About
Michael Parsons
Principal and Founder, Parsons Fine Art Advisory, LLC
Parsons Fine Art Advisory appraises fine art, decorative arts and antiques, and researches their history. The practice is based in Rochester, New York, and serves collectors, executors, attorneys, accountants and insurers across Western and Central New York, the Finger Lakes and Greater New York City. Research assignments are undertaken for clients anywhere.
The Houdon busts
An Old Master rediscovery, catalogued as a copy
The busts came from the estate of Mrs. Gertrude Chanler. A leading New York auction house had already appraised the estate, recorded them as copies and passed over them.
In 2019 Michael Parsons was asked to catalogue the pair. His research led to the Frick Art Reference Library, where he located the record that tied them to Jean-Antoine Houdon: signed portraits of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the Comte de Buffon, shown at the Paris Salon of 1789 and praised there in a verse addressed to the sculptor.
By the portraits you make of them I know them, these charming models… our sublime J. J. Rousseau and Buffon.
These were exceedingly rare marble reductions, recorded in the literature and then lost to it. For generations their whereabouts had been unknown; they had been standing in a private house, inventoried as copies.
The pair sold at auction for $1.475 million, and the rediscovery was reported by the international art and trade press. Two works were returned to the recorded oeuvre of one of the great sculptors of the eighteenth century.
This case and two others, with the records
The ownership history came from a second archive. The original purchase agreements were among the papers of the buyer at the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library: the busts had been bought in November 1926 from Paul Gouvert, the Paris dealer and consultant to the Louvre, by the Hon. Irwin B. Laughlin of Meridian House, Washington, D.C.
Neither archive was indexed under Houdon, and neither would have been found by searching for the sculptor. The records that settle such questions are largely absent from the public web: printed catalogues, dealer ledgers, unscanned trade press, closed museum files, subscription databases and archive boxes that a finding aid lists but does not describe. Reaching them requires knowing which archive to ask and whom to write to.
A comparable sale is easy to find once an object has been correctly identified. The appraiser’s value lies in the earlier work: establishing what the object is, who made it, where it has been, and whether the assumption on the inventory sheet holds. On these two objects, that work was worth $1.475 million.
Background
Fifteen years in the Rochester and Western New York market
Michael Parsons grew up in the auction business and trained under Sam Cottone, founder of the firm where he has spent his working life: a structured four-year apprenticeship from 2011 to 2015 in fine art, decorative art, American and European furniture and horology, learning attribution, condition and value with the objects in hand and the results tested at public sale, thousands of lots at a time.
He is Specialist in Research, Cataloguing and Press at Cottone Auctions, where his work spans object research and attribution, catalogue writing, provenance research, appraisal, photography and press relations. Estimates are set on live property continuously, across every category a regional auction house sees: American and European paintings, prints and drawings, furniture, silver, ceramics, glass, sculpture, photography and household contents.
His press work appears in Antiques Trade Gazette and Antiques and The Arts Weekly. He attends TEFAF Maastricht and New York, Frieze New York, The Armory Show and The Winter Show, and maintains an international network of dealers, specialists and collectors to consult when an assignment requires an opinion beyond the practice’s own. He is a member of the Convergence Council of the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, and studied at Canisius University, Buffalo, New York.
Specialties
Areas of depth
Fine Art
- American Art
- 19th Century European Art
- Old Masters Paintings and Drawings
- Prints
Furniture and Decorative Arts
- American Furniture and Decorative Arts
- English Furniture and Decorative Arts
- Continental Decorations and Early European Works of Art
- 20th Century Decorative Arts and Design
- Silver: General
- American and European Pottery and Porcelain
- Art Glass
Clocks and Watches
Clocks and wristwatches, including archive-extract authentication and complication references.
Gems and Jewelry
- Antique and Period Gems and Jewelry
Generalist
The general contents that make up most estates, valued as lots or individually as the assignment requires.
Working with counsel
Counsel in Rochester, Buffalo and Syracuse
Much of the practice’s work arrives through lawyers. Instructions on art and personal property matters have come from trusts-and-estates, tax and matrimonial counsel at firms in Rochester, Buffalo and Syracuse. References are available on request.
Attorneys need three things from an appraiser: a report whose methodology survives scrutiny, a schedule that meets the filing or court date, and someone who does not need supervising.
Credentials & standards
The position, stated precisely
- Qualified appraiser for federal tax purposes under Treasury Regulation §1.170A-17(b)(2)(i)
- Appraisals prepared in accordance with the principles of the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP)
- Accreditation in progress with the Appraisers Association of America; International Society of Appraisers to follow
- Fifteen years’ experience in fine art and personal property, including appraisals prepared for tax purposes that have supported individual charitable gifts of more than $100,000 to the Memorial Art Gallery and the Everson Museum of Art; references available on request
- Engaged by trusts-and-estates, tax and matrimonial counsel in Rochester, Buffalo and Syracuse; references available on request
- Member, Convergence Council, Buffalo AKG Art Museum
- Canisius University, Buffalo, New York
A full statement of qualifications, with representative assignments, categories appraised and the standards the practice works to, is published at Qualifications.
On accreditation, plainly
The accreditation is in progress rather than in hand, and it is fair to ask what that means for a report prepared now. For IRS purposes it means nothing: Treasury Regulation §1.170A-17(b)(2) provides two routes to qualified-appraiser status, a recognized designation or coursework in valuing the type of property together with at least two years of experience valuing it. The second route is met several times over: a structured four-year apprenticeship at Cottone Auctions under the firm's founder, Sam Cottone, from 2011 to 2015, covering fine art, decorative art, American and European furniture and horology, and continuous valuation of property of those types since. The designation is being pursued because it is the shorthand the profession uses, not because the work waits on it.
Independence
Stated plainly
Michael Parsons is employed as a research and cataloguing specialist at Cottone Auctions. Parsons Fine Art Advisory is separate and independent of that role. The practice does not buy or sell property on its own account, does not solicit or accept consignments, and holds no financial interest in the property it appraises.
Where an assignment involves property that employer has handled or may handle, the practice discloses it in writing before accepting the engagement. Where independence cannot be assured, the assignment is declined and referred.
Start a conversation
Ten minutes by telephone will settle whether this is the right practice for the assignment. There is no charge.