NEW

Updated buyer’s premium structure

Thomas Bangs Thorpe Sold at Auction Prices

Painter, b. 1815 - d. 1878

See Artist Details

18 Lots

Sort By:

Categories

Auction Date

Seller

Seller Location

Price Range

to
  • Thomas Bangs Thorpe, The Homestead, 1876
    May. 28, 2022

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe, The Homestead, 1876

    Est: $2,000 - $4,000

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (1815 - 1878) The Homestead, 1876 oil on canvas signed and dated lower left: T. B. THORPE. / 1876

    Santa Fe Art Auction
  • Thomas Bangs Thorpe (American/Louisiana, 1815)
    Nov. 20, 2021

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (American/Louisiana, 1815)

    Est: $3,000 - $5,000

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (American/Louisiana, 1815-1878) , "Portrait of a Gentleman from Jackson, Louisiana", 1839, oil on canvas, signed, dated and inscribed "Jackson, LA" en verso, 30 in. x 25 in., framed. Note: Thomas Bangs Thorpe (also spelled “Thorp”) moved to Louisiana in 1837. Originally from Massachusetts, he attended Wesleyan University and exhibited promising artistic and literary talents, however health concerns would prevent him from graduating. He was advised to seek a warmer climate, thus spurring his move to the South where he eventually landed in Baton Rouge. Thorpe worked to establish himself as portrait and still life painter in New Orleans before heading upriver in 1839 to the towns of Jackson and St. Francisville in Louisiana. He befriended local planters, including Bennet H. Barrow (1811-1854) of Highland Plantation, and observed with a keen, analytical eye the daily life of those around him. While a northerner was generally looked upon with bemused skepticism, Thorpe’s easygoing and charming manners earned him invitation into local society, resulting in portrait commissions. In 1839, the same year as the date of the portrait offered here, Thorpe’s sketch story of a beloved local character “Tom Owen, The Bee Hunter” was published in the New York Spirit of the Times. The story was so well received that it was republished in many different markets both national and international and included in several mid-century anthologies of American literature such as Rufus Wilmot Griswold’s Prose Writers of America and George and Ever Duyckinck’s Cyclopaedia of American Literature. The publication of “Tom Owen” launched Thorpe’s career as a writer and subsequent works such as “The Big Bear of Arkansas” placed him in the same league as other southern humorists such as Mark Twain. According to his biographer, Milton Rickels, “[The Big Bear of Arkansas] became so well known that Bernard DeVoto has called the body of literature which followed it the Big Bear School of Southern humorists.” His tone, always warm, jovial and bitingly precise, accurately conveyed his admiration for his newfound home from the eyes of a frank, yet respectful, outsider. Thorpe’s body of oil paintings proves incredibly difficult to study. While he relied mostly on his painting income while living in St. Francisville, there are not many known examples of his portraiture remaining. Additionally, he shifted his creative focus from painting to writing and editing for the Concordia Intelligencer in Vidalia, Louisiana in 1843 and would later pursue politics. Notably, no portrait by Thorpe has come to auction in at least twenty years, and most which have been recorded in local art history and portraiture books have been listed as unsigned and “attributed to” as is the case with The National Society of Colonial Dames’ Louisiana Portraits and Martin and Margaret Wiesendanger’s Louisiana Painters and Painting from the Collection of W. E. Groves. The painting offered in this lot is rare in that it is signed, dated “1839” and located “Jackson, La” en verso. The focus is a distinguished gentleman, dressed in fashionable period garb, with a thick black cravat and suit and crisp white shirt reminiscent of the contemporaneous famed portrait of Valcour Aime by Jacques Amans. He casts a gaze on the viewer that is stern and discerning. Rickels recounts in his biography that Thorpe did paint the family members of his aforementioned friend, Bennet Barrow, but there are not many other mentions of other potential subjects. While there were a finite number of planters and eligible sitters in East and West Feliciana Parish at the time, the mysterious gentleman in this portrait remains unidentified. Ref.: Milton, Rickels. Thomas Bangs Thrope, Humorist of the Old Southwest. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1962; “Thomas B. Thorpe”. Britannica. www.britannica.com. Accessed May 25, 2021

    Neal Auction Company
  • Thomas Bangs Thorpe (American/Louisiana)
    Jun. 25, 2021

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (American/Louisiana)

