A silver anniversary

Magazine Antiques, Oct, 2004 by Allison Eckardt Ledes

Like marriages, some institutions withstand the test of time better than others. Thus when an association achieves the age of fifty, it has reached a milestone worth celebrating. The New York Antique and Art Dealers Association (later renamed the National Antique and Art Dealers Association of America, or NAADAA) was founded during the summer of 1954 in New York City and shortly thereafter its members elected Alex G. Lewis, Eric Shrubsole, Ralph M. Chait, John P. Conklin, Frank Caro, and Edward Munves Sr. as its officers. One of the most important of the founding purposes of the organization was and remains, in the words of its current president Mark A. Schaffer, "to safeguard the interests of those who buy, sell or collect antiques and works of art through honorable and ethical trade practices and to advance the knowledge of our members' collecting fields to the public-at-large." The organization began as a group of nineteen firms and by the summer of 1955 there were twenty-one members who participated in NAADAA's first cooperative show, entitled Art Treasures Exhibition, which was held in the salesrooms of Parke-Bernet Galleries in New York City. It was the first of three large exhibitions that drew upon the considerable expertise of the membership.

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In 1962 NAADAA became a member of the Confederation Internationale des Negociants en Oeuvres d'Art (CINOA), a confederation of thirty-two art and antiques associations in twenty-one countries, which today encompasses about five thousand firms. NAADAA is involved in lobbying on behalf of art buyers and has donated funds to graduate programs in the decorative arts.

To celebrate this anniversary NAADAA has organized an exhibition that will be the centerpiece of the International Fine Art and Antique Dealers Show at the Seventh Regiment Armory in New York City from October 21 to 28. This fair, now in its sixteenth year, has relied from its inception on the participation of NAADAA members. Entitled The Passion of Collecting: 50 Years of NAADAA, the exhibition includes archival photographs and other memorabilia spanning the history of the organization, its members, and the major public and private collections that have been assembled through its member firms. Eric Shrubsole, the sole surviving founding member of the organization, will be honored at a dinner along with the firms that have been members since NAADAA was formed: A La Vielle Russie, Ralph M. Chait Galleries, James Graham and Sons, James Robinson, and Stiebel.