James Barry – Lord Baltimore and the Group of Legislators. UPDATE: THIS MADE 1,500 AT HAMMER
Breaking new ground with old paintings is the mission at James Adam. The venerable Dublin firm is launching a new category of sale – Irish Old Masters – on November 5.
James Barry, Nathanial Hone, George Barret, William Brocas, Adam Buck and Nathanial Grogan are among the many artists who feature in this fascinating art auction of 84 lots.
We tend to not think of Irish artists when Old Masters are on the agenda. Strictly speaking the term is applied to trained artists who worked in Europe before or around 1800. The terminology in art history is loose and Adams has slipped in a few Victorians like Jeremiah Hodges Mulcahy, Michael Angelo Hayes, George Mounsey Wheatley Atkinson and Robert Lowe Stopford though Erskine Nicol, who lived until 1904, is a bit of a stretch. Many of our artists – like Cork born James Barry appointed Professor of Painting at the Royal Academy in 1782 – clearly fit any definition.
Cork Savings Bank (1842) by James Mahony (1810-1879) UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
The sale sets out, according to a catalogue note by Stuart Cole of Adams, to reintroduce the exceptional and subtle mastery of Irish artists from previous centuries in an environment of their peers and contemporaries. The explosion of interest in art in Ireland during the last half century means that Irish art sales nowadays feature a far greater quantity of modern art than before. So Adams reckon the time is right for this new category of the artists – the backbone of early Irish art auctions – and to make it an annual sale.
No less than nine engravings by James Barry, with estimates ranging from €600-€2,000, grace the catalogue. Barry’s inscription on his 1793 engraving of Lord Baltimore and the Group of Legislators refers to the delusion of considering William Penn as the first coloniser to establish laws of religious and civil liberty. According to his inscription Cacilius Cavert, Baron of Baltimore and a catholic, originated them in his Colony of Maryland.
The River Lee at Inniscarra is listed in the Adams catalogue as by William Brocas (1794-1868), but a label on the back suggests that it is by John Butts. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
The most expensive lots in the sale are a pair of portraits of Thomas Carter (Secretary of State for Ireland) and his wife Mary by Charles Jervas (c1675-1739) (€60,000-€80,000), a landscape by Thomas Roberts (1748-1777) (€40,000-€60,000), a River Landscape by George Barret (1732-1784) (€40,000-€60,000) and Travellers resting on a Country Road by Francis Wheatley (1747-1801) (€20,000-€30,000). An 1809 folio of James Malton’s Views of Dublin from 1791 is estimated at €8,000-€10,000.
An oval watercolour of Glanmire Church from the River Lee by Nathanial Grogan (€3,000-€5,000), a water colour of Cork Savings Bank by James Mahony (€3,000-€5,000), Sailing vessels in Cork Harbour by Matthew Kendrick (€6,000-€8,000) and The Fleet Getting Away from Cork by George Mounsey Wheatley Atkinson (€15,000-€20,000) should create plenty of local interest in this evening auction. There is some confusion around an oil of the River Lee at Inniscarra which is by either William Brocas or John Butts (€4,000-€6,000),
With a fine selection of maritime views, portraits and topographical views of Ireland in the olden days and estimates from €400 up this sale is well worth a view.
Coloured engravings after Thomas Walmsley (1763-1806) published in 1806 – The White Abbey in Adare and The Roughty Bridge, Kenmare. UPDATE: THESE MADE 420 AT HAMMER.