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CHRISTIE'S JAPANESE SWORDS & SWORD FITTINGS FROM THE COLLECTION OF DR. WALTER A. COMPTON ( PART I ) NEW YORK MARCH 31ST 1992 SALE 7420 INCLUDING AUCTION RESULTS THIS CATALOG CONTAINS 466 PAGES AND 399 LOTS
CHRISTIE'S JAPANESE SWORDS & SWORD FITTINGS FROM THE COLLECTION OF DR. WALTER A. COMPTON (
CHRISTIE'S JAPANESE SWORDS & SWORD FITTINGS FROM THE COLLECTION OF DR. WALTER A. COMPTON ( PART III ) NEW YORK DECEMBER 17TH 1992 SALE 7554 THIS CATALOG CONTAINS 132 PAGES AND 255 LOTS
(( THIS EXTREMELY RARE COLLECTION IN 3 VOLUMES ARE SOLD OUT WORLDWIDE )) THESE EXTREMELY RARE COLLECTIONS ARE IN LIKE NEW CONDITION WHICH IS EVEN MORE RARE TO FIND CONTAIN THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE JAPANESE SWORD & FITTING COLLECTION IN HISTORY!!! WITH MYLAR COVERS TO PROTECT THIS RARE COLLECTION
PLEASE EMAIL ME WITH AND QUESTIONS OR CONCERNS BEFORE YOU PURCHASE THANK YOU!!
"It's the best private collection in the world," the president of the Japanese Sword Company of Tokyo, Tomihiko Inami, said before the sale. "The quality and the quantity is extraordinary. A Japanese cannot keep such a collection."
Indifferent to the current economic worries, collectors and specialized dealers spent a record $7.9 million at an auction of the largest and finest collection of Japanese swords and sword-fittings formed in this century.
Virtually anyone who matters in the field, from Tokyo to London and Paris, filled Christie's main auction room to capacity on Tuesday for the five-hour sale.
They fought over the pieces amassed in a lifetime by the late Walter Ames Compton, who died in October 1990 at 79 in Elkhart, Indiana. He was a pharmaceutical researcher who became the head of Miles Laboratories.
Mr. Compton bought everywhere, mostly from dealers, since auctions account only for a small part of the market in this highly specialized area. The items, particularly the blades, which are by far the most highly prized components of the swords, rarely appear in the open market.
He often went to Japan and acquired an expertise of which both top Japanese connoisseurs, such as the third generation Tokyo dealer Tomihiko Inami, president of Japan Sword Company, and Sebastian Izzard, Christie's expert in Japanese art, spoke in glowing terms.
Aware that no such sale had ever taken place nor would happen again, the connoisseurs paid huge prices, particularly for the swords.
A Kamakura period blade signed Sukezane and forged around 1250 astounded professionals as it nearly tripled Christie's high estimate. It went up to $374,000, paid by Mr. Inami.
He said that he remembered seeing it in the 1950s in his father's shop. He knows of no other sword of that type outside public institutions.
Other prices, such as the $104,500, paid by Mr. Inami for a Kamakura period short blade - a Soshu Tanto - were more in line with what one might have expected, a prominent Paris dealer, Bernard Le Dauphin commented.
By and large Mr. Le Dauphin went on, the ups and downs of the sale often surprised him.
His words echo the widespread feeling among European and American connoisseurs that the reactions of Japanese buyers whose superior connoisseurship they acknowledge, are difficult to anticipate when it comes to swords.
As Martin Lorber, the consultant who was called in by Christie's for the blades, put it: "Swords are very close to the Japanese heart." This may account for the impression shared by many Westerners, that Europeans and Americans got "many of the best blades."
The most expensive was a 13th-century weapon signed Ichi, which was bought for $480,000 by an Italian
CHRISTIE'S JAPANESE SWORDS & SWORD FITTINGS FROM THE COLLECTION OF DR. WALTER A. COMPTON (
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PART II ) NEW YORK OCTOBER 22ND 1992 SALE 7524 INCLUDING AUCTION RESULTS THIS CATALOG CONTAINS 250 PAGES AND 317 LOTSCHRISTIE'S JAPANESE SWORDS & SWORD FITTINGS FROM THE COLLECTION OF DR. WALTER A. COMPTON ( PART III ) NEW YORK DECEMBER 17TH 1992 SALE 7554 THIS CATALOG CONTAINS 132 PAGES AND 255 LOTS
(( THIS EXTREMELY RARE COLLECTION IN 3 VOLUMES ARE SOLD OUT WORLDWIDE )) THESE EXTREMELY RARE COLLECTIONS ARE IN LIKE NEW CONDITION WHICH IS EVEN MORE RARE TO FIND CONTAIN THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE JAPANESE SWORD & FITTING COLLECTION IN HISTORY!!! WITH MYLAR COVERS TO PROTECT THIS RARE COLLECTION
PLEASE EMAIL ME WITH AND QUESTIONS OR CONCERNS BEFORE YOU PURCHASE THANK YOU!!
"It's the best private collection in the world," the president of the Japanese Sword Company of Tokyo, Tomihiko Inami, said before the sale. "The quality and the quantity is extraordinary. A Japanese cannot keep such a collection."
Indifferent to the current economic worries, collectors and specialized dealers spent a record $7.9 million at an auction of the largest and finest collection of Japanese swords and sword-fittings formed in this century.
Virtually anyone who matters in the field, from Tokyo to London and Paris, filled Christie's main auction room to capacity on Tuesday for the five-hour sale.
They fought over the pieces amassed in a lifetime by the late Walter Ames Compton, who died in October 1990 at 79 in Elkhart, Indiana. He was a pharmaceutical researcher who became the head of Miles Laboratories.
Mr. Compton bought everywhere, mostly from dealers, since auctions account only for a small part of the market in this highly specialized area. The items, particularly the blades, which are by far the most highly prized components of the swords, rarely appear in the open market.
He often went to Japan and acquired an expertise of which both top Japanese connoisseurs, such as the third generation Tokyo dealer Tomihiko Inami, president of Japan Sword Company, and Sebastian Izzard, Christie's expert in Japanese art, spoke in glowing terms.
Aware that no such sale had ever taken place nor would happen again, the connoisseurs paid huge prices, particularly for the swords.
A Kamakura period blade signed Sukezane and forged around 1250 astounded professionals as it nearly tripled Christie's high estimate. It went up to $374,000, paid by Mr. Inami.
He said that he remembered seeing it in the 1950s in his father's shop. He knows of no other sword of that type outside public institutions.
Other prices, such as the $104,500, paid by Mr. Inami for a Kamakura period short blade - a Soshu Tanto - were more in line with what one might have expected, a prominent Paris dealer, Bernard Le Dauphin commented.
By and large Mr. Le Dauphin went on, the ups and downs of the sale often surprised him.
His words echo the widespread feeling among European and American connoisseurs that the reactions of Japanese buyers whose superior connoisseurship they acknowledge, are difficult to anticipate when it comes to swords.
As Martin Lorber, the consultant who was called in by Christie's for the blades, put it: "Swords are very close to the Japanese heart." This may account for the impression shared by many Westerners, that Europeans and Americans got "many of the best blades."
The most expensive was a 13th-century weapon signed Ichi, which was bought for $480,000 by an Italian
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