Art Auction

The Eskimo doll has coarse gray wolf's hair, clear marble eyes, and teeth made of beads. Value, about $250. The hand-carved African butterfly mask looks more like a giant wooden hat with five-foot wings rimmed with red tassels. Value, about $1,200. The hot-water bottle . . . well it's the two-quart size, kind of pink with a black stopper and "pebbled" inside so it won't stick together when it is empty. The Philadelphia Folklore Project is not quite sure of the monetary - or artistic - value of the hot-water bottle.

"How many of you have birthdays in April?" Twenty people raised their hands. "SOLD! One print for $400 to everyone with their hand up!" So joked auctioneer Bohdan Senkow as the art auction at Cardinal Dougherty High School got under way on April 15. About 75 students and parents attended the fund- raising auction, sponsored by Dougherty's parents' association and the Fine Arts Gallery Inc. of Ardmore. The gallery provided 168 lithographs, etchings, serigraphs and sculptures for sale.

The latest effect of glasnost is an agreement that will allow the first international art auction in the Soviet Union. Sotheby's auction house announced yesterday that it had reached agreement with the Soviet Ministry of Culture for a July 7 sale of 100 paintings by contemporary Soviet artists and pioneer modern artists at the Moscow Center for International Trade. Michael L. Ainslie, president of Sotheby's, said the paintings had presale estimates ranging from $3,500 to $35,000 and that the sale was expected to total about $1 million.

An art auction benefiting computer education at St. Matthias School, 122 Bryn Mawr Ave., will be held at 8 p.m. tomorrow. A preview of the items will be at 7. Tickets, which are available at the door, are $10 per person, $15 a couple. TEACHER TRAINING Thirty-two new teachers in the Haverford Township School District recently completed two Saturday workshops on instructional strategies, lesson- planning, role-playing, hands-on activities, real-world applications, and time management.

Gaily colored children's artwork resembling stained glass windows was hung along with the Wyeths, Matisses and Toulouse-Lautrecs in the basement hall of St. Paul's Episcopal Church. While the children's art was prized, the valuable prints by the renowned artists were about to be bid on in the second Art Show and Auction Jan. 29 at the church on Route 30 in Exton, next to the Church Farm School. The money raised in the event will benefit St. Paul's Church Mission and Ministry.

Creations for palate and palette will be featured at the Wine-tasting Party and Auction to be held Saturday evening at Rutgers University-Camden's Stedman Art Gallery. Tickets are $25. The event will raise funds for the Gallery's Museum Education Enrichment Program for area schoolchildren. "We want to really provide people with something special for the evening, something out of the ordinary," said Stedman director Virginia Steel. The event will begin at 7:30 p.m. with the wine-tasting.

Route 532 is a shortcut to the Shore for locals wanting to bypass the gridlock of Route 72. It's also the way to the "cranberry capital" of the country and the White Horse Inn, the former weekend retreat for the likes of the Astors, Drexels, Vanderbilts and other aristocratic families who belonged to the Chatsworth Club in the early half of the century. The association's modern, less-exclusive offshoot, the Chatsworth Club II, has been working to preserve the White Horse Inn and the history and lore surrounding its Pine Barrens location.

"Going . . . going . . . SOLD to the man in the Phillies T-shirt, for $5,000!" It could be you. Oh, you say, no it couldn't? Well, how about for $50? Here's an art auction with price ranges to excite the novice collector of moderate means along with his or her well-to-do counterparts. The nice thing about an auction is the possibility of getting a work of art for less than you'd pay for it in a gallery . . . a lot less. (Or, a lot more. But that's a story for "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.

If you're a smarty-pants little kid, you already know that the Zoo, 34th and Girard, is the place to be this weekend. Little people from all corners of the city and burbs are descending on our animal kingdom to catch the debut of the prairie dog and burrowing owl exhibit. It's an odd coupling but these critters do manage to live together. Also on the Children's Weekend agenda are Bippo the Hippo and other costumed characters strolling the grounds greeting the small fry. There's face painting and musical entertainment and a drawing for a set of the Young People's Encyclopedia, a 16-volume collection.

VIVANT ART Gallery in Old City can get to jumpin'. The last time I went to an event there, free wine flowed, local artists performed and the place was packed with hip young professional types. The gallery's owner, 32-year-old Florcy Morisset, had to repeatedly warn partygoers to be mindful about the original oil paintings on the walls - and not lean against them. The cool vibe left my mind free to indulge my wildest fantasies about one day actually taking home one of Morisset's artistic finds from Haiti or Tanzania or wherever.