    Est: $7,000 - $10,000

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (American/Louisiana, 1815-1878) , "Portrait of a Gentleman from Jackson, Louisiana", 1839, oil on canvas, signed, dated and inscribed "Jackson, LA" en verso, 30 in. x 25 in., framed. Note: Thomas Bangs Thorpe (also spelled “Thorp”) moved to Louisiana in 1837. Originally from Massachusetts, he attended Wesleyan University and exhibited promising artistic and literary talents, however health concerns would prevent him from graduating. He was advised to seek a warmer climate, thus spurring his move to the South where he eventually landed in Baton Rouge. Thorpe worked to establish himself as portrait and still life painter in New Orleans before heading upriver in 1839 to the towns of Jackson and St. Francisville in Louisiana. He befriended local planters, including Bennett H. Barrow (1811-1854) of Highland Plantation, and observed with a keen, analytical eye the daily life of those around him. While a northerner was generally looked upon with bemused skepticism, Thorpe’s easygoing and charming manners earned him invitation into local society, resulting in portrait commissions. In 1839, the same year as the date of the portrait offered here, Thorpe’s sketch story of a beloved local character “Tom Owen, The Bee Hunter” was published in the New York Spirit of the Times. The story was so well received that it was republished in many different markets both national and international and included in several mid-century anthologies of American literature such as Rufus Wilmot Griswold’s Prose Writers of America and George and Ever Duyckinck’s Cyclopaedia of American Literature. The publication of “Tom Owen” launched Thorpe’s career as a writer and subsequent works such as “The Big Bear of Arkansas” placed him in the same league as other southern humorists such as Mark Twain. According to his biographer, Milton Rickels, “[The Big Bear of Arkansas] became so well known that Bernard DeVoto has called the body of literature which followed it the Big Bear School of Southern humorists.” His tone, always warm, jovial and bitingly precise, accurately conveyed his admiration for his newfound home from the eyes of a frank, yet respectful, outsider. Thorpe’s body of oil paintings proves incredibly difficult to study. While he relied mostly on his painting income while living in St. Francisville, there are not many known examples of his portraiture remaining. Additionally, he shifted his creative focus from painting to writing and editing for the Concordia Intelligencer in Vidalia, Louisiana in 1843 and would later pursue politics. Notably, no portrait by Thorpe has come to auction in at least twenty years, and most which have been recorded in local art history and portraiture books have been listed as unsigned and “attributed to” as is the case with The National Society of Colonial Dames’ Louisiana Portraits and Martin and Margaret Wiesendanger’s Louisiana Painters and Painting from the Collection of W. E. Groves. The painting offered in this lot is rare in that it is signed, dated “1839” and located “Jackson, La” en verso. The focus is a distinguished gentleman, dressed in fashionable period garb, with a thick black cravat and suit and crisp white shirt reminiscent of the contemporaneous famed portrait of Valcour Aime by Jacques Amans. He casts a gaze on the viewer that is stern and discerning. Rickels recounts in his biography that Thorpe did paint the family members of his aforementioned friend, Bennet Barrow, but there are not many other mentions of other potential subjects. While there were a finite number of planters and eligible sitters in East and West Feliciana Parish at the time, the mysterious gentleman in this portrait remains unidentified. Ref.: Milton, Rickels. Thomas Bangs Thrope, Humorist of the Old Southwest. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1962; “Thomas B. Thorpe”. Britannica. www.britannica.com. Accessed May 25, 2021

    Neal Auction Company
  • Thomas Bangs Thorpe, The Homestead, 1876
    May. 29, 2021

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe, The Homestead, 1876

    Est: $2,000 - $4,000

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (1815 - 1878) The Homestead, 1876 oil on canvas signed and dated lower left: T. B. THORPE. / 1876

    Santa Fe Art Auction
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco
    Jul. 14, 2020

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco

    Est: $300 - $500

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) watercolor on paper, pastoral landscape with reclining cow and women and children playing and picking flowers, a house in the distance. Image measures 16.5" x 24.25", signed "Tho. Thorpe" lower right and dated 1877. In a gilt wood frame, 29" x 37" overall.

    O'Gallerie
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco
    May. 05, 2020

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco

    Est: $300 - $500

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) watercolor on paper, pastoral landscape with reclining cow and women and children playing and picking flowers, a house in the distance. Image measures 16.5" x 24.25", signed "Tho. Thorpe" lower right and dated 1877. In a gilt wood frame, 29" x 37" overall.

