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Gustave Courbet – La Bohemienne et ses enfants © Christie’s Images Limited 2015   UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD

A Gustave Courbet rediscovery La Bohemienne et ses infants will highlight Christie’s New York spring sale of 19th century European art on April 28.   Pressure of work in 1853-54 forced Courbet to halt work on the painting and it was housed by a neighbour in Ornans  under the floorboard of the attic.

It remained there, forgotten, until 2001.  It was taken then to the Courbet museum in Ornans where its authenticity was confirmed. It is estimated at $1.8-2.5 million.

This curated auction boasts a selection of paintings by Federico Zandomengeghi, Gustave Courbet, and Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida, among others as well as a strong collection of Barbizon, French Academic, Victorian, Orientalist and Maritime pieces. The sale is primarily sourced from private collections, with additions from the Art Gallery of Ontario and the Seattle Art Museum.

There is a group of seven paintings from the Art Gallery of Ontario deaccessioned to benefit further art purchases.

The two day sales of Modern and Contemporary Asian art and Modern and Contemporary South East Asian art at Sotheby’s in Hong Kong achieved US$110.7 million.  The Modern and Contemporary Asian art evening sale established nine auction records and brought in US$77.4 million over a top estimate of US$54 million. Wu Guanzhong’s Plum Blossoms was the top lot of the evening and made US$8.6 million.

Hendra Gunawan, Pandawa Dadu (The Dice Game from The Mahabharata Epic) 1971 (US$3,394,872).

Wu Guanzhong’s Plum Blossoms sold for US$8.6 million.

Jesus Crucified by Edward Delaney.

Jesus Crucified by the Irish sculptor Edward Delaney (1930-2009) sold for 2,800 at James Adams in Dublin this week.  It is a work in silvered alloy.  Delaney is considered one of Ireland’s most important sculptors.  Best known for public work like The Family and Wolfe Tone in St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin, Edward Delaney was born in Claremorris, Co. Mayo and studied at the National College of Art and Design and received funding from the Art Council of Ireland to study casting in Germany.

Being by Louis le Brocquy.

At the same sale  a work entitled Being by Louis le Brocquy (1916-2012) sold for 30,000 over a top estimate of 12,000.  Signed, inscribed and dated 1957 Being forms part of a series of paintings began in 1957, under the umbrella title, Presences. The series is characterized by the dominant use of white, applied thickly, broken only by small, carefully considered areas of brilliant colour, and enriched by their own impastoed textures. Most, like Being, represent a single, haunting figurative presence. Le Brocquy, like many post-war artists was fearful of the destructiveness of nuclear weapons and his work revealed that sense of human fragility.

Jack Butler Yeats (1871-1957) – Hearing the Nightingale.

The top lot at the James Adam sale of Important Irish Art in Dublin on April 1 was a 1936 oil on board by Jack Butler Yeats entitled Hearing the Nightingale.  Estimated at 25,000-35,000 the small oil on board sold for a hammer price of 42,000.

The auction of 180 lots was 85 per cent sold and brought in a little over 550,000 at hammer, which when fees are added amounts to around 660,000. There was a good viewing and a crowded salesroom for this auction.

(See post on antiquesandartireland.com for March 30, 2015).