The Proclamation at Sotheby’s
A copy of the Irish Proclamation comes up at Sotheby’s sale of English Literature, History, Childrens’ Books and Illustrations in London on July 12. When purchased in 1996 it was mounted on early stiff card. It was professionally repaired at the Williamstown Art Conservation Centre in Massachusetts and afterwards preserved in a clamshell box. The restoration saw the copy removed from its previous mount, washed, archival backed, newly remounted on thin Japanese paper and encapsulated. It is estimated at £100,000-150,000.
This is one of a small number of copies printed at Liberty Hall on Easter Sunday 1916, marking the beginning of the Easter Rising. Three men, printer Christopher Brady and two compositors, Michael Molloy and Liam O’Brien handled the printing. The Rising led eventually to the foundation of the Irish Free State and later Irish Republic. Less than 50 copies of the original are thought to have survived.
UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD