By Amy Zimmer
DNAinfo News Editor
MANHATTAN — The auction of art, jewelry, gowns and other memorabilia from the Upper East Side home of legendary entertainer and civil rights pioneer Lena Horne fetched $316,000 on Wednesday — more than double auction house Doyle New York’s high estimate.
The room was packed with hundreds of fans and friends of the elegant Brooklyn-born star, who died last May at age 92.
"It was standing room only," Louis Webre, of Doyle New York said. "Bidders on the telephone included quite a number of celebrities and some prominent institutions."
All of the roughly 200 pieces sold from the collection put up for sale by Horne’s daughter, Gail Lumet Buckley.
The big-ticket items included a small Louis Vuitton trunk that sold for $20,000 after being estimated at $700. An abstract painting by Charles Alston also went for $20,000, but that expected to bring up to $50,000.
A painting of the singer and actress by the dancer Geoffrey Holder, estimated to go roughly $3,500, took in more than $10,000.
A signed picture by James Van Der Zee from 1930 of women on the beach of Atlantic City went for $9,375 — more than three times what it was expected to fetch.
Horne’s Giorgio di Sant' Angelo Reversible mink coat went for more than $8,000, though it estimated at $500.
"She was one of the handful of women who came from New York and rose to truly national prominence furthering the arts and culture. I'm thinking: Lena Horne, Beverly Sills, Jacqueline Onassis, Kitty Carlisle," Webre told DNAinfo before the auction. "In the case of Lena Horne, she also established a legacy in the struggle for civil rights."
