Helen Torr Paintings & Artwork for Sale | Helen Torr Art Value Price Guide

May. 17, 2022
HELEN TORR (1886-1967) Imagined oil on canvas 26 1/4 x 20 1/4 in. (66.7 x 5
Est: $70,000 - $100,000
HELEN TORR (1886-1967) Imagined oil on canvas 26 1/4 x 20 1/4 in. (66.7 x 51.4 cm.)
Christie's
Nov. 28, 2012
Helen Torr (1886-1967)
Est: $50,000 - $70,000
Helen Torr (1886-1967) Calla Lily signed 'Torr' (lower right) gouache on board 20½ x 17 in. (54.6 x 43.2 cm.)
Christie's
Apr. 05, 2012
HELEN TORR
Est: $10,000 - $15,000
1886 - 1967 WHITE PLANT signed Helen Torr, stamped with the artist's estate stamp, titled White Plant and dated 1930 on an old label affixed to the backing oil on canvas 20 by 8 in. 50.8 by 20 cm.
Sotheby's
Jan. 24, 2012
Helen Torr 1886-1967 (American) Floral study with
Est: €1,500 - €3,000
Helen Torr 1886-1967 (American) Floral study with doves watercolor and gouache on paper 40 x 30 cm (16 x 12 in.) signed lower right Provenance: Private collection, Miami Beach, Florida Sale: Bonhams...
Millon & Associes
Jan. 24, 2012
Helen Torr 1886-1967 (American) Floral study with doves watercolor and gouache on paper
Est: €1,500 - €3,000
Helen Torr 1886-1967 (American) Floral study with doves watercolor and gouache on paper h:40 w: 30 cm. signed lower right Provenance: Private Collection, Miami Beach, Florida Sale: Bonhams & Butterfields, April 10, 2006, lot 1082. Sale: Doyle New York, November 8, 2006, lot 109. Private collection, Israel.
Matsart Auctioneers & Appraisers
Sep. 28, 2010
Helen Torr (1886-1967)
Est: $15,000 - $25,000
Helen Torr (1886-1967) Veneer and Grapes oil on board 27 x 19 in. (68.6 x 48.3 cm.) Painted in 1930-31.
Christie's
Dec. 03, 2009
HELEN TORR 1886 - 1967
Est: $20,000 - $30,000
DEAD LEAVES AND LETTER (1819) stamped Torr: Estate of Helen Torr, l.r.
Sotheby's
May. 19, 2009
Helen Torr American, 1886-1967 Shell, Stone, Feather and Bark, 1931
Est: $15,000 - $20,000
Helen Torr American, 1886-1967 Shell, Stone, Feather and Bark, 1931 Oil on board laid down on board 10 x 14 inches Provenance: Estate of the Artist Private collection, New York Exhibited: Helen Torr, Heckscher Museum, Huntington, New York, June 3-July 9 1972 and Graham Gallery, New York, July 17-August 18 972, no.18 Helen Torr 1886-1967 (In private Life, Mrs. Arthur Dove), Graham Gallery, New York, March 25-May 17, 1980, no.17 American Modernism, Graham Gallery, New York, Sep. 18-Oct. 20, 1984 Parrish Art Museum, Curator's Choice, Sep. 29-Nov. 10, 1985 Women of the Stieglitz Circle, Owings-Dewey Fine Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico, June 27-August 15, 1998 Out of the Shadows: Helen Torr, A Retrospective, traveling exhibition, Heckscher Museum of Art, Huntington, New York, February 1-April 14, 2003; Graham Gallery, New York, April 24-June 8, 2003; The Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, June 28-August 17, 2003; The Mitchell Gallery, St. John's College, Annapolis, Maryland, September 2-October 26, 2003 Every Day Mysteries: Modern and Contemporary Still Life, DC Moore Gallery, New York, March 18-May 1, 2004 Helen Torr's surviving oeuvre spans a relatively brief period of no more than twenty years. Despite a solid grounding in art at Drexel Institute and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, she did not seem to have worked actively until she and Arthur Dove left their unhappy marriages to begin a life together, living in challenging and often uncomfortable circumstances. Her earliest work does not appear to have survived. Torr's earliest extant paintings date from around 1923-4, a period roughly coincident with the earliest diary notations made by either Dove or Torr in an account book. She worked more or less actively until 1938, when her husband became seriously ill in Centerport, Long Island, suffering from heart disease as well as a debilitating kidney condition. From that point, she became less productive, predominantly creating modest compositions on paper. She is thought to have ceased working as an artist after Dove's death in 1946. An estate inventory of her oeuvre, compiled by Ronald G. Pisano, numbers fewer than 230 objects; of which the present work is number 154. Shell, Stone, Feather and Bark was created when Torr was working more or less continually, when the artists were living in Halesite, Long Island and dividing their time between their 42-foot yawl, the Mona, and the Ketewomoke Yacht Club, where they occupied the top floor in exchange for providing caretaking services. Some of Torr's most compelling paintings of Huntington Harbor and Halesite date from this period. Known familiarly as Reds, Torr painted many still lifes, incorporating shells, leaves and flowers as well as matchbooks, scraps of fabric, letters and other articles that were at hand. Through the winter and spring of 1931, she focused primarily on still life subjects. The usually reticent painter was delighted when Alfred Maurer visited the artist-couple in July and called one work "exquisite." Although she devoted much of the summer to seascapes, in October she returned again to still life, noting on October 29, "I started painting of piece of bark, shell, stone + feather." [Arthur and Helen Torr Dove papers, 1905-1975. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution]. She completed the piece two days later. Executed in a cool, elegant palette, the present work incorporates objects of the sort that Reds typically collected in walks around the community. Here her collection is displayed in a shallow, indeterminate space, the objects themselves casting strong shadows as though illuminated by a bright source of light. It is clear that Torr reveled in delineating the twists and turns of the section of bark that dominates the composition.
