John Wilde

John Wilde drew like a fifteenth-century Flemish master and dreamed like a surrealist. For half a century he worked quietly in rural Wisconsin, putting himself — bald, bespectacled, often undressed — into meticulous, impossible scenes, and reviving silverpoint, a Renaissance drawing technique that permits no erasing and no mistakes. Museums from the Whitney to the Art Institute of Chicago collected him while he stayed home.

If you own a work by John Wilde, Revere Auctions would like to see it. We are the auction house of the Upper Midwest, and Wilde is one of our region’s most important artists. Send photographs through our free auction estimate form and our fine art specialists will respond with an honest valuation.

Who Was John Wilde?

Wilde was born in Milwaukee in 1919 and educated at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. The Second World War interrupted his studies; he served in the Army, kept a journal thick with drawings, and mailed inked sheets home to friends. Back in Madison he wrote a master’s thesis on the surrealist Max Ernst — a clue, early, about where his art was headed.

He joined the Madison faculty in 1948 and taught drawing there for thirty-four years. His students included Bruce Nauman, who went on to become one of the most influential artists of the postwar era. Wilde himself never left. While his friends and rivals chased New York, he settled near the village of Cooksville, Wisconsin, and painted what he called the thing in the moment: love, mortality, gardens, birds, and his own recurring face.

He belonged to the circle now called the Wisconsin magic realists — his lifelong friend Karl Priebe, Sylvia Fein, Marshall Glasier, Dudley Huppler, and, in Chicago, Gertrude Abercrombie, at whose jazz-filled salons the group gathered. Wilde died in Cooksville in 2006, and the rediscovery of his circle has been gathering pace ever since.

What Did John Wilde Make?

Wilde is above all a draftsman. His most distinctive works are silverpoints — drawings made with a silver stylus on prepared ground, a technique of the Renaissance that rewards total control and punishes hesitation. Around them sit precise, jewel-toned oil paintings, etchings, and lithographs. The imagery is unmistakable: self-portraits in fantastical settings, figures paired with oversized fruit and insects, tender and unsettling at once.

Because he worked across mediums for six decades, works by Wilde surface at every level — major paintings, finished silverpoints, working drawings, and editioned prints. Telling them apart, and telling an important sheet from an ordinary one, is exactly the kind of judgment an estimate exists to provide.

How Much Is My John Wilde Work Worth?

Several things determine what a work by John Wilde brings at auction:

• Medium — paintings and finished silverpoints lead his market; etchings and lithographs, made in editions, sit well below unique works
• Imagery — the classic Wilde subjects — the self-portraits, the figures with fruit and birds, the dreamlike still lifes — are what collectors compete for
• Date and finish — a fully realized sheet from his mature decades carries more weight than a study or a late variant
• Condition — silverpoint and works on paper are unforgiving of damp, light, and amateur framing; an untouched sheet matters
• Provenance — many works passed directly from Wilde to Wisconsin friends and colleagues, and that history adds interest and value

The honest answer is that no two are alike, and the difference between an ordinary example and an exceptional one is a conversation with a specialist, not a chart. Send us photographs through our free auction estimate form — front, back, signature, and any labels — and we will tell you what you have.

The Market for Wilde

Wilde’s reputation was always national — his work entered the Whitney, the Smithsonian, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago decades ago — but his market long remained a regional secret. That is changing. The Milwaukee Art Museum is currently showing the Wisconsin magic realists as a group, national attention on Gertrude Abercrombie has pulled the whole circle upward, and works by Wilde have appeared in our own sales.

A rising market is precisely when auction matters most. No private offer will pay tomorrow’s price today; competitive bidding among the collectors and museums now looking for Wilde is how his new level gets set. If you own one, this is a good moment to find out what it is worth.

How to Sell a Work by Wilde

The strongest results for a John Wilde work come at auction, where national and international collectors bid against each other. Revere Auctions offers free, no-obligation auction estimates: send photos and dimensions and our specialists respond with a current market valuation and a recommendation on how to sell. Consigned works are professionally photographed, cataloged, and marketed through our fine art auctions to a worldwide bidder base, and we regularly arrange shipping for consignors across the country. If you need a formal written valuation for insurance or estate purposes, our appraisal and valuation services team can help; you can also read more about how selling at auction works.

Related: Wisconsin artists & the magic realists, our fine art department, appraisal services, free auction estimates.

Reviewed by the fine art specialists at Revere Auctions, St. Paul, Minnesota.

John Wilde: Frequently Asked Questions

How much is a John Wilde worth?

It depends on medium, imagery, date, and condition. Paintings and finished silverpoint drawings lead his market, while editioned prints sell for less. Revere Auctions provides free auction estimates from photographs.

What is a silverpoint drawing?

A drawing made with a silver stylus on specially prepared paper, a technique of the Renaissance masters. The line cannot be erased, and it tarnishes over time to a warm gray. Wilde was one of the few modern American masters of the medium, and his silverpoints are among his most sought-after works.

How do I know if my John Wilde is authentic?

Wilde signed and often dated and inscribed his works, and much of his output passed through documented Wisconsin collections. Send photographs of the front, back, signature, and any labels with your free estimate request and our specialists will review it.

Why is interest in John Wilde growing?

Museum attention on the Wisconsin magic realists, including a current Milwaukee Art Museum exhibition and a major traveling retrospective of Gertrude Abercrombie, has brought the whole circle to a national audience. Collectors follow museums.

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