Marion M. Perkins Paintings & Artwork for Sale | Marion M. Perkins Art Value Price Guide

Jun. 05, 2024
Marion M. Perkins
Est: $6,000 - $9,000
American, 1908-1961 Untitled (Head) Singed with intitials MP on the backside Stone 4 3/4 x 4 x 5 inches (12.1 x 10.2 x 12.7 cm) Some soiling to surface. Scattered small pockmarks to face. A few scattered tiny white spots to surface.
DOYLE Auctioneers & Appraisers
Dec. 02, 2023
Marion Perkins, 1908-1961, Head of a Boy
Est: $15,000 - $25,000
Marion Perkins 1908-1961 Head of a Boy c. 1950 carved stone sculpture 7-1/2 x 4-1/2 x 5-1/2 inches (sculpture only), initialed MP on a contemporary painted wooden base (2-1/4 x 6-1/4 x 6-1/4 inches) Provenance: private collection, Chicago, IL
Black Art Auction
Nov. 19, 2022
Marion Perkins, 1908-1961, Head of a Boy
Est: $25,000 - $35,000
Marion Perkins 1908-1961 Head of a Boy c. 1950 carved stone sculpture 7-1/2 x 4-1/2 x 5-1/2 inches (sculpture only), initialed MP on a contemporary painted wooden base (2-1/4 x 6-1/4 x 6-1/4 inches) Provenance: private collection, Chicago, IL
Black Art Auction
Oct. 06, 2022
MARION PERKINS (1908 - 1961) Untitled (Head of a King).
Est: $30,000 - $40,000
MARION PERKINS (1908 - 1961) Untitled (Head of a King). Carved marble, mounted on a granite base, circa 1950 -1955. Approximately 330x241x51 mm; 11 3/4x9 1/2x2 inches (not including the base). Incised signature on the backside. Provenance: private collection, Chicago; private collection, South Carolina; private collection (2012). This marble carving is an exceptional and extremely scarce work of the great Chicago sculptor Marion Perkins. Born in Marche, Arkansas, at the age of eight, Perkins was sent to live with relatives on the South Side of Chicago in 1916. Marion Perkins attended Wendell Phillips High School, the first Chicago high school where the majority of the students were African American. He soon married Eva Gillon, who became his model and muse; they had three sons and settled in Bronzeville. While interested in theatre and literature, Perkins worked a series of menial jobs to support his family until he acquired a newstand in the late 1930s. Perkins then had the resources and time to create an outdoor studio in his backyard. Not only a talented stone carver, the self-taught artist also carved in wood, and modelled in clay, plaster and steel wire. Perkins first gained attention in 1940 with two stone works included in the American Negro Exposition. With the opening of the Southside Community Art Center that year, Perkins had an artistic venue where he could both exhibit and teach; he soon became an important figure of the Chicago Renaissance. His first triumph was being invited to exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago's prestigious Annual Exhibition of American Art in 1942 where he showed his powerful limestone carving John Henry. After participating in several invitational exhibitions, in 1947 the IBM Corporation acquired his Figure at Rest. Then in 1948, his beautiful marble Ethiopia Awakening won the prize in sculpture at the Art Institute's Annual Exhibition of Artists of Chicago and Vicinity, and Perkins was awarded an esteemed Julius Rosenwald Fund fellowship grant. Perkins's direct approach to stone sculpture is epitomized by his iconic 1950 Man of Sorrows. This powerful African American head of Christ with a crown of thorns was the sensation of the 1951 annual Chicago artists invitational at the Art Institute; it was featured in an Ebony magazine profile, and acquired by the museum. Perkins often found such fine materials in vacant lots and abandoned houses on the South Side. With Untitled (Head of a King), Perkins was not deterred by the narrowness of the marble slab - he rendered this regal head in three dimensions by carving the profile in the thin outer edges. This distintictively modern approach, influenced by Brancusi and Modigliani, is also seen in his pair of limestone heads, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, circa 1955. Despite these successes and widespread acclaim in Chicago, Perkins never received national recognition. His sculptures are found in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the DuSable Black History Museum and Education Center, and the National Gallery. Marion Perkins continues to exert his influence on contemporary art today. Kerry James Marshall's monumental picture, Souvenir III, 1998 includes a homage to the artist in his painting, along with Bob Thompson, Zora Neale Hurston, Dorthy Dandridge, and Augusta Savage. Perkins/Flug/Lusenhop pp. 2-7, 20; Schulman p. 138.
Swann Auction Galleries
Jun. 04, 2022
Marion Perkins, Head of a Boy
Est: $30,000 - $50,000
Marion Perkins Head of a Boy c. 1950 carved stone sculpture 7-1/2 x 4-1/2 x 5-1/2 inches (sculpture only), initialed MP on a contemporary painted wooden base (2-1/4 x 6-1/4 x 6-1/4 inches) Provenance: private collection, Chicago, IL
Black Art Auction
Feb. 27, 2022
Attrib. to Marion M Perkins Wood Carved Sculpture
Est: $100 - $200
Wood carved Renaissance sculpture, attributed to Chicago artist, Marion M. Perkins (1908-1961). Size: 9 1/2 x 5 in.
Sarasota Estate Auction
Dec. 12, 2021
Attrib. to Marion M Perkins Wood Carved Sculpture
Est: $200 - $400
Wood carved Renaissance sculpture, attributed to Chicago artist, Marion M. Perkins (1908-1961). Size: 9 1/2 x 5 in.
