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  • Archive for October, 2017

    VARIETY AT MORGAN O’DRISCOLL’S ONLINE SALE

    Tuesday, October 31st, 2017

    Morgan O’Driscoll’s current online sale of Irish art features 350 varied lots of affordable Irish and internatonal art. It runs until the evening of Monday November 6.  The catalogue is online. Here is a small selection:

    GRAHAM SUTHERLAND (1903-1980) – INSECT (2/35) (300-500)  UPDATE: THIS MADE 280 AT HAMMER

    JOHN KINGERLEE (B.1936) – HEAD (400-600)  UPDATE: THIS MADE 500 AT HAMMER

    MARKEY ROBINSON (1918-1999) – THE OLD MILL (1,000-1,500)  UPDATE: THIS MADD 1,700S AT HAMMER

    MARK O’NEILL (B.1963) – COTTAGE SPREAD (1,500-2,000) UPDATE: THIS MADE 1,900 AT HAMMER

    GREAT WAR VORTICIST WORK BY C.R.W. NEVINSON AT SOTHEBY’S

    Tuesday, October 31st, 2017

    C.R.W. Nevinson – A Dawn

    An iconic depiction of French soldiers in 1914 by the leading British war artist C.R.W. Nevinson – A Dawn – comes up at Sotheby’s Modern and Post War sale in London on November 21.  It is from a landmark moment in the  career of Nevinson, who is widely considered the definitive British artist of the First World War.

    The painting encapsulates the best of his Vorticist style of the period between 1914 and 1916. It shows a seething mass of soldiers reduced to mechanical forms. First exhibited at Nevinson’s acclaimed 1916 solo exhibition at the prestigious Leicester Galleries, attended by the likes of Sir Winston Churchill and G. Bernard Shaw, it is one of very few paintings from this landmark show still in private hands.

    Simon Hucker, Senior Specialist in Modern & Post-War British Art, said:
    “Nevinson’s A Dawn ranks alongside the Tate’s La Mitrailleuse and the Imperial War Museum’s French Troops Resting as the very best of the artist’s war paintings, works that define our vision of the Great War. With the majority of Nevinson’s most important works in major museums, the term ‘museum-quality’ can be applied with total confidence to this profoundly powerful painting.”

    “It happened that I was the first artist to paint war pictures without pageantry, without glory, and without the over-coloured heroic that made up the tradition of all war paintings up to this time…. No man saw pageantry in the trenches.” (Nevinson).  The work is estimated at £700,000-£1 million.

    THE WINTER SALE AT MEALY’S IN CASTLECOMER

    Monday, October 30th, 2017

    The winter sale at Mealy’s in Castlecomer, which takes place on November 7 and 8, features contents from a selection of country and city houses around Ireland.  The auction will feature material formerly the property of Daniel O’Connell, the Liberator (1775-1847).  Viewing gets underway in Castlecomer on November 5.  The catalogue is online. Here is a small selection:

    VICTORIA (DUBOURG) FANTIN-LATOUR, FRENCH 1840-1926, “Still Life, Roses in a Glass bowl, on a Marble Ledge (2,000-3,000) UPDATE: THIS MADE 1,400 AT HAMMER

    THE DANIEL O’CONNELL SILVER CRESTED SALVER, A LARGE HEAVY CHASED SILVER SALVER, by Richard Sawyer of Dublin 1839 (5,000-7,000)  UPDATE: THIS MADE 5,500 AT HAMMER

    SERPENTINE-SHAPED NINETEENTH CENTURY FRENCH BRASS-MOUNTED PARQUETRY AND WALNUT LADIES WRITING TABLE (600-700)  UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR 1,000 AT HAMMER

    GEORGE III STYLE ARCHITECTURAL FIRE SURROUND AND OVERMANTEL (2,400-2,600) UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD

    ROSEWOOD, WALNUT AND SATINWOOD-BANDED CABINET-ON-STAND (3,500-4,000) UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,000 AT HAMMER

    TEFAF FALL IN FULL SWING IN NEW YORK

    Sunday, October 29th, 2017

    Nicolas Mignard (1606-1668) – Portrait of Scipion du Roure (1628-1696) at Tomasso Brothers.

    Over 90 leading dealers representing the best of European and global antiques haved converge on the Park Avenue Armoury in New York  for the  for the fall edition of TEFAF (the European fine art fair) which runs until November 1.   The finest and rarest objects across a broad range of disciplines from ancient art to portrait miniatures to the arts of Oceania, Old Master paintings, furniture, silver, European ceramics, porcelain and glass are on offer.