Antiques/Art/Crafts Annual Flea Market & Bake Sale Proceeds support the West Chester Food Cupboard. Unitarian Fellowship of West Chester, 501 S. High St., West Chester. 4/16. 8 am-1 pm. Daily Fiber Intake Work by 15 current & former students of Kutztown University's fiber arts program. Some Things Looming, 526 Washington St., Reading. www.kutztown.edu . 4/16. Homeowner Interior Design Seminar & Workshop Hands-on workshop developed exclusively for homeowners.

Lehman Bros. art auction pays off NEW YORK - An auction of contemporary artworks held by Lehman Bros. and its former subsidiary, Neuberger Berman, brought in nearly $12.3 million Saturday, according to Sotheby's. The auction house said many of the works sold for far more than what Lehman and Neuberger paid. Profits will help pay the failed investment firm's many creditors. Top sellers included an ink and acrylic work by the Ethiopian artist Julie Mehretu called Untitled 1 , which fetched a little over $1 million, and Liu Ye's oil painting The Long Way Home , which sold for $962,500.

The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts earned $1.487 million for its American art acquisition fund when it sold 27 European paintings at two auctions last week in New York. A 19th-century classic, The Birth of Venus by the French painter Alexandre Cabanel, supplied the biggest chunk of the total. It sold for $834,500 at Christie's, including buyer's premium. The hammer price was $750,000, a world auction record for this artist. With a few exceptions, the academy is selling its European art to strengthen its holdings of American art, in which it specializes, particularly from the second half of the 20th century.

The chamber choir of St. Peter's Episcopal Church in the Great Valley, accompanied by the instruments of the Sarum Consort, will offer evensong at 4 p.m. Nov. 11 at the church in honor of those killed in the Sept. 11 attacks. The service will include anthems and service music by baroque composers and use the 1662 Book of Common Prayer, which was in use when St. Peter's was founded. St. Peter's Church is at Church Road between Swedesford and Yellow Springs Roads near the Great Valley Corporate Center.

A French citizen who made illegal contributions to Sen. Robert G. Torricelli's 1996 campaign has accused top Torricelli aides of plotting several improper activities, including an art auction that illegally raised $40,000, according to court papers unsealed yesterday. The disclosures - which provide the first official glimpse into the long federal investigation of the Torricelli campaign and implicate his staffers in alleged criminal activity - were scattered throughout several court documents connected with a plea agreement entered in September by Philippe Hababou.

More than 1,100 middle and high school students from across the state will travel to Hatboro-Horsham High School this week for the annual conference of the Pennsylvania Association of Student Councils. The student council delegates will attend three days of leadership workshops, lectures and social activities. Retired Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf will be the keynote speaker at the welcoming ceremony Thursday. The student council association will present a $100,000 donation to Habitat for Humanity when the conference concludes Saturday, said William Hickey, adviser to the Hatboro-Horsham student council.

For more than half a century, M&E Marine was a haven for local boaters. Its retail complex just off Route 130 in Collingswood boasted an inventory far surpassing that of most of its local rivals. Not only could you get charts, compasses, radios, sonars, depth finders and all the other high-tech toys no self-respecting boater would forgo; you also could get the materials to rebuild a boat from keel on up. Unlike most other retailers it specialized in open stock of boat-building supplies: fiberglass matting by the yard; Monel and other corrosion-resistant fasteners by the pound.

When Bruce Coyle and his friends gather tonight at the Chadds Ford Inn, the four artists will display work they crafted with their skilled hands. The pieces will be sold at an auction that will donate 15 percent of all sales to Chester County's Children Inc., a nonprofit organization that helps local children in need. Some of the money will help families pay for the basics; heating and electric bills are near the top of the list. However, most of the money will purchase items that abused and neglected children would otherwise be unable to afford - a week at summer camp, a musical instrument, or even a bus ticket to bring a grandmother across the state to see her granddaughter.

Labor Day weekend is traditionally busy with country sales, but this year they will be overshadowed by a cataloged estates sale beginning at 9 a.m. Thursday at the Alderfer Auction Center in Hatfield. More than 500 lots of fine arts, furniture ephemera and decorative accessories will be offered. In addition there will be a non-cataloged antiques and collectibles auction also beginning at 9 a.m. Thursday and a non-cataloged art auction beginning at 5 p.m. Wednesday. A highlight of the catalog sale is a collection of documents, medals and historical photos, many from the Civil War era, according to auctioneer H. Brent Souder.