Sotheby’s of New York has been approved once again by the James Prendergast Board of Trustees to handle the auction of oil paintings purchased by funding left by Mary Prendergast’s will.
On Thursday, the library board unanimously approved a resolution cosigning the bulk of the art collection to Sotheby’s. After the meeting, R. Thomas Rankin, library board president, said the paintings will be physically transferred to New York City to Sotheby’s facility to be cleaned up for the auction, which will take place later this year.
There will be several separate auctions, with the first one occurring the first week of October, Rankin said. He said the library board should be able to announce the dates for the auctions by the end of the summer.
Rankin said the library also took a hit financially when the city of Jamestown cut their funding by 71 percent for 2017. The city funded the library $100,000 this year, which was decreased from $350,000 in 2016.