    Tomasso Brothers, for example, have brought a rare portrait by Nicolas Mignard (1606-1688) of Scipion du Roure (1628-1696) of Nimes aged 30.

    Since last year TEFAF runs three fairs internationally, at Maastricht in The Netherlands and at New York in spring and fall.  The fall fair at the Park Avenue Armory will feature a cultural programme with institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Frick and Neue Galerie. An exhibition of new photographs by Vera Lutter is on loan from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.  The fair runs until November 1.

    A c1770-1780 Sevres Bleu Celeste Vase a Perles at Christophe de Quenetain.

    George I green japanned bureau cabinet almost certainly by John Belchier (active in London from 1687-1753) at Ronald Phillips.

    FORMER PRESIDENT MARY ROBINSON TO SELL CONTENTS FROM MAYO ESTATE

    Saturday, October 28th, 2017

    Derek Hill (1916-2000) – Portrait of Mary Robinson

    Contents from the Mayo home of Ireland’s first woman President Mary Robinson will come under the hammer at Sheppards in Durrow on November 28 and 29 next.  The contents of Massbrook  include antique and contemporary furniture, art, glass, porcelain and collectible items.   Around 200 lots from the estate will go under the hammer and the catalogue for the sale is being prepared.  Among the lots to be sold are portraits of Mary Robinson and of her husband Nick by Derek Hill.

    Mary Robinson served as president from 1990 to 1997.  The family bought the Massbrook estate in 1994 and lived there when she left office. Mrs. Robinson served as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights from 1997 to 2002.

    GOYA’S DISASTERS OF WAR AT CHESTER BEATTY IN DUBLIN

    Saturday, October 28th, 2017

    Francisco Goya (1746-1828) The deathbeds (Las camas de la muerte)

    In these days of instantaneous visual news we are all too familiar with war and destruction.  Yet even today it is impossible to better the unflinching look taken in The Disasters of War series by the great Spanish artist Francisco Goya now on view at the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin.

    Goya’s realistic depictions of the brutaliity of war and its consequences have influenced artists from Manet to Dali and Picasso. The series of etchings has been described as the greatest anti-war manifesto in the history of art.
    Created using sparse line combined with strong light and dark shadow it depicts the warfare, famine and political disillusionment which followed Napoleon Bonaparte’s invasion of Spain in 1808.  Goya worked on the plates from 1810-1820.  The three sections of the disasters show first the brutality of warfare, followed by the famine in Madrid during the winter of 1811-12 in which over 20,000 died and thirdly the ruling elite in Spain is bitterly satirised.
    The prints, complete with ironic titles like What Courage, The Deathbeds and Against the Common Good were not published until 35 years after the artists death. Only in 1863 was it considered politically safe to do so. This was due in part of the repressive regime of King Ferdinand VII (1784-1833) which followed the Napoleonic War.
    The Chester Beatty Library holds the entire series of 80 prints from the second edition of 1892.  Forty of them are on display in a special exhibition which runs until January 21.  Curator of the western collections Dr. Jill Unkell said the etchings are often regarded as the predecessors of modern photo journalism. “Though harrowing, Goya’s poignant observations of human suffering help mitigate the scenes of extreme violence”.

    Francisco Goya (1746-1828) What courage! (Que Valor!)

    Francisco Goya (1746-1828) With or Without Reason (Con razon ó sin ella)

    SAVILLS ART PRIZE TO BE PRESENTED AT VUE

    Friday, October 27th, 2017

    Paddy Graham, last year’s winner. Conor McCabe Photography.

    The Savills Art Prize will be presented at the Vue contemporary art fair at the Royal Hibernian Academy on Thursday, November 2.   It is to be awarded to an artist who has exhibited in the last year and made a substantial contribution to the visual arts in Ireland.  Vue runs at the RHA from November 2-5 next.

    “This is the third year the Savills Art Prize has been presented at Vue and we hope the award will become as important to Irish art as the Turner Prize is in the UK,” said Vue 2017 organiser Louis O’Sullivan. “Savills is the perfect partner to present the prize as most art is found in homes and businesses, and not just museums.” In 2017 the prize is worth 5,000.

    Last years winner was Paddy Graham, one of Ireland’s most noted living artists, who is credited with the introduciton to Ireland of neo-Expressionism in the 1980’s.  Galleries participating include Art Box, Kerlin Gallery, Cross Gallery, Gibbons and Nicholas, Molesworth Gallery, Peppercanister Gallery, Stoney Road Press, Hillsboro Fine Art, Green on Red, Eight, Kevin Kavanagh Gallery, Taylor Gallery, Black Church Print Studio, Kerlin Gallery, Catherine Hammond Gallery (Cork), Parallel Editions, Gormleys Fine Art, Solomon, Olivier Cornet, Oonagh Young Gallery, Claremorris Gallery and SO Fine Art Editions.

