Auction Ninja

‘Pawcasso’ and ‘Vincent van Goat’: Toronto Zoo animals become artists for annual silent auction

The annual event marking the zoo’s birthday goes until Sunday, with items ranging from animal artworks to behind-the scenes-tours.

Updated Aug. 16, 2025 at 8:50 p.m.
Aug. 16, 2025
Aug. 16, 2025
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Ever wanted to paint with a polar bear?

If this is your dream, and you’ve got a couple thousand dollars to spend, the Toronto Zoo’s silent auction is for you.

The annual event that celebrates the zoo’s birthday began last Friday and stretches until Sunday, with items ranging from concert tickets to behind-the scenes-tours to art created by zoo creatures — including a brush-wielding donkey.

The organization just squeaked passed their $30,000 fundraising goal on Friday which they say will go toward protecting wildlife in Ontario and funding Toronto Zoo operations.

ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW

“Education, animal welfare and well-being and conservation science work are the three key areas of our focus for fundraising so this is a very, very big for us,” said Kathy Koch, executive director of the conservatory.

The critter-crafted art pieces have been the auction’s staple through the years, though only the Polar Bear Painting Experience offers bidders the chance to meet the animal and pick the colours the bear then smudges on its paws before decorating a canvas.

The other works, which include footprint and brush-stroke creations with names like ”Vincent Van Goat,” ”Teenage Mutant Ninja Tortoises” and ”Pawcasso,” were painted before the silent auction. Some animals got to pick their colours before stepping into them and then onto the canvas. Others, like the zoo’s gorillas and orangutans held paintbrushes — donkey Sterling held his brush in his mouth — to make their masterpieces.

“It really is sort of a novel sensory experience for them. It’s a tactile experience. It’s not really something that they get to do on their day-to-day,” Kelsey Godel, an engagement co-ordinator with the conservatory, said.

The most sought after art piece is a black footprint of the western lowland gorilla Charles, who passed away at the zoo last October at age 52. Charles’s canvas had the highest bid in the auction Saturday night at $2,000.

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The Irresistible Allure of DC Estate Sales

The pandemic all but killed the in-person estate sale. But they’re back—and booming.

Written by Eric Wills
| Photographed by Evy Mages
| Published on August 12, 2025

Shoppers lined up on a recent Saturday for an estate sale in Bethesda.

But there were treasures still to be found. In the kitchen, tucked into a corner, I discovered mine: a midcentury rosewood bar cart by Danish designer Ludvig Pontoppidan. The handle was cracked, the finish worn, but one could imagine Safire pouring himself a bourbon, neat, soda on the side—his go-to order—before retiring to his office to finish a column. The price, $300, was a bit steep given the condition. So, as some sales allow, I placed a bid, $160, and waited to hear my fate.

The lure is in the hunt. In 2005, at an estate in Louisiana, a collector bought a painting for less than $10,000; it turned out to be Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi,” which sold at auction in 2017 for $450 million. Big scores have become less common in the age of Google Lens, which makes it easier to identify pricey antiques.

And yet the in-person sale has demonstrated surprising staying power. For one thing, the auction model makes less sense for inexpensive items: glassware, old games, knickknacks. For another, the community that’s developed around in-person sales remains a draw. “We missed our people,” says Shreve Cady about the pandemic hiatus. “It’s a different shopper who comes for the experience than one who’s looking online to add the perfect lamp to their living room.”

In June, I encountered a listing for an estate sale unlike any I had ever seen. “I’m a performance artist, and I’m turning my post-marital estate sale into a filmed performance and documentary,” the Facebook ad read. “This is more than a sale. It’s a conversation about change, identity, sacrifice, and starting over.”

On a Sunday afternoon, I pulled up to a midcentury-modern house in Alexandria’s Waynewood neighborhood. The front lawn was filled with art, glassware, vintage barstools, Ikea chairs—everything that the host, Jodi Askew, was unable to squeeze into a Honda Fit before embarking on a cross-country road trip to start a new life, post-divorce, in Portland. The emotional backstory of a sale usually remains a veiled mystery—but not here.

“I was in a ten-year relationship with a really good man, and through the course of that relationship, I realized I was queer,” Askew, 31, who uses they/them pronouns, said in their living room turned studio, as a film crew recorded. “I didn’t really want the domestic life I thought I wanted.”

How hard was it to part with so many possessions? “Seeing the things I procured at much simpler times in my life” left Askew “mourning that innocence.” But “having them live on with somebody else who sees them with fresh eyes feels beautiful.”

I didn’t attend the sale; I didn’t want to see the masses wrangling over my mom’s possessions. I don’t think she would have much liked it. But now when I visit a sale, I feel like I’m communing with her spirit, sharing in the chase. Especially at one precipitated by a death, I’m attuned to life’s evanescence, reminded that my time will also come.

Estate-Sale Tips

Need to host a sale? Here are suggestions for finding a company.

Do Your Research

Get It in Writing

Make sure to sign a contract that considers all the potential contingencies of a sale and that lays out specific fees, if any, for cleaning post-sale or consigning or tossing leftover items.

