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Lena Horne's Upper East Side Estate Heads to Auction

By Amy Zimmer | February 15, 2011 6:23pm | Updated on February 16, 2011 6:05am

By Amy Zimmer

DNAinfo News Editor

MANHATTAN — The late legendary singer and actress, Lena Horne, who blazed trails in Hollywood for black performers, was also a collector with a cultivated eye.

Art works that had hung in her Upper East Side home, including a colorful abstract painting by Charles Alston and black-and-white photos by James Van Der Zee, along with roughly 200 other pieces of fine art costume jewelry, gowns, memorabilia, furniture and books are being auctioned off by Doyle New York on Feb. 23 at 2 p.m. The Alston painting is estimated to sell for $30,000 to $40,000; the Van Der Zee photos for $100 - $300.

"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," Doyle's spokesman Louis Webre said. "In the case of Lena Horne, she also established a legacy in the struggle for civil rights."

The Brooklyn native, who passed away in May 2010, had been a lifelong member of the NAACP since the age of two, said Webre, who credited that to her grandmother, an early suffragette.

"During World War II, [Horne] volunteered to entertain the troops and found herself facing an audience of white enlisted men, behind white German prisoners of war, and behind the prisoners of war were African American enlisted men," Webre recounted. Horne refused to sing to a segregated audience, and the USO dismissed her, he said.

The estate also includes inscribed books and autographs from Eloise illustrator Hilary Knight, Madeline author Ludwig Bemelmans, and African-American writer Langston Hughes and other photos by Richard Avedon, and Carl Van Vechten.

From her wardrobe, there are accessories by Chanel, couture by Giorgio di Sant'Angelo, and trunks by Louis Vuitton.

"As in every celebrity sale, there is always interest to see what's in the wardrobe," Webre said. Horne's includes Indonesian, Incan and Arabic styles, he said. "It speaks to the fact that she was a citizen of the world although we all loved her as a New Yorker.”

The public is invited to the exhibition of the Estate of Lena Horne on view from Feb. 18 through Feb. 22 at Doyle New York, 175 E. 87th St.