Heritage Auctions Awarded Property from the Wine Collection of Frederick H. Schrader

Treasures from the Napa Valley powerhouse winemaker, to be offered in a series of auctions throughout 2024 and 2025, include acclaimed wine, American and European art, antiques and more DOWNLOAD DIGITAL PRESS KIT DALLAS, Texas (Nov. 14, 2024) — Heritage Auctions is honored to announce it will offer property from the Collection of Frederick H. Schrader, Napa Valley. The collection includes rare and significant wine, art and antiques; the consignment will be offered in several Heritage auctions in the coming weeks and through 2025, including a single-owner auction titled The Sophisticated Palate: The Collection of Frederick H. Schrader, scheduled February 20, 2025. Fred Schrader’s fine instincts have served him incredibly well over the decades. Schrader’s success as an art and antiques collector and dealer — with his killer eye and an unquenchable thirst for discovery — eased his way into his enormously successful wine-making venture. The New Jersey-born, Florida-raised businessman, who started collecting and selling art in the 1970s and ’80s, has traveled the world in pursuit of treasures ranging from 16th-century Italian sculptures and modern abstract paintings to American Indian artifacts and Tiffany lamps. His reputation as an award-winning Napa Valley winemaker was solidified by 2000, when he partnered with winemaker Thomas Brown and an outstanding barrel sample from the Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard carved out Schrader’s direction and led to overwhelming critical acclaim, including thirty-nine perfect 100-point scores from top wine critics. By Schrader’s estimation, over the decades he has bought and sold more than 200,000 artworks and sought-after objects, and as an avid collector of fine wines, he maintains a 5,000-bottle collection. “Heritage is honored to present the important and diverse collection of Frederick H. Schrader, whose discerning taste and decisive nature led to tremendous success in the worlds of wine, art, and antiques,” says Samantha Robinson, Director of Decorative Arts and Design. “Given its breadth and depth, the collection will be sold in a series of Heritage’s sales through 2025, including the dedicated February 20 auction, The Sophisticated Palate, which includes a section dedicated to works that depict winemaking and drinking, and a forthcomingThe Cabinet of Curiosities: The Collection of Frederick H. Schrader Showcase Auction.” Much of the magazine and newspaper ink that’s been spilled on Schrader is focused on his remarkable wine-making ventures, which began in the 1980s and entered a new prime in the 2000s. Says Frank Martell, Heritage’s Senior Director of Fine & Rare Wine, “The story of Schrader wines is really a guidebook for any aspiring label: buy the best grapes, hire the best winemaker, price your wines reasonably, sell them into the right markets, and make sure your team understands that your product is what’s inside the bottle, rather than the packaging and marketing. Earn your place in the glass, and the buyers and ratings will follow.” Among the many highlights from the Schrader Collection that will lead Heritage’s November 22 Fine & Rare Wine Signature® Auction in Beverly Hills, this 2001 Schrader Cabernet Sauvignon, MX, Beckstoffer To-Kalon, is from Schrader’s personal cellar. There are only 300 magnums of this wine, a cuvee produced from Schrader Cellars’ finest lots. Also on offer from the collection is the 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon Schrader Beckstoffer To-Kalon Vineyard, which Thomas Brown calls the “Schrader Schrader, the ... perfect wine of the vintage.” “Some highlights are the rare and early vintages, which simply don’t exist in the open marketplace,” says Schrader. “The 2007 double magnum of Old Sparky was my first 100-point score awarded by James Laube. The suite of double magnums from 2012 is one of the highest-acclaimed vintages Schrader ever produced. Also being offered are several 2016 mixed cases known for their concentrated fruit and velvety mouthfeel, showcasing the Tokalon terroir beautifully.” Before he discovered his talent for bringing about popular and critically acclaimed wines, Schrader was (and is) an established art and antiques dealer and collector, with a keen eye for American and European art, both classic and contemporary. “I started collecting when I was seven or eight years old,” says Schrader. “I was collecting coins — that’s how I started in the business. Then, as I got older, it expanded to antiques and then to paintings. So, by the time I was 18, I was fully immersed in just about all fields of art.” His expansive taste will benefit a new set of collectors. “Heritage is delighted to present several