I'm Josh Levine. I've spent 25 years and more than 500 auctions looking at art in Arizona homes, from paintings that turned out to be worth less than their frames to the Ed Mell that nobody in the family knew was an Ed Mell. I'm a personal property and fine art appraiser in Phoenix, formerly J. Levine Auction & Appraisal, and I write fine art appraisals to USPAP standards for collectors, families, attorneys, galleries and insurers across the Valley, Sedona and Prescott.
The work is research. Anyone can tell you a painting is pretty. My job is to tell you who made it, what shape it's in, what it has sold for and what that means for the decision in front of you.
What a fine art appraisal covers
Oil and acrylic paintings, watercolors and drawings, prints and editions, photographs, sculpture and bronzes, and the categories that run deep in Arizona: Western and Southwestern painting, Cowboy Artists, Taos and Santa Fe school works, Native American art, mid-century modern and contemporary pieces. I also appraise the European and East Coast works that arrive here when people retire to the Valley: 18th and 19th century paintings, marine scenes, icons, portraits.
A single painting over the sofa or a 60-piece collection, the method is the same. Each work is examined, photographed, measured, described and researched individually.
Attribution, authentication and what an appraiser can honestly say
People often call asking me to authenticate a work. Here's the straight answer. An appraisal states a value opinion. Authentication, in the strict sense, comes from the artist's foundation, estate, catalogue raisonné committee or recognized scholar, and some artists have no such authority at all. What I do is attribution research: I examine the signature, materials, construction, labels and provenance, compare the work against documented examples, and tell you how strong the attribution is and where to go if a formal opinion is needed. Where forensic analysis helps, I'll say so and point you to the right lab.
Then I value the work in a way that reflects that evidence. A painting firmly by a listed artist, a painting attributed to that artist, and a painting in the manner of that artist are three different markets, and my report says plainly which one yours is in.
Market value, replacement value and retail guidance
A fine art report can serve several purposes, and the value definition changes with the purpose. For a sale or an estate, you want fair market value, built from comparable auction results. For insurance, you want retail replacement value, built from gallery and dealer pricing. For a gallery or an owner planning to sell in a specific market, I can add retail pricing guidance for that market.
For a Sedona client in 2025 with four paintings, two attributed to 18th and 19th century European artists, I prepared a market value appraisal for insurance, estate and resale decisions and added separate Sedona retail price recommendations for each piece, so they could decide whether to sell locally, consign to auction or keep and insure. Total market value came to $7,750, which is exactly the kind of honest, mid-range result that lets a family make a calm decision.
The Arizona art market
Scottsdale, Sedona and Santa Fe form one of the strongest regional markets in the country for Western, Southwestern and Native American art. Artists tied to this region, and the galleries and auctions that specialize in them, can carry prices a national database won't show you. The reverse is true too: a regional East Coast painter may have a thin market here and a strong one back home. Knowing where a work should sell is as much a part of the appraisal as knowing what it is.
How the process works
Send photos through the form, front and back, with any signatures, labels or stamps, and tell me what you need the appraisal for. I'll reply within one business day. For one or two works, good photographs and measurements may be enough to start. For a collection, or anything where condition matters to the value, I come to the house. Then I research comparable sales, write the report, send you a draft to check the details, and deliver the signed final.
Timeline and quotes
A single, well-documented painting moves quickly. Works that need attribution research or a conservator's condition opinion take longer, and I'll tell you that at the start. You'll have a delivery date when I quote the job.
I don't post prices because research time varies so much from one work to the next. Call or send photos and I'll quote the whole job up front. My fee is never a percentage of the value and I don't buy or sell what I appraise, so you can trust that the number in the report isn't bent toward anyone's interest.