Displaying items by tag: u.s. bankruptcy court

The art collection once belonging to the infamous Ponzi-schemer, Bernie Madoff, will be sold at Sotheby’s New York and Stair Galleries in Hudson, NY at the end of this year. The 61 works have an insured value in excess of $575,000. Securities Investor Protection Corporation trustee, Irving Picard, and the U.S. bankruptcy court are liquidating the assets, which include posters, rugs and fine art. Sotheby’s will be responsible for selling a large portion of the works and Stair Galleries will sell the remainder including posters, carpets and decorative items. The collection has been stored at Cirkers Fine Art Storage & Logistics in Manhattan since 2009.

While the majority of the lot is lackluster, there are a few important works including a lithograph by Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) illustrating a black bull, six bull lithographs by Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) and a small drawing of a woman’s head by Henri Matisse (1869-1954). There are also a number of works on paper by important postwar artists such as Jasper Johns (b. 1930), Andy Warhol (1928-1987), Frank Stella (b. 1936), Cy Twombly (1928-2011) and Ellsworth Kelly (b 1933). The sale will also include a pair of oriental rugs that once decorated Madoff’s offices in Manhattan and Queens.

Picard has been working to liquidate Madoff’s assets since the disgraced financier’s arrest in 2008. To date, he has collected about $9.3 billion to compensate the people and companies that Madoff defrauded. Picard has overseen the sales of three powerboats, various cars, jewelry, pianos and Madoff’s wine collection.

In an effort to curb the massive debts accrued by the American Folk Art Museum’s former chairman, Ralph Esmerian, the institution has decided to sell over 200 works from its collection at an auction at Sotheby’s. Esmerian, the former owner of the jewelry company Fred Leighton, is currently serving a six-year jail sentence for wire fraud and other charges.

In 2005, Esmerian promised to donate 263 works from his illustrious collection to the Folk Art Museum. However, he used some of those same works as collateral to secure multi-million-dollar loans with Christie’s and Sotheby’s. Late last month, Manhattan’s U.S. Bankruptcy Court arranged a settlement with the museum allowing the Folk Art Museum to keep 53 of the promised works as long as they enhance the institution’s collection and aid its educational mission. The remaining works, which include paintings, sculptures, scrimshaw, and needleworks, will be sold at Sotheby’s.

The trustee responsible for liquidating Esmerian’s estate has decided to sell the remainder of the collection through Sotheby’s, much to Christie’s dismay. Christie’s filed an objection to the settlement on March 15, 2013 claiming that Sotheby’s intimidated the trustee into choosing them to host the important auction.

The Esmerian sale will be held in December 2013 or January 2014 and the profits will go towards repaying the creditors the former chairman defrauded.