    REDISCOVERED CONSTABLE LANDSCAPE AT AUCTION IN LONDON

    Friday, October 27th, 2017

    John Constable, R.A. (1776 – 1837) Dedham Vale with the River Stour In flood from the grounds of Old Hall, East Bergholt. Courtesy of Sotheby’s

    A rediscovered Constable landscape comes up at Sotheby’s Old Masters evening sale in London on December 6.  One of the most important additions to Constable’s oeuvre to have emerged in the last 50 years Dedham Vale with the River Stour in Flood is one of the last early views of “Constable Country” in private hands.  John Constable (1776-1837) is one of Britain’s best-loved and most significant landscape painters and this work is estimated at £2-3 million.

    Julian Gascoigne, Senior Specialist, British Paintings at Sotheby’s said: “Constable’s views of Dedham Vale and the Stour valley have become icons of British art and define for many everything that is quintessential about the English countryside.  Dedham Vale with the River Stour in Floodwas long mistakenly thought to be by Ramsay Richard Reinagle (1775-1862), a friend and contemporary of Constable’s, but recent scientific analysis and up-to-date connoisseurship has unanimously returned the work to its rightful place among the canon of the great master’s work and established beyond doubt its true authorship. It is without question one of the most exciting and important additions to Constable’s oeuvre to have emerged in the last fifty years”.

    The painting is thought to have been commissioned by Thomas Fitzhugh as a wedding present for his future wife, Philadelphia Godfrey, whose parents were neighbours and friends of Constable’s family. It is the view from the back garden of Philadelphia’s childhood home, and must have served as a perfect memento once settled into married life in London.

    PICASSO AND BACON MUSES AT SOTHEBY’S

    Friday, October 27th, 2017

    Portraits of celebrated muses by Francis Bacon and Pablo Picasso come up at Sotheby’s in New York next month.  Francis Bacon’s Three Studies of George Dyer (estimate $35-45 million) depicting the artist’s great love and most prevalent subject, comes up at the Contemporary Art evening sale on November 16.  Pablo Picasso’s Buste de femme au chapeau (estimate $18-25 million) comes up at the Impressionist and Modern evening sale on November 14.  Each work is appearing at auction for the first time.  

    Pablo Picasso, Buste de femme au chapeau, Oil on canvas, Estimate $18/25 million

    Francis Bacon, Three Studies of George Dyer, Oil on canvas, in three parts, Estimate $35/45 million

    EL GRECO, CLAUDE MONET, GEORGIA O’KEEFFE AT CHRISTIE’S

    Thursday, October 26th, 2017

    IF  you are a collector drawn to artists like El Greco, Claude Monet, Robert Delaunay, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Russian artists of the twentieth century it is probably just as well that your name is Rothschild.   Christie’s has announced that property from the collection of Stanford Z. Rothschild, Jr. will be offered across a series of sales in November and December, including the Impressionist and Modern, American Art and Old Masters sales.

    In his lifetime he amassed one of the largest, privately owned collections of Russian avant-garde art in the United States. Certain works in the collection are being sold by the Rothschild Art Foundation, a charitable organization founded by Stanford Z. Rothschild, Jr.  Overall, the collection includes 51 works and is expected to exceed $30 million.

    Conor Jordan, deputy chairman, Impressionist and Modern Art, commented: “Stanford Rothschild, Jr.’s forty-year journey in art collecting was distinguished by an ambitious range and a keen sense of quality.  Few collections range from the 17th to the 20th century; fewer still are as rich in prime examples from the artists represented. Whether it is the expressive force of El Greco’s ‘Saint Francis and Brother Leo in Meditation,’ or the scintillating atmosphere that marks the two fine Monets of the Normandy coast and Venice, Stan’s attention to the compelling experience a great work of art should offer is present everywhere.”

    EL GRECO (1541-1614) ST. FRANCIS AND BR. LEO IN MEDITATION ($5-7 MILLION)

    GEORGIA O’KEEFFE (1887-1986) APPLES – NO 1 ($300,000-500,000)

    ROBERT DELAUNAY (1885-1921) LA TOUR EIFFEL ($2.5-3.5 MILLION) CHRISTIE’S IMAGES LTD. 2017

    Claude Monet (1840-1926) – Le Rio de la Salute painted in 1908 ($7-10 million) CHRISTIE’S IMAGES LTD. 2017