations. You said you went online and you did research, and you couldn't find it, and I actually did further research, going through some special art and poster art databases, and I found out that this piece has actually come up at auction once before.
GUEST: Oh, it did, okay.
APPRAISER: In 1985. There are no pictures of it online, and in 1985, it sold for $440.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: And a lot has changed in that time. And the other thing about this I should say, there's no date on the poster.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: It's hard to say exactly, but other posters for beach resorts that had a similar look were done in 1925 or 1928.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: So I think this one would certainly fall within, certainly between 1925 and 1930. I think this is a superb Art Deco image, and I'm wondering if you have any ideas as to what you think this might be worth?
GUEST: I would probably pay $2,500 for it. That's my guess, that's the top I would pay for this.
APPRAISER: So you would probably pay $2,500, but you got it for $175.
GUEST: Correct.
APPRAISER: In my enthusiasm, in my poster-lust, I agree with you to an extent that it's probably a $2,500 poster.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: Except, the reality is, in the past, I have been very enthusiastic about works by Brunelleschi and put high estimates on them at auction, and they have always sold for less than I thought they would.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: In fact, the highest price that his work has ever brought at auction is $6,300, and that's for a piece about four times the size, for a fashion store in Paris, a completely different graphic.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: So, tempering my enthusiasm, I would think that at auction, a very realistic estimate on this piece would be between $1,200 and $1,800.
GUEST: Okay, very good -- very good. That's fair enough.
