Goodwill Hunting

Goodwill is becoming known more and more for some of the artistic finds which occasionally become available.  Recently an Alexander Calder print was purchased for $12.34 at a Goodwill store in Milwaukee.  This sales follows a Dali found in Tacoma, Washington, there was a painting found in NC, and an a Native American artifact discovered in Buffalo, NY.

AND, of course we recently had the Renoir found at a flea market, which was originally offered for sale at the Potomack Company, and then pulled as it was discovered to have been stolen in the early 1950s.

All the items were purchased for nominal amounts, and valued in the thousands.  Yahoo News reports on the most recent Goodwill find.

"Red Nose" just meant a reindeer named Rudolph to Karen Mallet until she bought a print by that name for $12.34 at a Goodwill store in Milwaukee. It turned out to be a lithograph by American artist Alexander Calder worth $9,000.

Mallet's good fortune is at least the fourth time in six months that valuable art has turned up at Goodwill, where bargain-hunters search for hidden treasure among the coffee cups, jewelry, lamps and other household cast-offs.

Last month, a Salvador Dali sketch found at a Goodwill shop in Tacoma, Wash., sold for $21,000. Last summer, a North Carolina woman pocketed more than $27,000 for a painting she bought for $9.99 at Goodwill. And last spring, a dusty jug donated in Buffalo, N.Y., was discovered to be a thousands-of-years-old American Indian artifact — it was returned to its tribe instead of being offered for sale.

When told of the Milwaukee woman's find, a Goodwill spokeswoman said workers at its 2,700 stores try to spot valuables and auction them on the organization's online auction site to net more money for the charitable group. But things slip through the cracks and the workers aren't art experts.

Source: Yahoo News