News last week that Battersea Power Station in London was up for sale prompted me to think of other iconic buildings that have been associated with great moments in Rock and Roll History. Battersea Power Station is significant to most people around the world for having been featured on the cover of Pink Floyd’s 1977 LP “Animals”, not forgetting an appearance in the 1965 Beatles film “Help!”.
Very nice memento of Paul McCartney’s 1989 World Tour, the set list used by the tour manager for the Japan leg. Used by the tour manager on a lanyard with his backstage passes and available now on ebay!
Ringo Starr’s drum case
I’m pleased to announce that we have discovered a hugely exciting piece of Beatles Memorabilia!! This gem is Ringo Starr’s drum case used to carry his tom tom drum all over the world when travelling with the Beatles!!
The case is stencilled in two places RINGO STARR THE BEATLES and has a freight label attached that is signed by Ringo. It also comes with a letter signed by Ringo himself stating that the case was in fact his. We have carried out extensive research on the labels on the case and one of them has a date that nails it down to being used to travel to New York for George Harrison’s Concert For Bangladesh in 1971. We also know that this case was certainly used in 1968, around the time of recording the White Album in Abbey Road Studios, and possibly earlier in the Beatles’ career too. This is quite simply one of the nicest pieces of Beatles memorabilia I have seen in a very long time.
If you would like to see memorabilia at Dig Gallery click here .
And it’s for sale, just contact Dig for further details.
Enjoy!
Audrey Hepburn’s Little Pink Dress
Christie’s held their sale of Film Memorabilia yesterday and included as lot 22 was Edith Head’s design for a pink cocktail dress worn by Audrey Hepburn in “Breakfast At Tiffany’s”.
The sketch reminded me of when I found the original pink dress from this sketch in a bedroom in Hoboken, New Jersey. In 2007, I was sent to a gentleman’s flat in Hoboken, the gentleman had recently died and it was well known that he was a collector of Hollywood costumes. The flat was, shall we say, in a poor state of repair, and the owner of the costumes stored them all stacked up on a guest bed. There was no paperwork with the costumes and very few had the original lot tags so we had to carry out a lot of detective work, contact all the auction houses from where the gentleman had made his purchases, locate original auction catalogues and try and piece together the puzzle.
This pretty pink dress was eluding me, I didn’t recognise it and neither did any of the leading costume archivists I contacted. After the third visit to the flat, I found a bunch of old film stills and amongst them was a photograph of Audrey Hepburn wearing the little pink dress. This narrowed it down considerably so we started to watch all of Audrey Hepburn’s films to try and work out which film the dress made an appearance in and there it was - in Breakfast At Tiffany’s! The detective work paid off when the dress made an astonishing $192,000 at Christie’s, New York. It just goes to show how important research is in the memorabilia market - in this case, it made the difference between a few dollars for an unlabelled dress and $192,000 !
Follow this link to view the dress at Christie’s.
There are so many exciting auctions coming up this season, including the Collection Of Elizabeth Taylor at Christie’s on 13-16 December and Profiles In History’s ‘Icons Of Hollywood” auction on 15-17 December featuring a breathtaking array of important and iconic pieces of Film Memorabilia, such as a pair of Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers from the “The Wizard Of Oz”; Marilyn Monroe’s beautiful wedding ring from her marriage to Joe DiMaggio; Bela Lugosi’s cape from Dracula (which has come direct from the Lugosi family); and a DeLorean time machine car from “Back To The Future III”. As if that wasn’t enough, Profiles In History will also host Part II of the Debbie Reynolds Collection auction on 3 December, which includes more incredible Marilyn Monroe costumes, including the green leotard from “Bus Stop” and Christie’s have an amazing John Lennon placard from the Montreal Bed-In in their Rock Memorabilia auction on 15 November. But those pieces are the stuff of dreams and not quite within reach of most of us so I decided to compile a shopping list from this season’s offerings with a price limit of £20,000 per item. Not as easy as you might think! 5) Please Please Me LP signed by the Beatles, Cameo auctions, UK, 8 November, estimate £3,000-5,000. Cameo are a small auction house in the UK that hold regular auctions of Film and Music memorabilia. Although most of the music sales consist of small value records, there are usually a couple of gems hidden in the sale catalogue. Beatles signed LPs are getting harder and harder to find and this is a nice copy of Please Please Me with relatively clean signatures on the reverse. 4) A U.S. cinema poster for “Cat On A Hot Tin Roof” signed for Richard Burton by Elizabeth Taylor “To Richard — the hottest cat on any roof! Happy Birthday - …5/18/85”, included in the Collection Of Elizabeth Taylor at Christie’s, estimate $2,000-3,000. Brilliant! 