    O'Gallerie
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco
    Jul. 16, 2019

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco

    Est: $700 - $900

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) watercolor on paper, pastoral landscape with reclining cow and women and children playing and picking flowers, a house in the distance. Image measures 16.5" x 24.25", signed "Tho. Thorpe" lower right and dated 1877. In a gilt wood frame, 29" x 37" overall.

    O'Gallerie
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco
    Jun. 04, 2018

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) waterco

    Est: $1,000 - $1,500

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE (Louisiana, 1815-1878) watercolor on paper, pastoral landscape with reclining cow and women and children playing and picking flowers, a house in the distance. Image measures 16.5" x 24.25", signed "Tho. Thorpe" lower right and dated 1877. In a gilt wood frame, 29" x 37" overall.

    O'Gallerie
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER (Louisiana
    Jan. 18, 2017

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER (Louisiana

    Est: $1,500 - $2,000

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER (Louisiana, 1815-1878) Pastoral landscape with reclining cow and women and children playing and picking flowers, a house in the distance. Image measures 16.5" x 24.25", signed "Tho. Thorpe" lower right and dated 1877. In a gilt wood frame, 29" x 37" overall.

    O'Gallerie
  • LANDSCAPE BY THOMAS BANGS THORPE (AMERICAN, 1815-1878).
    Jul. 31, 2015

    LANDSCAPE BY THOMAS BANGS THORPE (AMERICAN, 1815-1878).

    Est: $3,000 - $5,000

    LANDSCAPE BY THOMAS BANGS THORPE (AMERICAN, 1815-1878). Oil on canvas, signed and dated "1874" lower right. Group of sheep under a large shade tree in a bucolic landscape setting with a town in the distance. 23.5"h. 35"w., in a period carved and gilded frame, 34"h. 46.25"w.

    Selkirk Auctioneers & Appraisers
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER (Louisiana
    Apr. 01, 2015

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER (Louisiana

    Est: $2,000 - $3,000

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER (Louisiana, 1815-1878) Picking flowers in the pasture, depicting a landscape with women and children playing in a pasture with a reclining cow and a house in the distance. Image measures 16.5" x 24.25", signed "Tho. Thorpe" lower right and dated 1877. In a period gilt wood and gesso frame.

    O'Gallerie
  • Thomas Bangs Thorpe (Louisiana/Minnesota/Massachusetts, 1815-1878) The Old Stone Mill, Newport, R.I. Signed and dated "T.B. Thorpe/1859
    Aug. 10, 2014

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (Louisiana/Minnesota/Massachusetts, 1815-1878) The Old Stone Mill, Newport, R.I. Signed and dated "T.B. Thorpe/1859

    Est: $6,000 - $8,000

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (Louisiana/Minnesota/Massachusetts, 1815-1878) The Old Stone Mill, Newport, R.I. Signed and dated "T.B. Thorpe/1859" (under the liner) l.r., signed, dated, titled, and inscribed "The Old Stone Mill/Newport/R.I./Presented to W.J.A. Fuller/by T.B. Thorpe/1859." Oil on canvas, 19 1/2 x 24 in., in an elaborate gilt-gesso frame with oval liner. Condition: Retouch primarily to sky and to address frame abrasion at edges.

    Skinner
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER
    Dec. 04, 2013

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER

    Est: $2,000 - $3,000

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE WATERCOLOR ON PAPER (Louisiana, 1815-1878) Picking flowers in the pasture, depicting a landscape with women and children playing in a pasture with a reclining cow and a house in the distance. Image measures 16.5" x 24.25", signed "Tho. Thorpe" lower right and dated 1877. In a period gilt wood and gesso frame.

    O'Gallerie
  • Thomas Bangs Thorpe (1815-1878, active N.O.)
    Nov. 19, 2011

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (1815-1878, active N.O.)

