This massively large painting by Frank Ashford was recently purchased and returned to Aberdeen, South Dakota. We don’t know a lot about its origins or exact date, however it was featured in a newspaper article in 2000. The article was about investing in art and featured a gallery in Sioux Falls called LD Andrews Fine Art. The article included a picture of this painting. It turns out it was purchased about this same time by a South Dakotan who ultimately ended up in New Your City. The receipt from the gallery lists the name of the painting, “Portrait of my Model,” and a price of $15,000. To date, that’s the highest price we’ve seen for an Ashford painting. The buyer, however received a substantial discount for buying multiple items from the gallery. We recently acquired the painting from him for about the same discounted price he paid in 2000. We have noticed that a lot of Ashford’s non-commissioned portraits feature a woman that is similar across many paintings. Her hair color, style and clothing are all different, however. But it is the same woman. If you look at “Marjorie” you’ll see a resemblance to this painting. The painting named “Marjorie” is purported to be Frank’s wife, of the same name. We can count at least four known paintings featuring this same woman with the same expression. Frank did not marry Marjorie until 1918, and many of these paintings were done before then. He certainly could have known her, and painted her long before marrying her. Perhaps that’s how they met. The size of this canvas is 43″ X 34″ and it’s signed, FC Ashford and is now part of the collection owned by Troy McQuillen.

If you have a painting by FC Ashford or Frank Clifford Ashford, and wish to know the value, just let us know. Reach out via the contact form on this site.