By Tenethia
On October 20th, 2014, the auction house Profiles in History held a Hollywood auction of items from all three of Walden’s currently released Narnia films, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian, and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Nearly two hundred items were sold, including many of the Pevensie children’s costumes from all three films, Tumnus’s flute, Jadis’s wand, and the children’s gifts from Father Christmas (Lucy’s gifts cost nearly $6000 US Currency, while Susan’s horn alone went for $3600). Many pieces of Telmarine armour were also sold, as well as Miraz and Prunaprismia’s costumes. Pieces sold from VDT included the painting, the helm of the Dawn Treader, Eustace’s costumes and the golden statue of Lord Restimar. The most expensive item of the auction was the Book of Spells, which sold for $9,940!
To see the full list of items auctioned, you can view it online in this flipbook format or as a PDF here (may take some time to load). Scroll to page 92 or 91 respectively.
I would love to own any of those props but my goodness do they go for a lot! I’m sure whoever bought them are pleased with their purchases. ^.^
My goodness! Those props/costumes/thingamajigs went for a lot! Bet whoever got the Book of Spells was quite pleased (and broke 😉 .)
hahahaha, I know right?
Wow, that was so cool to look through the catalog. Wish I was a millionaire and could buy some real props! 😉 There are great photos of the costumes in there for costume referencing, especially a couple outfits that we don’t see full length or for very long on screen.
A few of the items went for less, or didn’t go at all (because how many people have room for a bunch of stone statues?). The three Pevensie Statues from the Treasure room went for $450 plus buyer’s premium. I didn’t find out about the auction till a week later, and was very sad, but on the other hand, if I’d known, I might now have three statues in my room and spend the rest of my life attempting to locate Susan.
The Hunting of the White Stag costumes went for a pretty fair price, if you consider fabric costs and labor. Nice that they stayed together as a set.
I feel like there’s some kind of appropriate irony at play in the thought of the Susan statue being missing and the thought of anyone “spending their life trying to locate her”. I’m of the view that Susan did eventually join her siblings in Aslan’s country, but I like the idea of this imagery. 😛
(Alternatively I may have been reading too many bizarre Greek texts and my brain is frazzled 😉 )
You make a good point! NarniaJewel reminded me that the statue of Susan traveled with the Narnia Exhibition, which is presumably why it was separated from the others, so it wasn’t necessarily damaged (though Lucy seems to be. The top of her crown is missing, I think.), but apparently the set has never been reunited.
The are several reason the statues didn’t go for much besides the fact that Susan is missing, there was also reports of key damage to Lucy’s head and also buyers had to take into consideration the incredible cost to ship such large items. International buyers were automatically out on such pieces and east coast buyers had to be prepared to pay several thousand in shipping such pieces. The statue of Susan is owned by Philip Anschutz the primary investor in the creation of the films. It was shipped to his residence from the CA storage company that held a lot of the props after the films. This storage company was bought out by Profiles in History about six months ago and now they are auctioning some of the things as we’ve seen. The other three statues were planned to go to Anschutz but never were and thus were sold as Walden grew tired of paying storage fees and dealing with the stuff and PIH was anxious for them to start moving things.
Ohhhhhhhhhhh…I wish I was a billionaire and had been at that auction! 😛
But then that brings up the question of what on earth would I do with all those props? 😆 I’m sure I’d find a use for them…probably start another Narnia museum.
The most expensive item sold at the auction wasn’t actually the Book of Incantations ($9,840), but rather Peter Pevensie’s Prince Caspian battle armor from his dual with King Miraz ($12,000). The DT painting referred to that sold quite possibly would have challenged for the top spot as it being such an iconic piece however interested buyers could not authenticate it with screen matching from the film. It was rumored to be an unused extra.
There were only about a dozen buyers in on this little known auction, a couple on the floor bidders, a couple phone bidders, which included our ministry, and the rest were internet bidders from around the world. Most of the top (and most expensive) pieces ended up in the hands of a private collector who had an endless bank account and got whatever he wanted. Sadly these pieces will likely never be seen again as he is a “vault collector.” (privately owned/never displayed/never resold) Much of the rest was split between our ministry and another private collector in New York. Despite the small number of buyers, the bidding was very intense and competitive and nothing of significance went cheap. We feel very fortunate to have been able to acquire what we did for our ministry’s purposes. Soon at least these pieces will still be available to the public to see and enjoy!
Oh! Thank you for the correction. Yes, I was wrong.
I was wondering about the DT painting. I expected it would be rather expensive too; now it makes sense for it to go for lower. (I would’ve still bought it, myself, if I’d had the money)