STEAMBOAT SPRINGS — A folk-art cabinet abandoned in a Routt County home and banished to a barn in 2006 has been appraised at $20,000.
Michelle Caragol, owner of Steamboat Moxie Home Consign and Design, went to a home in Stagecoach to pick up a load of furniture to be sold on consignment in June.
While she was there, the homeowners had her take from the barn a carved cabinet, which had been in the house when they purchased it. The wife didn’t like the piece and so moved it out.
Caragol knew the cabinet was folk art but had no idea whether it was trash or treasure, until a regular customer and artist recognized it as the work of Vermont artist Stephen Huneck.
“Typically, we find out it can go one way or another,” Caragol said about folk art. “It can be a piece of junk, or it can be really valuable.”
Initially, the cabinet owners thought it might be worth $200.
Huneck, best known for his humorous woodcut prints featuring dogs, battled depression and committed suicide in 2010.
His signature and the date 1991 are carved lightly into the cabinet, which appears to be from his Corporate Structure series, which includes tables chairs and clocks carved with themes of rebellion against the corporate world, Caragol said.
The cabinet in the Moxie store has 42 hand-carved men in blue suits and one more on top turning his back to the others.
Caragol described the piece as attention-getting yet polarizing for customers at her store. “They really like it and they’re attracted to it, or they think it’s really creepy.”
After more research, the store thinks Olivia Skye Johnson, an heir to the Johnson & Johnson company, bought the cabinet from what was a Huneck gallery in Breckenridge from 2002 to 2006.
The Stagecoach couple inherited the cabinet when they purchased Johnson’s home in 2006.
“It’s in pretty remarkable condition,” said Moxie employee Bryan Antalek, who helped research the piece.
The cabinet was appraised at $20,000, and Moxie has it listed for sale at $18,508.
Knowing that she is looking for a unique buyer, Caragol is trying to publicize the cabinet’s existence and have it listed on websites, including eBay.
“We can’t find any cabinet for sale that comes from his Corporate Structure period,” Antalek said.
