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    • Archive for February, 2012

    ANTIQUE FURNITURE AT WOODWARDS

    Sunday, February 5th, 2012

    The Woodwards sale in Cork on February 8 at 6 p.m. features Georgian, Victorian and Edwardian furniture, silver, art, garden statuary and collectible items.  The catalogue features 266 lots.  The prime antique furniture on offer are this Georgian wine cooler by the Dublin firm of Mack, Williams and Gibon and a Georgian rosewood circular centre table.  Each piece is estimated at 1,000-2,000.

    This wine cooler by Mack Williams and Gibton is at Woodwards in Cork on Wednesday. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR 900

    This Georgian circular table is at Woodwards on February 8. UPDATE: THIS FAILED TO SELL.

    Posted in AUCTIONS, FURNITURE | Comments Off on ANTIQUE FURNITURE AT WOODWARDS

    CEZANNE’S CARD PLAYERS MOST EXPENSIVE ARTWORK IN WORLD

    Saturday, February 4th, 2012

    The Card Players by Paul Cezanne, currently the world's most expensive work of art.

    There has been rumors circulating for months about Cezanne’s painting The Card Players.  Now it has emerged that the work – one of a series painted in the 1890’s  – has become the most expensive painting in the world.  The Qatari Royal Family paid £158 million ($250 million) for the painting.  The previous record for a work of art was the £88.7 million paid for Jackson Pollock’s No. 5 1948 in 2006.

    The Card Players was bought from the estate of George Embiricos, a Greek shipping magnate.  Qatar was ranked the world’s biggest art buyer last year by The Art Newspaper.

    There are four other Cézanne Card Players in the series; and they are in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Musée d’Orsay, the Courtauld, and the Barnes Foundation.

    Posted in ART | Comments Off on CEZANNE’S CARD PLAYERS MOST EXPENSIVE ARTWORK IN WORLD

    WORKS ON PAPER BY HOCKNEY AT CHRISTIE’S, SOUTH KENSINGTON

    Friday, February 3rd, 2012

    David Hockney (b. 1937) Lithograph of Water made of thick and thin Lines and two light blue Washes (Pool #1E) lithograph in colours, 1980. (£25,000-30,000). Click on image to enlarge. Photo courtesy Christie's Images Ltd., 2012. UPDATE: THIS MADE £43,250.

    David Hockney (b. 1937) Self-portrait lithograph in colours, 1954. (£15,000-20,000). Click on image to enlarge. Photo courtesty Christie's Images Ltd., 2012. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £22,500.

    A total of 147 works on paper by David Hockey are to be auctioned at Christie’s, South Kensington, London on February 17.  They include etchings, lithographs, drawings and photography.  The sale spans over forty years of the artist’s career and includes works which reflect Hockney’s various incarnations: the precocious student, the young émigré in California, the Hollywood pool-sider and chronicler of gay life, the portraitist, the fax-artist, the collagist photographer, the set designer and the camera obscura provocateur.

    The sale neatly coincides with Hockney’s blockbuster show A Bigger Picture at the Royal Academy.  Demand for tickets is heavy in a show that has proved to be exceptionally popular and places Hockey in the best loved category of British artists.

    UPDATE: The Hockney on Paper sale realized a total of £1,399,400,

    Posted in ART, AUCTIONS | Comments Off on WORKS ON PAPER BY HOCKNEY AT CHRISTIE’S, SOUTH KENSINGTON

    EXCEPTIONAL MEISSEN AT SOTHEBY’S IN MARCH

    Thursday, February 2nd, 2012

    Buen Retiro group of Italian Comedy spaghetti eaters. (Click on image to enlarge). UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD.

    Exceptional Meissen figures feature at a single owner collection sale at Sotheby’s  in London on March 14.  The collection of Giovanni and Gabriella Barilla includes some of the earliest Commedia dell’Arte figures and some of the rarest groups of Capodimonte and Buen Retiro ever offered on the market. Venetian eighteenth-century furniture and paintings, sixteenth-century majolica, silver and a group of illuminated books of Hours are included among more than 400 lots.

    Meissen figure of a Harlequin modelled by J.J. Kandler. (Click on image to enlarge). UPDATE: THIS MADE £121,250.

    Highlights include a Buen Retiro group of Italian Comedy spaghetti eaters c1770 modelled by Giuseppe Gricci  (£15,000 – 25,000), a set of four engraved Venetian mirrors (£40,000 – 60,000), a 17th-century Marco and Sebastiano Ricci oil on canvas titled A capriccio of classical Roman ruins (£150,000- 200,000) and a group of Meissen figures from the Weissenfels series. A rare Meissen Figure of Harlequin with pug as a hurdy-gurdy, modelled by  J.J. Kandler, circa 1738-1740 is estimated at £25,000-35,000.

    Descendants of the founder of the most important pasta producer in the world, Giovanni Barilla and in particular his wife Gabriella created one of the greatest collections of ceramics and porcelain in Europe.  The collection is from their residence in Geneva.

