'Antiques Roadshow' guest stunned after hearing the value of 1959 painting she received as gift
Even the most valuable gifts turn out to be more valuable than expected on "Antiques Roadshow." That's why guests who already treasure items as gifts are shocked at finding out their monetary value. The owner of a '1959 Jimmy Ernst Painting' only knew that the item was too small and from a renowned artist, but it was the show's expert, Debra Force, who told her how significant the artwork was. In the end, Force left the guest stunned after valuing the piece at over $5,000.
The guest shared that she and her husband got the painting as a gift decades ago. "My husband is an artist, and his drawing professor was moving from Nebraska and gave us a selection of pieces, and when we got this from him, he said that Jimmy Ernst was doing a mural for a bank in Lincoln, Nebraska, where his professor had been working, and he bought it from Ernst at that time," she told Force.
She further added that the painting had been with her for around 30 years, and she was always curious about it. "I thought this was a perfect opportunity to try to learn something about it other than the fact that it's a watercolor, or probably with gouache. I know it's opaque. And I know his father was Max Ernst, a very renowned artist, but not much about Jimmy," she said.
Force took over to explain the significance of the artwork. She told the guest that Max Ernst was one of the most important surrealist painters in the world, and his son, Jimmy Ernst, was abandoned by him at an early age.
"His father had abandoned the family, and he was raised primarily by his mother, who was an art historian. And he moved to the United States by himself. He did not have a great love for his father, and he really tried to steer him away from going into the art field. But when he came to New York, he got a job at MOMA through various connections of his family, and then he became Peggy Guggenheim's personal assistant," Force explained.
The expert added that Jimmy Ernst made more connections over the years and eventually became a painter. "But he would do it in his own way. And they were often quite bizarre. What we have here, in your piece, is actually a little later piece from 1959," Force noted. She added that the artwork was very characteristic of the artist's work, and it was as authentic as it could be. "And you're absolutely right that it is watercolor and gouache. The white areas are the gouache," she noted.
Force then asked the guest if she knew how much the gentleman paid for the piece before he gifted it to her husband. To this, the guest said she saw the number 20 written in pencil behind the frame, so she assumed it was sold for $20. Force told the guest that Jimmy Ernst was a popular artist in the market at the time. "And this particular work, if it were in a gallery in New York, the value would be $5,000," Force went on to say, leaving the guest in shock.
In the end, all the guests could say was, "That's nice! Fantastic! Thank you," as she tried to recover from the surprise appraisal.
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