Auctions: Philadelphia-area auctions offer arts and crafts from well-known creators

The twin catalogs for next weekend's sale of modern and contemporary arts and crafts at the Rago Arts and Auction Center present a history of the movements and creators of the last 110 years, from the well-established to the up-and-coming. Just as remarkable is the sale itself.

The more than 1,300 lots of furniture, ceramics, glass, metalwork, and decorative art for sale at the two-day event in Lambertville include works by many of the best-known names in an abundance seldom seen.

The second session, beginning at 11 a.m. June 12, for instance, will feature more than 20 lots of Wharton Esherick, the artist and cabinetmaker so closely associated with Rose Valley (and the Hedgerow Theatre there). Along with woodcuts and sketches, there are at least three major pieces of furniture: a wagon-wheel table made in 1932 for an equestrian tack room, which has a presale estimate of $80,000 to $110,000; a 1965 carved oak and cherry set of library steps, which has a presale estimate of $25,000 to $35,000; and a 37½-by-99½-inch cherry and poplar sideboard done in 1969, near the end of the artist's life, with a presale estimate of $100,000 to $150,000.

That session also has Bertoias by the bunch. One of the 13 pieces, an 87-inch-high sound sculpture, has a presale estimate of $40,000 to $60,000.

At the first session, beginning at 11 a.m. June 11, there is Stickley by the stack, with presale estimates for the three dozen lots in the low- to mid-four-figure range.

The session also features two other lots of Arts and Crafts furniture. And this is where the auction catalogs' role as a compendium comes into play. The two lots, a dining room table with four leaves and hammered copper hinges and a set of six dining chairs carved with family crests, were made at Arden, a utopian colony founded in 1900 on 162 acres in Delaware by Frank Stephens and the Philadelphia architect William Lightfoot Price.

Many Arden residents also were artisans, according to the catalog description of the two pieces, including Frank Stephens' son Don, who along with Price designed the dining room set for his brother, Roger, and sister-in-law-to-be, Alice Thornall. The two lots, with presale estimates of $5,000 to $7,000 and $9,000 to $12,000, respectively, come from the estate of Caroline Stephens Holt. The Stephens family made about 100 pieces of furniture, and the estate has donated 11 other pieces to the Arden Craft Shop Museum in Wilmington and the Biggs Museum of American Art in Dover.