Drooling Over Old Things

Hello, all! I know I've not posted anything of much interest lately, but I want to recommend a few of my favorite sites. 


Many museums have digitized their collections and made them available to view online. However, some institutions have done a better job of this than others. The best and most comprehensive collection I have found online belongs to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I've never been to the Met, and even if I had, I would only be able to view a fraction of their immense collection. For someone like me who is interested in learning to date antiques and determine the origin of a piece, this is an amazing resource. 


Each item has at least one picture, and gives the name of the item or work, the maker (if known), the date, cultural origin, material, etc. Their collections include: American decorative arts, American paintings and sculpture, Ancient Near Eastern Art, Arms and Armor, Arts of Africa, Asia, and the Americas, Asian Art, Religious Art, the Costume Institute (my favorite), Drawings and Prints, Egyptian Art, European Paintings, European Decorative Arts and Sculpture, Greek and Roman art, Islamic art, Medieval art, Modern Art, Musical Instruments, and Textiles.


Visit the site at www.metmuseum.org.


I've already pitched another favorite of mine on the blog, but that was quite some time ago, so I'll reiterate. Shorpy calls itself the "One Hundred-Year-Old Photo Blog." They post daily high-resolution scans of pictures from the dawn of photography to the 1960s. It really is fascinating, and I encourage you to check it out at www.shorpy.com.


One more of my favorite sites is not so much about history as it is about buying and selling extremely expensive items. What site am I talking about? Christies.com, of course. Not every sale deals with antiques, and not every sale is interesting. I couldn't care less about wine or modern art. But I'm all about some jewelry, books, posters, you know, cool things. 


What's awesome about Christie's is the way the site is organized. You can see the results of every auction held for the last fourteen years. Most lots have at least one picture, the original estimate, what it actually sold for, a great description, and any provenance. It's another great resource for those developing an eye for appraising. It's also fun to window shop for things that are worth ten, sometimes fifty times more than my parents make in a year. It's also amusing to see ugly figurines and modern art that could have been painted by a three-year-old could that are worth more than my house. It's like Antiques Roadshow, but without the worthless stuff.


Always, 
Callie