Dour economy and Antique Road Show change the market for Baltimore

Daily Record, The (Baltimore), Sep 13, 2003 by Robyn Lamb

Thousands of vendors and buyers have trekked their way to Baltimore every summer for the last 23 years to attend the Baltimore Summer Antiques Fair.

Ask anyone - dealers and collectors alike - and they will say it is the premier show on the East Coast.

That's because it's more than just Wedgwood and Tiffany's.

A $3,800 armchair made of tree limbs, an $8,000 clay horse from 206 B.C and a $40,000 sculpture of a woman that is so lifelike she's got goose bumps were just a few of the pieces on sale at this summer's event, which brought 550 exhibitors to the convention center from 35 states and abroad.

Who's buying?

Well, that would depend on who you ask.

The old ones are dead, said Poppy Najoan.

They're not really dead, she says reassuringly, but they're certainly not buying.

Najoan and her husband, Alex, own APN Trading Corp. in New York. The two have been selling primitive art from South East Asia, Africa and Latin America for more than 20 years.

It was at their booth that shoppers could pick up a clay horse and rider piece from the Han Dynasty - 206 B.C. - for about $8,000.

The older generations are going out of the picture, said Najoan's husband. These days it's young professionals who were at one time hippies. They want to own something that reflects what they saw, maybe when they were traveling.

Even the yuppies are gone, he explained.

It is a sentiment shared by many vendors this year.

The days of spending $10,000 just because you like something are over, said Dan Seldin from Saugerties, N.Y.

Seldin, who specializes in what he calls unusual antiques, said it was not at all uncommon a few years ago to have dot-com types breeze into his shop and blow wads of cash with little concern and almost no knowledge about the pieces they were buying.

But these days, you just can't predict who your customers will be, said Lawrence Perlmutter from Kensington.

Perlmutter and many other dealers say the Internet and programs like the Antique Road Show have forever changed the antique market.

They have extended it, said auctioneer David L. Wilt from Bethesda, and made it more efficient.

For Perlmutter, that means handling pieces he may not have carried before - like that 1960s' tree limb armchair.

The big difference is that that very contemporary pieces are desirable these days, and Perlmutter is constantly reassessing what is salable.

Lighting and designer furniture from just around the corner - the 1980s, of all things - is often easier to sell than 19th century glass, for example.

Sex sells too, said Ray Kisber from Montreal.

In addition to his collection of standard modern furniture and Art Deco and Art Nouveau pieces, Kisber showed three sculptures of women - the most expensive going for $40,000 - that drew crowds of onlookers with dropped mouths and wide eyes.

Complete with goose bumps and saggy elbow skin, the resin-cast, hand-painted sculptures were lifelike and shockingly bare.

People think they are either eerie or phenomenal, said Kisber. Men aren't afraid of it but some women find it scary.

Scary perhaps because they look anorexic, commented one wide-eyed woman to her male companion.

To C. Barton Diehl, a dealer from Alexandria, Va., the pieces were sensual - a selling point for both sexes.

The more sensual and erotic , both men and women buy them, he said.

A bronze Art Deco piece at his store in Old Town sold as quick as he could say nude, he added.

That is why Art Deco is so big. It's because of the women - they're nude, explained Kisber.