3) Hand-written letter from James Dean to then girlfriend Barbara Glenn, 1954, estimate £5,000-6,000, with unpublished snapshots of the couple on the beach. Wonderfully early letters written by James Dean during his time in Philadelphia whilst appearing in a theatrical production of The Immoralist. It seems Dean was deeply unimpressed with the play of which he writes “Probably a monster success; but to me it’s still a piece of shit…”. James Dean letters so rarely appear on the market and there are three of these letters to Barbara Glenn in the Christie’s sale of Film Memorabilia on 23 November. 2) A set of 15 Bag One lithographs by John Lennon, 1970, in original white vinyl portfolio, Rock and Pop Memorabilia auction, Christie’s, estimate £15,000-20,000. Created by Lennon as a wedding gift for Yoko Ono, these erotic lithographs caused quite a stir when they were first exhibited in London and were confiscated by Scotland Yard. It is pretty rare to find a complete set with original portfolio and, according to Christie’s specialists, this set is mint condition, having been put away in 1970 and pretty much forgotten about. 1) The Burton wedding bands, two diamond wedding bands given to Elizabeth Taylor upon her marriages to Richard Burton in 1964 and 1975, estimate $6,000-8,000. I could put money on these rings exceeding their pre-sale estimate in the Christie’s auction of the Elizabeth Taylor Collection but it’s nice to think I could buy these at this estimate. Wonderfully poignant considering the history of the Burton-Taylor relationship and beautiful rings too.
The Blitz Benefit is a little-known gig which has become known as Punk’s Woodstock. The gig was organised by friends and peers of Dead Boys drummer, Johnny Blitz who was stabbed in New York’s East Village. Being without medical insurance, fellow Punk musicians held a benefit gig to help pay for his medical bills. The gig took place at CBGBs and was held over 4 nights from 4-7 May, 1978. The artists featured were Blondie * Contortions * Corpse Grinders * Criminals * Dead Boys * Derringer * Dictators * Dots * Erasers * Fleshtones * Ghosts * Glen Buxton * Helen Wheels * Jerry Nolan * John Belushi * Jo Nathan * Paley * Mumps * Richard Hell * Ramones * Rudies * Senders* Shrapnel * Sic Fucks * Spicy Bits * Slander Band * Steel Tips * Stilletto * Students Teachers * Stumblebum * Suicide * Bob Rudnick - what a lineup!
The t-shirts for the gig were designed by Arturo Vega and the original vintage tees are hugely rare - check out ours here at Dig Gallery:
We are very excited about the collection of Punk Memorabilia from the collection of Eileen Polk which we are offering for sale through our gallery, Dig. Check out Dee Dee Ramone’s own personal vintage Ramones tee and Jerry Nolan from the New York Dolls’ used drumstick.
Click here to view memorabilia at Dig Gallery
We also interviewed Eileen and she gives us some wonderful memories about her experiences on the New York Punk scene in the 1970s. Read the interview here, it’s fascinating stuff:
Enjoy!
Helen
In the last few weeks, there have been a series of mega memorabilia auctions, with Marilyn Monroe’s “Subway” dress from “The Seven Year Itch” smashing records to make $4.6 Million. Much has been said about these auctions and the record-breaking prices achieved so I thought I would focus on a slightly more affordable area of collecting: Punk Memorabilia.
When I began work at Christie’s in 1998, a God Save The Queen UK poster would make around £100-200, in fact, it was deemed of insufficient value to even sell as a lot on it’s own so we would group it up with other Pistols posters, like a “Never Mind The Bollocks” poster. One such lot, containing these two posters, made £219 including buyers premium in our Pop Memorabilia sale in December, 1998. But how things have changed. Last month, in Christie’s sale of Rock Memorabilia in London, a “God Save The Queen” poster made £1,375 and this is not unusual. In fact, over the last couple of years, these posters have consistently made over £1,000, sometimes as much as £2,000. Buyers have come to appreciate the Punk asthetic and Jamie Reid’s artwork in particular and now understand that these images are important landmarks of 20th Century Popular Culture. If only I had had the cash back in 1998 to buy some of those posters and tuck them away …but hindsight is a wonderful thing.
Similarly, other gems of Punk Memorabilia are now realising their full potential. The Christie’s sale last month also included a Fender Precision Bass owned and played by Dee Dee Ramone on stage in London in 1981. The guitar made £10,000, an unprecedented price for Ramones Memorabilia. The Clash were out-performing past prices too with an autographed copy of the “London Calling” LP making £1,625.
It’s about time Punk Memorabilia was making prices previously reserved for the likes of The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix and other cultural icons. Prices are still relatively affordable and the confidence shown by buyers in this market recently can only prove Punk Memorabilia to be a good investment for the future.