Manage Your Expectations

Those shelves of Delft pottery that your mom collected as an investment? They now go for a song. Check recent sales on LiveAuctioneers.com or eBay or to get a sense of the going rate for antiques. Most companies will bring in appraisers to help price more obscure items.

Keep the Threads

A lot of people will offload all the clothing in a house before staging a sale. But that’s a mistake, says estate-sale influencer Maddy Brannon. Vintage clothing can draw people in: “It’s actually a pretty important piece of the sale.”

And if you’re looking to score a bargain, consider this advice:

Pick the Right Sales

Estate sales come in many forms. Some are expertly curated—they tend to have higher prices but more refined offerings. And some are glorified garage sales, with items tossed into boxes. Check out the listings and photos on EstateSales.net or Facebook Marketplace to get a sense of what a sale might have.

Make a Last-Minute Offer

Most sales run for two or three days over a weekend, and some companies drop prices by a predetermined amount each day: 50 percent off on the last day, for instance. Scoring a deal gets easier in the waning hours. For items with big sticker prices, companies may decide to consign them to auction, so be realistic when making a bid.

But there were treasures still to be found. In the kitchen, tucked into a corner, I discovered mine: a midcentury rosewood bar cart by Danish designer Ludvig Pontoppidan. The handle was cracked, the finish worn, but one could imagine Safire pouring himself a bourbon, neat, soda on the side—his go-to order—before retiring to his office to finish a column. The price, $300, was a bit steep given the condition. So, as some sales allow, I placed a bid, $160, and waited to hear my fate.

The lure is in the hunt. In 2005, at an estate in Louisiana, a collector bought a painting for less than $10,000; it turned out to be Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi,” which sold at auction in 2017 for $450 million. Big scores have become less common in the age of Google Lens, which makes it easier to identify pricey antiques.

And yet the in-person sale has demonstrated surprising staying power. For one thing, the auction model makes less sense for inexpensive items: glassware, old games, knickknacks. For another, the community that’s developed around in-person sales remains a draw. “We missed our people,” says Shreve Cady about the pandemic hiatus. “It’s a different shopper who comes for the experience than one who’s looking online to add the perfect lamp to their living room.”

In June, I encountered a listing for an estate sale unlike any I had ever seen. “I’m a performance artist, and I’m turning my post-marital estate sale into a filmed performance and documentary,” the Facebook ad read. “This is more than a sale. It’s a conversation about change, identity, sacrifice, and starting over.”

On a Sunday afternoon, I pulled up to a midcentury-modern house in Alexandria’s Waynewood neighborhood. The front lawn was filled with art, glassware, vintage barstools, Ikea chairs—everything that the host, Jodi Askew, was unable to squeeze into a Honda Fit before embarking on a cross-country road trip to start a new life, post-divorce, in Portland. The emotional backstory of a sale usually remains a veiled mystery—but not here.

“I was in a ten-year relationship with a really good man, and through the course of that relationship, I realized I was queer,” Askew, 31, who uses they/them pronouns, said in their living room turned studio, as a film crew recorded. “I didn’t really want the domestic life I thought I wanted.”

How hard was it to part with so many possessions? “Seeing the things I procured at much simpler times in my life” left Askew “mourning that innocence.” But “having them live on with somebody else who sees them with fresh eyes feels beautiful.”

I didn’t attend the sale; I didn’t want to see the masses wrangling over my mom’s possessions. I don’t think she would have much liked it. But now when I visit a sale, I feel like I’m communing with her spirit, sharing in the chase. Especially at one precipitated by a death, I’m attuned to life’s evanescence, reminded that my time will also come.

Estate-Sale Tips

Need to host a sale? Here are suggestions for finding a company.

Do Your Research

Get It in Writing

Make sure to sign a contract that considers all the potential contingencies of a sale and that lays out specific fees, if any, for cleaning post-sale or consigning or tossing leftover items.

Manage Your Expectations

Those shelves of Delft pottery that your mom collected as an investment? They now go for a song. Check recent sales on LiveAuctioneers.com or eBay or to get a sense of the going rate for antiques. Most companies will bring in appraisers to help price more obscure items.

Keep the Threads

A lot of people will offload all the clothing in a house before staging a sale. But that’s a mistake, says estate-sale influencer Maddy Brannon. Vintage clothing can draw people in: “It’s actually a pretty important piece of the sale.”

And if you’re looking to score a bargain, consider this advice:

Pick the Right Sales

Estate sales come in many forms. Some are expertly curated—they tend to have higher prices but more refined offerings. And some are glorified garage sales, with items tossed into boxes. Check out the listings and photos on EstateSales.net or Facebook Marketplace to get a sense of what a sale might have.

Make a Last-Minute Offer

Most sales run for two or three days over a weekend, and some companies drop prices by a predetermined amount each day: 50 percent off on the last day, for instance. Scoring a deal gets easier in the waning hours. For items with big sticker prices, companies may decide to consign them to auction, so be realistic when making a bid.

This article appears in the August 2025 issue of Washingtonian.