    “The porcelain collection was formed as a result of Gabriella Barilla’s exhaustive research and passion – guided by the advice of international experts – resulting in one of the most important collections of European porcelain” according to Mario Tavella, Sotheby’s deputy chairman, Europe. “Giovanni, on the other hand, sought only the most elegant furniture for their home, and of which much has been published and originally belonged to Ing. Giuseppe Gatti Casazza, who left most of his collection to the Museo di Arti Decorative at Ca’Rezzonico in Venice.”

    Posted in AUCTIONS, COLLECTIBLES | Comments Off on EXCEPTIONAL MEISSEN AT SOTHEBY’S IN MARCH

    CORK SILVER TANKARD MAKES $31,250 IN NEW YORK

    Thursday, February 2nd, 2012

    The Irish Silver tankard by the Cork maker Robert Goble sold for $31,250 in New York.

    WHAT was billed in New York as a George II silver tankard turned out to be a Cork piece and sold for more than 30 times its top estimate. Lot 292 at the Doyle New York sale of important furniture and Old Master paintings was a silver tankard of cylindrical form with rubbed marks. It was estimated at $700-1,000.  The catalogue noted that further research indicated it might be of Irish origin.

    Irish silver dealers immediately recognised the Cork marks when photos of the eight inch high tankard appeared on the internet just days before the auction.  They were outbid at the sale by the international trade and it was knocked down for $31,250 including buyers premium.

    The tankard is a Queen Anne/George I piece. It was made in Cork by Robert Goble, who worked in the city from 1672 to 1719.  It was marked with his initials and with the two castles and gallery mark based on the Arms of the City of Cork used by local silversmiths. Robert Goble, the maker of the 1696 Mace of the Trade Guilds of the City of Cork now at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, died in 1719 and is buried in the Huguenot Cemetary on French Church St. in the heart of the city.

    Posted in AUCTIONS, COLLECTIBLES | Comments Off on CORK SILVER TANKARD MAKES $31,250 IN NEW YORK

    GLOBAL SALES UP AT CHRISTIE’S IN 2011, LED BY CONTEMPORARY ART

    Wednesday, February 1st, 2012

    Roy Lichtenstein: I Can See the Whole Room!...and There's Nobody in it!, from 1961, was the most expensive artwork sold by Christie's in 2011. It made $43,202,500 in New York.

    Led by contemporary art global sales were up nine per cent at Christie’s in 2011.  The overall sales total was £3.6 billion/$5.7 billion. This includes private sales of  £502 million/$808.6 million, up 44% on 2010. Auction sales of  £735.7 million/$1.2 billion in post war and contemporary art amounted to an increase of 22 per cent over 2010. Asian art was the second strongest category, up 13 per cent to £552.9 million/$890.1 million.

    The top ten art prices of 2010 at Christie’s were led by Roy Lichtenstein‘s (1923-1997), I Can See the Whole Room!…and There’s Nobody in it!, from 1961, which sold for $43,202,500 in New York on November 8. Andy Warhol‘s Self Portrait 1963-64 made $38,442,500, George Stubbs Gimcrack on Newmarket Heath made  $35,906,000, Mark Rothko‘s Untitled No. 17 made $33,682,50, Pablo Picasso‘s Femme assise, robe bleue made  $29,133,148, Francis Bacon‘s Study for a Portrait, 1953 made $28,666,155, Andy Warhol‘s Self-Portrait, 1986 made $27,522,500, Francis Bacon Three Studies for Self-Portrait, 1974 made $25,282,500, Claude Monet‘s Les Peupliers, 1891 made  $22,482,500 and Maurice de Vlaminck’s Paysage de banlieue, 1905 made $22,482,500.

    In 2011, Christies sold 719 works at auction for over $1 million compared to 607 in 2010. “This is a very encouraging set of results”, said Steven P. Murphy, Chief Executive Officer, Christie’s. “While we are seeing more investors collecting, there are many more collectors who are increasing their investment in their collections as the explosion of interest in art, fuelled by globalization, facilitated by the technology that increases access to information and images, meets the art that is coming to the market.”

    Results also illustrate solid demand at every price level, not just for the most expensive works, with the highest selling rate for works sold between £250,000 and £1 million at 87%. Sales of impressionist and modern pieces declined by 28% to £548.6 million pounds, behind Asian art. Christie’s website had  77% more unique visitors than the previous year. In total 29% of Christies bidders transacted online (not including the online-only auction of the Elizabeth Taylor Collection which achieved more than 57,000 on-line bids).

    “As we approach the sales over the next fortnight in London, we are optimistic about the market in 2012” Mr. Murphy said. “We also remain committed to our role as cultural stewards through our auctions, private sales and exhibitions”.

    Posted in ART, AUCTIONS | Comments Off on GLOBAL SALES UP AT CHRISTIE’S IN 2011, LED BY CONTEMPORARY ART

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