Early Fort Worth artist Bror Utter‘s intriguing oil on canvas painting “The Visitors” (1943) fetched $35,850 at Heritage Auctions in Dallas last weekend.
That’s some serious cheese for local art.
Utter (1913-1993) is a prominent figure among the Fort Worth Circle artists who explored modernism in the 1940s. He’s often pegged as Fort Worth’s most influential early artist.
Still, Kelly Fearing‘s “The Lifters” (1944) appears to hold the record for top selling painting — it reportedly sold for close to $40,000 a couple of years back.
Fearing is still alive and kicking and living in Austin.
Bror Utter gave a talk and demonstration about art at a school assembly when I was a kid. He painted a watercolor while he spoke, signed the painting, and gave it to the school.