Mary Coffin Sampler for Sale

For those who have ever been in the May Your Hands and Shady Bower courses, one of the premiere samplers out of the 15 known horizontal shady bower samplers that the project was based on is on sale!  The sampler had been in the collection of Ralph Esmerian and depositied in the American Museum of Folk Art in NYC.  I was able to view it there two years ago in preparing the research for the online version of the course.  

The piece is part of Sotheby's Americana auction in late January.  If you are in the NYC area and want to take a look before this wonderful sampler goes back into private collection you can view the collections between 10-5pm from Jan 18-23rd at the NYC Sotheby's location.  This auction is particularly rich with many samplers and folk art.  Just looking at the online catalog is a treat.  If you have the chance to go view it, it will be like a big folk art museum on sale.  You can always take something home!  The pre-sale estimate for this piece is $60,000-$80,000.