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Beginning on November 13, Doyle New York will start auctioning select works from the Spanierman Gallery, one of the Upper East Side’s foremost American art galleries. Founded by Ira Spanierman in the 1960s, the Spanierman Gallery has played an important role in the understanding and appreciation of American art from the colonial era through the 20^th century. The gallery has also placed many iconic works in prominent public and private collections across the country.

As the Spanierman Gallery has decided to shift its focus to modern and contemporary American art, they will auction hundreds of works from their early American art collection at a number of select sales that will take place in 2012 and 2013. The November 13 auction will include thirty works including four pieces by John Henry Twachtman, the last fully bound sketchbook of studies by Maurice Prendergast not in a museum collection, and a double-sided work by Alfred Maurer that exemplifies the artist’s Fauvist palette.

Another 36 works from the Spanierman collection will be sold at Doyle’s American furniture, decorations, and 19^th century painting sale on November 19.

Taking over two galleries at New York City’s Morgan Library & Museum, Dürer to de Kooning: 100 Master Drawings from Munich, spans the sixteenth through the twentieth centuries. The show includes rarely seem works by old masters such as Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Raphael, and Rubens as well as nineteenth century sheets by van Gogh and contemporary works by Pablo Picasso, David Hockney, and Georg Baselitz. The drawings, which are on loan from the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung in Munich, have never before been on view in the United States.

Comprised of a complex of buildings on Madison Avenue, the Morgan began as the private library of the financier Pierpont Morgan. In 1924, eleven years after Pierpont’s death his son, J.P. Morgan, Jr., turned the library into a public institution.

100 Masters will be on view through January 6, 2013.

Best known for his dynamic and powerful seascapes, painter Winslow Homer (1836–1910) spent the last twenty-seven years of his life working diligently in a studio in Prout’s Neck, Maine. It was here, isolated on the craggy coast, that Winslow’s work matured and he created some of his most admired paintings. While in Maine, Homer became fascinated with the untold power of the natural world and often explored the theme in scenes of man versus nature, particularly the ocean.

Beginning September 25^th, after a multi-year, $2.8 million restoration by the Portland Museum of Art, Homer’s studio will be open for public tours. After Homer’s death, the studio was passed down from family member to family member and ultimately landed in the hands of his great-grandnephew, Charles “Chip” Homer Willauer. Willauer, now 74, spent many summers living in his great-granduncle’s studio and began to worry about the future of the building. Hoping to preserve the significant piece of American art history, Willauer sold the studio to the Portland Museum of Art in 2006 for $1.8 million.

The Museum took the undertaking very seriously and went to work on renovations. The foundation was stabilized, the balcony and windows were replaced, the chimney was restored, and the exterior returned to its original green hue with brown trim. The museum ultimately raised $10.6 million to pay for the purchase and renovation of Homer’s studio as well as an endowment and educational programs and exhibitions.

To celebrate the renovation and opening, the museum will present the exhibition “Weatherbeaten: Winslow Homer and Maine,” featuring 38 oil paintings, watercolors and etchings that Homer created in his secluded studio. “Weatherbeaten” will run through December 30^th.