DOYLE Auctioneers & Appraisers
Dec. 04, 2008
Helen Torr (1886-1967)
Est: $15,000 - $25,000
Helen Torr (1886-1967) Zinnias bears the artist's estate stamp and inscribed '#138' (on the reverse) gouache and pencil on paper 11 x 8½ in. (27.9 x 21.6 cm.)
Christie's
Nov. 29, 2006
HELEN TORR 1886-1967
Est: $40,000 - $60,000
MELODRAMA (THUNDERSTORM) measurements 20 by 26 in. alternate measurements (50.8 by 66 cm) oil on canvas Painted in 1931. PROVENANCE Estate of the artist James Graham & Sons, New York Private Collection Kraushaar Galleries, New York Vivian O. and Meyer P. Potamkin, 1999 (acquired from the above) By descent to the present owner EXHIBITED New York, An American Place, Arthur Dove and Helen Torr, 1933 Huntington, New York, Hecksher Museum of Art; New York, James Graham & Sons, Helen Torr, June-July 1972, 1972, no. 22 New York, James Graham and Sons, Helen Torr, In Private Life, Mrs. Arthur Dove, March-May 1980, no. 16 Southampton, New York, Parrish Art Museum, An American Place, May-July 1981 Southampton, New York, Parrish Art Museum, The Long Island Landscape, 1914-1946, June-August 1992 Huntington, New York, Hecksher Museum of Art, Arthur Dove & Helen Torr, The Huntington Years, March-April 1989, no. 89, illustrated in color on the back cover Huntington, New York, Hecksher Museum of Art; New York, James Graham & Sons; Chicago, Illinois, The Terra Museum of American Art; Annapolis, Maryland, The Mitchell Gallery, St. John's College, Out of the Shadows: Helen Torr, A Retrospective, February-October 2003, no. 32, p. 25, illustrated in color p. 24, illustrated in color as frontispiece NOTE Melodrama, painted in 1931, is one of few remaining paintings by the artist Helen Torr, best known as the wife of American modernist Arthur Dove. Torr stopped painting when her husband fell ill in the 1940s and after his death in 1946, she destroyed much of her body of work. Anne Cohen di Pietro writes, "Dating from September 1931, Melodrama, [Helen Torr's] largest and one of her most successful oils, was inspired by a storm approaching over Northport Harbor that she initially captured in charcoal and pencil... Torr's dramatic subject is dispersed across the canvas with characteristic evenness, the generalized forms of surrounding trees repeated in a curving bank of clouds above. The muted green and plum-gray tones of the trees are close in value to the gray-brown water, nearly still in the calm before a storm and revealing the crisp contours of white boats. Amid the vessels, which are rendered in a flat, almost naïve manner, is a black yawl with a striking resemblance to the Mona" (Helen Torr: Out of the Shadows, p. 25). An entry from Helen Torr's unpublished diary mentions Melodrama: "I worked on 'Thunderstorm' and although parts--water especially are nicer, it has lost much of its 'ominous' quality which I must recapture tomorrow... I made drawings of trees on bank, got 'too literal,' now it has a landscape-gardened look. I painted 'Thunderstorm' and got back the ominous quality--best its been...Alfy [Alfred Stieglitz] said my 'Before a Thunderstorm' beautiful, 'very much Ophelia, don't you think so?" and lovely color-I pleased" (Helen Torr Dove Papers, reel 38, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution).
Sotheby's