About

Spellman Gallery handles artwork and select antique objects from around the globe.

Founded in 2016 by Glenn Spellman, a certified member of the Appraisers Association of America.

Drawing on 30 years of experience placing art with sophisticated collectors, Glenn has the knowledge, expertise and resources to assist clients. He maintains long-established relationships with private collectors, corporations, and museums around the world and welcomes the experienced collector as well as those acquiring art for the first time.

Spellman Gallery is located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

We welcome all inquiries regarding your buying, selling, consigning, and appraisal needs.

THE TRUE STORY OF A RARE EVA HESSE PAINTING FOUND AT A GOODWILL AUCTION

Laurie Gwen Shapiro for Hyperallergic, April 30, 2025

One afternoon last fall, 55-year-old Kara Spellman was working from her Upper East Side apartment when her phone pinged. Her big brother Glenn, 58, a longtime licensed appraiser and self-described “picker” who lives in the same building, had texted a photo and a short message: “Take a look at this.”

The image was of a small abstract painting — 30 by 24 inches — titled “Landscape Forms” and newly listed on ShopGoodwill.com, the online auction wing of the national thrift store chain. The brushwork was gestural, the color palette felt just right, and in the lower-right corner, a signature: E.H.

Glenn had a hunch. Kara, director of Estates and Acquisitions at Hollis Taggart Gallery in Chelsea, had a stronger one.

“We both have a good eye,” she told Hyperallergic, laughing. “The brushwork looked too specific to be a copy.”

But instinct wasn’t enough. The siblings, who’ve teamed up before on treasure hunts, needed the catalogue raisonné — the official compendium of an artist’s authenticated work.

Kara emailed the Watson Library at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and begged them to pull the volume by the end of the day. Miraculously, someone she knew replied right away: They’d do it. She jumped in a cab.

“There it was,” she said. “Landscape Forms” (1959). Signed. Documented. And officially marked: “Whereabouts Unknown.”

The only visual in the book was an off-color image made from an unmarked slide in the artist’s papers at Oberlin College’s Allen Memorial Art Museum. In fact, as noted in the catalogue raisonné, it’s “one of 15 paintings known only by unmarked slides” included in that archive. But it matched exactly. And it was lost for decades until it popped up at a Goodwill warehouse in Frederick, Maryland.

Read the full article on Hyperallergic