Sarasota Estate Auction
Dec. 04, 2021
Marion Perkins, 1908-1961, Head of a Man
Est: $6,000 - $8,000
Marion Perkins 1908-1961 Head of a Man c. 1950 carved wood sculpture 12 x 6 x 6 inches (sculpture only, not including base) initialed Provenance: the artist to a friend, private collection, Chicago.
Black Art Auction
May. 22, 2021
Marion Perkins, 1908-1961, Portrait of a Youth
Est: $6,000 - $8,000
Marion Perkins 1908-1961 Portrait of a Youth c. 1950 oil on canvas board 20 x 16 inches signed Provenance: the artist to a private collection, Chicago.
Black Art Auction
May. 22, 2021
Marion Perkins, 1908-1961, Head of a Man
Est: $40,000 - $60,000
Marion Perkins 1908-1961 Head of a Man c. 1950 carved wood sculpture 21 x 8 1/2 x 10 inches (sculpture) on a painted wooden base, 4 x 11 1/4 x 11 1/4 inches, slightly recessed unsigned, but documented in a photograph with the artist, taken outside his home Provenance: the family of artist, Mitchell Caton. Caton was a friend and neighbor of Perkins in Chicago, and Perkins gifted it to Caton. This is a rare and important work by the artist. Illustrated: Selections from the Art Institute of Chicago, African Americans in Art. Daniel Schulman's essay, "Marion Perkins: A Chicago Sculptor Rediscovered", p. 107. University of Washington Press, 1999.
Black Art Auction
Nov. 14, 2020
Marion Perkins, 1908-1961, Mother and Child, Hand carved ceramic stele, 10.5 x 5 x 2 inches
Est: $25,000 - $35,000
Marion Perkins 1908-1961 Mother and Child Hand carved ceramic stele 1953 Signed and dated. Marion Perkins was born in 1908 near Marche, Arkansas. When his parents died in 1916, he was sent to live with an aunt in Chicago. He attended Wendell Phillips High School in the Bronzeville area. Perkins quit school just before his senior year, married and started a family. His wife, Eva, was his muse and model for many of the feminine sculptures he created. Perkins owned a newspaper stand for many years and had aspirations to become a playwright for a short time. Sculpting was something he chose as a hobby in early days, and he was largely self taught. His work caught the eye of Margaret Burroughs, who was in his circle of friends, as well as Peter Pollack, gallery owner and administrator for the Illinois Art Project. The latter eventually became a patron and was instrumental in introducing him to Si Gordon. Gordon was an Illinois Art Project sculptor and teacher who gave Perkins his first formal training in sculpting at the black YMCA at 38th and Wabash. Perkins showed his work there for the first time in 1938 as a part of a student show. In the 1940â€™s, Perkins grew rapidly as an artist, and by the end of the decade, his work demonstrated a clear personal aesthetic. His technique was conservative by many criticâ€™s standards as abstraction was coming into vogue. Perkins process involved direct carving in stone or wood, a process that was favored by European Modernists like Constantin Brancusi, AndrÃ© Derain, and Modigliani. His politics also informed his work. Perkins was a committed Marxian activist and intellectual and â€œbelieved art could convey ideas effectively only through recognizable imagery.â€ Abstraction, in his views, was biased toward the elite, whereas figurative sculpture applied to all. Perkins gleaned much of the marble and sandstone he used for his sculptures from homes being wrecked in the Chicago area and worked in his backyard. In 1940, two of his sculptures were chosen to appear in the American Negro Exposition. His work appeared regularly in shows at the Art Institute of Chicago throughout the 1940â€™s and 50â€™s. In 1947 he received a Rosenwald Grant, and in 1948, he won 2nd prize at the 52nd Annual Chicago and Vicinity Exhibition held at the Art Institute of Chicago for his work, Ethiopia Awakening. He taught classes at the South Side Community Art Center and took a ceramics course at Hull House. By the 1950â€™s, Perkinsâ€™ work took on a more political tone. One of his most important works, Man of Sorrow, not only received a prize from the Art Institute of Chicago in 1951 Chicago and Vicinity Exhibition but was also purchased for their collection. This work was notable for its portrayal of a black Christ - strong in its presence, yet clearly expressing his agony. In 1952, he won the Joseph Golde prize at the Art Institute of Chicago for Dying Soldier. His last work exhibited at the Art Institute in his lifetime was Unknown Political Prisoner in 1957. Perkins was quite direct with the political themes in his art and wrote about his convictions in the Marxist monthly, Masses & Mainstream. He had been planning a series of figures, a monument to Hiroshima called the Skywatchers series. Although he did execute a number of marble reliefs and works in plaster, the project remained in the â€œstudyâ€ stage. Both Perkins and his wife died in 1961. REF: Schulman, Daniel. â€œMarion Perkins: A Chicago Sculptor Rediscovered.â€ Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies, vol. 24, no. 2, 1999, p. 220-243+267-271 10.5 x 5 x 2 inches
Black Art Auction
Sep. 07, 2014
Study in Carved Wood
Est: $600 - $800
Attributed to Marion M. Perkins, possible study, carved wood, with tape affixed underside bearing the name "M. Perkins," 11" h x 5" w x 4" d. Provenance: From a California collection.
Kaminski Auctions