Press Release: Sotheby's to auction 30 Depression-era photographs by
Dorothea Lange
Bill Hendrie rescued 30 photographs of "Okie"
migrants from a garbage bin at the San Jose Chamber of Commerce in the late
1960s because his family also came from Oklahoma and he said he could relate to
them. During the next 40 years, aside from several attempts by his wife to
return them to the trash, the photos were mostly forgotten. This spring,
Hendrie's daughter, Marian Tankersley, rediscovered them when she was emptying
out her parents' house after their deaths. She contacted experts who confirmed
her suspicions: They are original prints made by the photographer Dorothea
Lange, The Associated Press reports. Among them is "Migrant Mother," the
legendary photo that symbolizes the era.
On Oct. 11, Sotheby's in New York will open bidding
on Tankersley's set of 30 vintage, unretouched Lange photographs at its annual
fall auction, AP says. The pre-bid estimate for the lot: $50,000 to $70,000.
"Dorothea Lange is one of the most important photographers of the 20th century,"
said Christopher Mahoney, a vice president in Sotheby's photography department.
"The photos are documents of a difficult time in American history. But also, in
a lot of instances, they transcend their own time and place and speak
universally of the human condition."
The
photographs, all mounted on weathered white cardboard and annotated either in
Lange's hand or with a typewriter, are from approximately the same time,
1936-38. They feature different migrant families who had come to California from
the Midwest to escape both the Depression and a devastating drought, AP says.
Tankersley was surprised her family still had the photos. She said her father
learned a few years ago from Oakland Museum of California curators that they
were valuable, but he continued to store them in the folds of a sleeper-sofa.
Tankersley thought they were lost when the couch was given away. She said her
mother rediscovered them in a closet at the end of 2003.
Posted: Wed - September 28, 2005 at 12:09 PM