Art Scam Alert!

Beware of this mutant trying to rip off artists!

Andrea Catsimatidis     chaparralsupermarket@gmail.com

Hello,

    My name is Andrea Catsimatidis. I wish to place an email Order from you. I have heard a lot about the quality and standards of your work. Thus I have decided to place an order with you. I want to ask you questions, your efforts would be appreciated

   Do You Accept pick up from your location?

   Do You Accept E-Mail Order?

   Do You Accept Visa/Master Credit Card and Cashiers check?

    I look forward to your reply with your current product price list 

Best Regard

Andrea Catsimatidis

This small and very cool 1997 proof just showed up at an auction house in Virginia... good starting bid price!

Bid for it here.

Stolen Artwork

Received an email from the daughter of a collector who died unexpectedly of a heart attack - I am sharing in the hope that the eyes of the Internet can help... here's a bit from her email:

I had plans to keep most of her vast collection of artwork, especially the mermaids. It’s a longer story but her house was ransacked. They came with a giant moving truck and took pretty much everything that wasn’t nailed down. (The neighbors thought we hired movers. These were good con artists and they vanished into thing air.) My heart was shred to pieces. The material possessions are one thing, whatever. But the art... her passion for art was intense and she instilled it in me. Losing the artwork was one of the lowest blows I’ve ever received.

I've advised her to report it to the FBI's stolen art unit... but I will also keep an eye on the secondary art market to see if any of the below pieces show up...

The Rampant Lilith

New watercolor which will be at Context Art Miami in about a week and a half as part of the Art Basel Miami Beach week of art fairs!

Suddenly, She Wasn't Afraid Any Longer (The Rampant Lilith) (Detail)

Suddenly, She Wasn't Afraid Any Longer (The Rampant Lilith) 36x36 inches

Art Scam Alert!

Beware of this rip off artist:

"Potter Carlos" pottercarlos502@gmail.com

Hello,

How are you doing? Guess your business is going smoothly? My name is

Potter. Me and my wife stumbled on your page while searching for art

pieces. After seeing your various works, i give you accolades!!! Quite

an insane level of creativity you got. I am interested in purchasing a

piece as a SURPRISE GIFT for my wife, she seems fond of your designs.

I would really love to receive further information if you would be

kind enough to confirm the availability of the art pieces ready for

immediate sales. Thank you and my best regards.  Potter Carlos

Tia Ñica moves on...

Yesterday my aunt Ñica passed away in her beloved home in Miami Beach. 

She was in her nineties and holds a special place not only in my heart, but also in my family's history. 

Tia Ñica and her husband Jose immigrated to the United States in the 1950s and settled in Brooklyn, in the old Italian neighborhood clustered around the beautiful Our Lady of Loretto church, convent and school in East New York. 

One of 11 children to Galician immigrants to Cuba, not only did she herself become an immigrant to a new land where she did not know a single person, but also (I am certain), the first woman in her family to work. 

She worked in the factories that back then surrounded the neighborhood, and "after work", also worked babysitting the neighbors' children while their parents worked late hours. By the late 50s my aunt and uncle had saved enough money to buy a six apartment brownstone on Sackman Street, which is where they lived, and where my family and I landed in the 1960s when our family left Communist Cuba as political refugees during the "Freedom Flights" that allowed hundreds of thousands of Cubans to escape the political wrath of the Cuban dictatorship. 

My aunt was a strong, powerful, opinionated woman, with a strong will and even a stronger, loud voice that could and would command attention in the chaos and cacophony of Cuban family dinners. For a few years, when I was a teen, I would accompany her after school, as we went door to door in Brooklyn selling oil painting portraits, where she'd send a photo to someone in Spain, who would then send back a pretty good oil copy of the photo! In retrospect, my "training" as an art dealer started back then! 

My aunt and uncle moved to Miami Beach in the early 1970s, and bought a gorgeous house on Alton Road surrounded by palm trees and avocado trees, and as a teenager my parents would "ship" me to them for the summer. I would always be picked up at the airport, and waiting in their house would be an ancient, retired Spaniard who would then give me a haircut and bring my hair length to my aunt's severe, anti-hippie standards, part of her belief that long hair, not wearing a watch, bell bottom pants and parting your hair down the middle, all contributed to moral corruption! 

Those summer months spent with my aunt and uncle remain as some of the happiest times of my life. But my strongest debt to this powerful gallega remains the fact that it was because of her and her loving husband, that my family was able to escape the living nightmare that their birthplace had become. 

And on behalf of your my children, and their future descendants, I send her a warm hug, and a most sincere "gracias" for all that she did, and the key part that she played in my destiny... and for all the love and support that she gave me through the decades: I love you Tia, and "teikyrissy" on Tio Jose!

Coming to Miami

Laura Beth Konopinski

As usual, we'll be returning to Miami this coming December for the big dance of the art world during Art Basel week in the Greater Miami area, with over twenty art fairs all over. This will be our 12th year coming to Miami!

This year we're returning to Context Art Miami, where we'll have two booths: C321 and C322 and featuring works by Matthew Langley, J. Jordan Bruns, Michael Janis, Erwin Timmers, Amy Lin, Tim Vermeulen, Dulce Pinzon, Elissa Farrow-Savos, Laura Beth Konopinski and Audrey Wilson.

J. Jordan Bruns

J. Jordan Bruns

Tim Vermeulen

Tim Vermeulen

Erwin Timmers