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J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851) – Rome from Mount Aventine (£15-20 million)  UPDATE: IT SOLD FOR A NEW WORLD RECORD OF £30.3 MILLION.

One of the last great Turner masterpieces in private hands – Rome from Mount Aventine – comes up at Sotheby’s in London in December.  In immaculate condition it has been in the Roseberry Collection for the last 136 years. It is described as one of Turner’s most subtle and atmospheric depictions of the eternal city.  The large scale oil is distinguished by its exceptional preservation.   An expert from Sotheby’s  said that there are hairs from Turner’s own paintbrush still trapped on the canvas, with drips of paint visible down its side.

It is one of less than ten major Turner’s known to be in private hands.  Alex Bell  of Sotheby’s said: “This painting, which is nearly 200 years old, looks today as if it had come straight from the easel of the artist: never re-lined and never subject to restoration the picture retains the freshness of the moment it was painted:.

The auction next December 3 will coincide with the exhibition “Late Turner” at the Tate.  The painting is estimated at £15-20 million.  The current auction record for Turner is £29,721,250 for Modern Rome – Campo Vaccino.  This was bought by the J.Paul Getty Museum at Sotheby’s in London in 2010.

Henry Moore (1898-1986) – Reclining Figure on a Pedestal.

A monumental work by Henry Moore will be a feature at Bonhams auction of British and Irish art in London on November 17-18. Figure on pedestal, which belongs to a UK Corporation and was acquired directly from the artist in the  early 1960’s, is estimated at £1-2 million.  Since its conception in 1959-60 casts of this bronze have been exhibited in Europe and the United States. The theme of the reclining nude obsessed Moore and played a central role in the development of his sculpture throughout his career as an artist. He defined his own persona as an artist not so much by endless variety as by his ability to return to a familiar motif and make it new. In so doing, he renewed himself.

Moore commented on his fascination with the recumbent form: ‘I want to be quite free of having to find a ‘reason’ for doing the Reclining Figures, and freer still of having to find a ‘meaning’ for them. The vital thing for an artist is to have a subject that allows [him] to try out all kinds of formal ideas, things that he doesn’t yet know about for certain but wants to experiment with, as Cézanne did in his ‘Bathers’ series. In my case the reclining figure provides chances of that sort. The subject-matter is given. It’s settled for you, and you know it and like it, so that within it, within the subject that you’ve done a dozen times before, you are free to invent a completely new form-idea.’   He once pointed to the maternal element of his Reclining Figures, referring to both womanhood and mother earth.  The configuration of Reclining Figure on a Pedestal identified the female form with the undulating landscape and natural forms.  The work will be exhibited in New York in October.