Ted DeGrazia died in 1982, 12 years before eBay was even a point-click-buy dream.

Too bad. Arizona’s best-known and best-loved artist would have had a hoot over the frenzy his work is causing on the world’s largest online auction network, where daily selections of DeGrazia paintings, prints, ceramics and memorabilia routinely number 100-250, far more than such masters as Diego Rivera or Frida Kahlo, sometimes more than Picasso.

DeGrazia was a paradox. While his serious paintings of Southwest Indians and Mexican life command thousands of dollars and hang in major museums, he also created tons of arty knickknacks–dolls, ceramic figures, ash trays, wind chimes, Christmas-tree ornaments, greeting cards, collector plates, fabrics, needlepoint designs, necklaces and bolo ties, you name it–all bearing the trademark DeGrazia symbol of cute, button-eye, flower-decked Indian and Mexico children.

Most of the latter were produced through licensing arrangements with art guilds and private firms here and abroad. The artist acknowledged at one point that refrigerator magnets alone were bringing in more than $100,000 a year.

DeGrazia liked reaching the masses, and reach them he does through eBay. I began looking out of curiosity. I knew DeGrazia personally and have long collected his work. I bought a couple of hand-signed prints and some other items that seemed like a good deal, particular early work that I wasn’t familiar with. I like the colors and the mood. DeGrazia was an amazing colorist, but I still like best the early flat pastels he applied with a pallet knife.

Oddly, I have very few hand-signed DeGrazia prints. At one time, I felt I was above collecting prints instead of original oils or watercolors. Also, you don’t pal around with somebody like DeGrazia for very long if you’re constantly bugging him to sign something. Today’s escalating prices add a new twist. I can do prints.

Buying anything on eBay, particularly artwork, can be tricky if you’re not familiar with the company’s policy and terminology. One can only marvel at the descriptions sellers come up with to market their goods. “An original print,” for instance. There’s no such thing. Being a print makes it not original. “A signed print.” DeGrazia signed everything on the original. For a reproduction to have value, it must also be hand-signed, or double-signed. Numbered lithographs. DeGrazia may have experimented with lithographs, but he rarely did them, and they weren’t numbered. Frequently, framed greeting cards are offered as prints. I hope they’re nice frames because, as such, the cards are virtually worthless.

Occasionally, an original oil will show up listed to start for an amazing 99 cents. But then you’ll see the “reserve not met” notation, which means the seller isn’t going to part with this baby for anywhere near 99 cents.

I bought something called a “midnight sketch” not long ago. They were DeGrazia’s defense again insomnia; he did hundreds of those, with little handwritten captions on the bottom. I bought it, chancing that the seller had no idea of its value. My mistake. When it came, I removed it from its frame. It was a DeGrazia print from a bank calendar. It even had the days and months on the back.

Just because an artist’s name is DeGrazia, it’s not necessarily the Ted DeGrazia. One recent “DeGrazia” offering depicted Venice gondolas done in a kind of mock Renaissance style. DeGrazia was Italian, but he never painted gondolas, and he didn’t do Renaissance.

DeGrazia and his son Nick were often at odds, but nothing caused a wider gap in their relationship than when Nick, who worked as a boxer and a wrangler, decided to take up painting. He copied his father’s work in the simplest of styles, mimicked the colors and of course the very familiar and famous “DeGrazia” signature which, one assumes, he was fully entitled to use. Nick died some years ago, but his work–donkeys and Indian maidens–still pops up in eBay’s DeGrazia section, often without mentioning his first name.

I also see red flags with this familiar description on eBay: “New DeGrazia design.” DeGrazia died 23 years ago. I doubt he’s turning out many new designs. Another favorite eBay sales pitch: “Purchased from my grandmother’s estate sale and still in its original frame. I don’t know what it’s worth, but I understand DeGrazia was pretty good.”

That he was.

This article appears in Jul 21-27, 2005.

13 replies on “Guest Commentary”

  1. 1974, he was selling necklaces on the counter at a Green Valley bank of a friend of his. My sister bought one for me.($12 then) It is an orginal, he even strung the beads himself. How do I find out the value?

  3. I have 2 signed original De grazia watercolors, one specifically, that says “to Trena” my deceased wife.I also have drinking glasses still in the original box, refrig. magnets & various other items, I am trying to find the value of, especially the signed watercolors. Any suggestions as to how I can get an approx. value? Anyone?