outstanding works from the Schrader Collection in our November 15 auction of important American Art,” says Aviva Lehmann, Heritage's Senior Vice President of American Art. “These pieces reflect Schrader’s visionary and discerning approach to collecting, with a focus on classic American Impressionism and Modernism. William Merritt Chase’s Portrait of a Young Girl with Yellow Hair Ribbon, a likely portrayal of one of the artist’s daughters, is an intimate and tender piece that exemplifies the finest qualities of Chase’s portraiture.” Other Schrader highlights in the Nov. 14 American Art auction include an significant sculpture by Gaston Lachaise. “Lachaise’s Breasts, from 1933, sensuously carved from marble rather than the more typical bronze, is a tribute to Lachaise’s wife and muse, Isabel Dutaud Nagle, and represents Lachaise’s profound dedication to Modernist interpretations of the female form,” says Lehmann. Adds Schrader, “It was one of his most loved and coveted pieces that Lachaise only sold at a time of great desperation to the man who would become his biggest benefactor, Mr. Edward M.M. Warburg.” And on the more recent art front in this auction is a dynamic Ed Mell painting from 2011, titled Reaching Clouds. “Mell’s breathtaking work, a prime example from the artist’s mature period, stands as a poignant homage to the master, who passed away in 2024,” says Lehmann. In fact, Schrader’s impeccable taste in Modern & Contemporary art also shines through in Heritage’s December 10 Modern & Contemporary Art Signature® Auction through such gems as Burgoyne Diller’s striking and graphic 1963 oil on canvas First Theme. The work, with its intersecting black, white, yellow and orange “positive” and “negative” space, is a powerful testament to Miller’s De Stijl sensibilities and to Schrader’s cultivated eye. And on tap from Schrader’s sweeping collection for Heritage’s Dec. 6 European Art Auction are just over a dozen works that reflect his taste for gorgeous landscape painting and more. “On offer this season is a beautiful cache of luminous views of Venice from the Schrader Collection, all painted by gifted 19th-century Spanish landscapists who loved the city,” says Dr. Marianne Berardi, Heritage's Director of European Art. “These beautifully detailed expanses along the Grand Canal and a sparkling scene of the Piazza San Marco painted from the water are featured in the work of Jose Villegas y Cordero, Rafael Senet y Perez, Martin Rico y Ortega, and Antonio Reyna Manescau.” Highlights include Martín Rico y Ortega’s bright and serene oil-on-canvas painting Santa Maria della Salute and the Dogana, Veniceas well asAntonio María de Reyna Manescau’s 1888 Chiesa di Santa Maria del Rosario, Venice, San Giorgio Maggiore in the distance. And Schrader’s love of sculpture surfaces in the European Art auction with a circa-1500 bronze pacing horse from the Northern Italian School, eternal in its clean and muscular lines. “What I am offering through Heritage is packed with true gems from my collection,” says Schrader. “I am now passing on for the next generation to enjoy.” Property from the Collection of Frederick H. Schrader, Napa Valley, California, will be offered in several Heritage auctions this year, including the November 15 American Art Signature® Auction, the November 22 Fine & Rare Wine Signature® Auction, the December 6 European Art Signature® Auction and the December 10 Modern & Contemporary Art Signature® Auction. The sale of the collection will continue in a variety of 2025 Signature and Showcase auctions, including the February 20 The Sophisticated Palate: The Collection of Frederick H. Schrader, Napa Valley Signature® Auction; the May 9 Fine Silver & Objects of Vertu Signature® Auction; and the June 4 Ethnographic Art Signature® Auction. For more, please visit HA.com. Heritage Auctions is the largest fine art and collectibles auction house founded in the United States, and the world's largest collectibles auctioneer. Heritage maintains offices in New York, Dallas, Beverly Hills, Chicago, Palm Beach, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, Hong Kong and Tokyo. Heritage also enjoys the highest Online traffic and dollar volume of any auction house on earth (source: SimilarWeb and Hiscox Report). The Internet's most popular auction-house website, HA.com, has more than 1,750,000 registered bidder-members and searchable free archives of 6,000,000 past auction records with prices realized, descriptions and enlargeable photos. Reproduction rights routinely granted to media for photo credit. For breaking stories, follow us: HA.com/Facebook and HA.com/Twitter . Link to this release or view prior press releases . Hi-Res images available: Christina Rees, Public Relations Specialist 214-409-1341 or Christina Rees@HA.com