Two oil paintings by Jasper F. Cropsey, a leading 19th-century artist of the Hudson River School, that hung unappreciated and unrecognized for decades in a basement recreation room in Connecticut, were sold Sunday at auction and fetched prices far higher than anticipated.

A winter hunting scene at Niagara Falls sold for $552,000, according to Tom Curran, an appraiser at the Clarke Auction Gallery in Larchmont, N.Y. An autumn view of Mount Washington in New Hampshire sold for $288,000, Mr. Curran said.

The bidding started at $50,000, though Cropseys of the size of the two paintings have sold in a bustling art market for $250,000 to $500,000. The art market has been depressed in recent years.