  5. We have a de grazia painting here on the back it says littlest angel its signed on the front i think its in oils not coloured ive tried everywhere to find out whom values de grazia paintings or art ive come up with the same answer over and over again no one so therefore tha art is worth nothing if it cannot be valued pages everywhere with questions all unanswered my wife brought this in L.A. we live in the UK i be pleased to see someone answer any questions about these artworks contact me at stickmaker47@yahoo.com if anyone finds anything out thank you

  6. Hi Ron,

    my name is James F. I run a small Company that acquire items and on occasion, i’ve bought some art. I’ve bought four items of degrazia’s from various estate sales around Arizona. you make it sound like we must all of a sudden, throw out all of degrazia’s stuff including the oils and signed lithographs because Ted had a son who did paintings and signed his name to them. How many of these could his son have made, especially after he had to take up the art after he became an adult, and become as good as his father. He would have had to be a natural to put the quality on paper and canvas well enough to fool the educated art buying public.

    Recently, I retired and I am in the process of selling out all of my collection of art and other items because its not only a hard thing but its damn near impossible to get an auction house to do any work for you. Over my 33 years of collecting. every significant find that I ever had, someone has referred to it as being phoney and with the next comment out of their mouth is, I’ll take it off of your hand as a favor for a little bit of money.

    I just recently found a Raoul Dufy, I was told by one outfit (all via the internet e mail) from France that it was phoney, the other said it might be phoney but the signature looks like it was good and is in the right place. I was told that I would have to pay 500. to have it authenticated and if they find that it was phoney before they complete the authentication, they would give me half of my money back. My wife and are educated people, by that I don’t mean that we know everything but, I’m saying that we know how to research a subject and over the years, we have accumelated a good size library. Books of signatures, Davenports Auction results, American Artists, Cornish colony history and many other history books along with many websites listings for reference.

    I don’t think much of absolute comments. logically, they are not suppose to be true 100% of the time.

    Forgive me but when I hear comments regarding the items that I have like, “is that a Nick Degrazia”, when I never heard of this guy until I put a couple of pieces on ebay, I want to just scream. I have and oil by degrazia and a lithograph with degrazia’s art insciption and a blue pen signature along with numbers. you see, your very good friend, liked women , and I must say a good many of us do. Degrazia, liked to have an early lunch, coffee and whatever else, according to a dauther of a woman he met quite often at that restaurant whereever it was. They met there and he knew her well enough to give her a few of his works.

    No one including you can truely say what anyone else, epecially an artist, would do unless you were living in his back pocket and I think you were not. I salute you for having the opportunity to know such a great man but, some of your comments are absolute and you can’t really verify that all of those facts are true. If you can say that Nick became as good as his father in maybe 1/4 of the time it took his father to achieve his greatness then, you are saying that a true genius was also a very stupid man.

    Thanks for letting me this comment, As I complete my tour on planet earth I have hope that we can get better by working at things ourselves rather than grabbing hold of another man’s coat tail.

  7. I knew the family in the 1970s and Nick’s was quite good at copying the style his dad’s work. He did the designs for a series of resin medallions that were produced in the 1970s. He would sculpt it in beeswax and that was used to make a latex mold. His nephews would then paint them.

    My mom worked at the gallery for 27 years. Ted was quite bitter that his more serious work never received the acclaim that his more popular pieces did.

  8. Hey Ron, THANKS. I have two little handpainted (heavy coat primary color watercolors) of little boy and girl each with donkey. Tried to clean up some idiots pencil scratches and kind of ruined that section of the brown beige background. I also have some resin jewelry which a guy in Tucson told me was pretty worthless. ???
    Anyway, what did you do with your Nick DeGrazia little watercolor paintings?

  9. I bet the resin necklace medallion and ear rings signed “deGrazia” are by Nick too.
    Interesting. Does anyone buy Nick DeGrazia’s work?

  10. Yes. It was Nick who designed the resin medallions. They were produced in a work shed in the backyard of the house where my friend (Nick’s nephew) grew up. They referred to them as “cookies” because of the size and shape.

  11. Hi i put a post on some time back about Nick DeGrazia the Clown painting signed on the bottom r side . The back in pencil To Dorothy From Nick Degrazia . There is a red stamp Reproduction Rights reserved by artist also . The clown looks like a kid painting but cute i deleted the picture on photobucket some time ago had no help on is so gave up . Flo G

  12. Back in 1976 my dad and i were traveling throughout Arizona just after passing throught apache junction my dad said he wanted to stop at a friends place soon after we stopped at an art gallery when we enterd man dad was met by a man who had know my dad because they hugged and spoke for a long while. The man then asked me if i would like for.him to.scetch for me i said yes and he did its a beautiful sctech of a little girl holding an umbrella. Done with a black market. This man turned out to be ted can anyone give me an idea of the value of such a scetch if it has any value.

  13. Hello,
    My friends mother passed away recently and he is getting ready for an estate sale. She has a painting of De Grazia’s “Little boy holding rooster” so where may I send a picture of it to you, I bvelieve it is an original but not positive. Is there a certain number of originals he painted or?
    Any comment would be greatly appreciated.
    Thank you for your time.

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