    Est: $40,000 - $60,000

    Thomas Bangs Thorpe (1815-1878, active New Orleans 1836-1854, and 1862-1863), "The 'Temple'" and "The Pyramid", both at Chichén-Itzá, Yucatán, 1843; a pair of paintings, oil on canvas, signed and dated en verso of the canvas "Thos. B. Thorpe, Pinx. / after B. M. Norman 1843", and with stencils of New Orleans art-supply houses also en verso of the canvas, each 21 1/2 in. x 27 in., framed Accompanied by B.M. Norman, Rambles in Yucatan...1843, 3rd edition, 3/4 leather, 304 pgs

    Neal Auction Company
  • Thorpe, Thomas Bangs [American, 1815-1878] oil on
    Sep. 11, 2010

    Thorpe, Thomas Bangs [American, 1815-1878] oil on

    Est: $2,500 - $3,000

    Thorpe, Thomas Bangs [American, 1815-1878] oil on canvas landscape painting of ancient ruins on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, c.1848, with gallery label verso "James E. Earle & Son, Earles' Galleries, No. 816 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia", signed verso "Tho. B. Thorpe, Pinx, After____1848". 21.5"x27"

    Wiederseim Associates, Inc.
  • Thorpe, Thomas Bangs [American, 1815-1878] oil on
    Sep. 11, 2010

    Thorpe, Thomas Bangs [American, 1815-1878] oil on

    Est: $2,500 - $3,000

    Thorpe, Thomas Bangs [American, 1815-1878] oil on canvas landscape painting of the Chichen Itza pyramid on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, c.1848, with gallery label verso "James E. Earle & Son, Earles' Galleries, No. 816 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia", unsigned. 21.5"x27"

    Wiederseim Associates, Inc.
  • THOMAS BANGS THORPE
    Aug. 06, 2004

    THOMAS BANGS THORPE

    Est: $4,000 - $6,000

    Signed and dated "T. Banks 1875" l.r.; titled l.l.

    Barridoff Auctions
  • (Thorpe, Thomas Bangs)
    Nov. 29, 2001

    (Thorpe, Thomas Bangs)

    Est: $1,500 - $2,500

    (Thorpe, Thomas Bangs) "The Big Bear of Arkansas," in The Big Bear of Arkansas, and Other Tales Illustrative of Characters and Incidents in the South and South-West. Edited by W[illiam]. T. Porter. Philadelphia: Carey & Hart, 1845 In 6s (7A x 4A in.; 194 x 117 mm). Additional engraved pictorial title-page and 9 engraved plates by Darley; some foxing and soiling, plates moderately to severely browned. Original printed green wrappers; frayed, chipped, repaired, spine splitting, shaken. Half green morocco slipcase, chemise. First edition. "'The Big Bear of Arkansas' by Thomas Bangs Thorpe is the finest example of the maN0 stories of legendary hunters who pursued fabulous bears, a genre coeval with the arrival of the white man on the Atlantic frontier. The tale itself became so popular and exemplary that it provided a designation, 'the big bear school,' for the Southwestern frontier writers who followed Thorpe. Though comic in tone and modest in scope, Thorpe's yarn has much in common with two other important American hunting stories, Melville's Moby-Dick (1851), and Faulkner's The Bear (1942). ... As a popular magazinist, Thorpe successfully employed the romantic themes and genteel style that were conventional in his day. He remains of literary interest, however, for his originality, earthy comedy, realism, and the sense of dignity which he saw in the life and people of the Southwestern frontier" (Humor of the Old Southwest, ed. Cohen and Dillingham, 2d ed., Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 1964, pp. 267-68). Scarce in wrappers, in aN0 condition. References: Litchfield 27; BAL 20301; Wright 2061

    Sotheby's
Lots Per Page:

Popular Artists

Artist Thumbnail
Andy Warhol
Artist Thumbnail
Keith Haring
Artist Thumbnail
Pablo Picasso
Artist Thumbnail
Roy Lichtenstein
Want to be notified when new upcoming works by Thomas Bangs Thorpe are available?

Follow now to be notified when new works of theirs are available at auction.

Devices

Get Invaluable on Your Phone

Download the app via text link to get instantly notified if you’re outbid and receive auction reminders so you never miss out!

Bid On-the-Go!

Download the Invaluable app and never miss an auction from your iOS or Android device.

App Store badgeGoogle Play badge
Invaluable Logo

As the world's leading online auction marketplace, thousands of auction houses use Invaluable to deepen relationships with millions of clients around the world. Stay connected to the things you love with curated items and auctions sent to your inbox.

You can unsubscribe at any time. View ourPrivacy Policy.

© 1986-2025 Invaluable, LLC. and participating auction houses. All Rights Reserved.

TermsSubscription AgreementPrivacy PolicyCopyrightGDPR InfoPrivacy ChoiceYour Privacy ChoicesSite Map