antiquesandartireland.com

Velazquez, Portrait of a Gentleman (click on image to enlarge).

A previously unknown portrait by Velázquez highlights Bonhams sale of Old Master Paintings in London on December 7. The half length portrait of a gentlemen by the Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velázquez (1599-1660) is estimated to sell for £2,000,000-3,000,000.

In August 2010 a number of works by the nineteenth century British artist, Matthew Shepperson, were consigned for sale at Bonhams Oxford office.  The portrait was among these works. It was withdrawn for further investigation.  The stylistic similarities to works by the great Spanish master led to extensive research by the department and consultant Brian Koetser; their views were confirmed by Dr Peter Cherry, Professor of Art History at the University of Dublin and one of the world’s foremost authorities on Velázquez and his school.  In an article published in the Spanish arts magazine ARS, Cherry writes “the particularized likeness and recognisably lifelike texture, weight and colours of the fleshy face speak of the actual encounter between  subject and painter: while the style and technical brilliance of the representation itself betrays its author”.

Carmen Garrido, Head of Technical Services at the Prado Museum in Madrid and author of the authoritative work on the artist’s technique, Velázquez: Technica y Evolución was consulted about the painting, and technical analysis and an x-radiograph further confirm the attribution to Velázquez.

The Silver Apples of the Moon by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh. (Click on image to enlarge).

A re-discovered symbolist watercolour by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh inspired by a poem from W.B. Yeats made £115,250 at Christie’s on October 25.  It had been estimated at £50,000-70,000.

The title of the painting, The Silver Apples of the Moon, came from Yeats’ poem The Song of Wandering Aengus.  It was bought by an anonymous purchaser.

Joy McCall of Christie’s said: “We are thrilled about the price achieved for the rare and rediscovered The Silver Apples of the Moon by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, which highlights the significance of her work internationally”.

See posts on antiquesandartireland.com for October 2 and September 30.

Tinkers Enter the City by Louis le Brocquy. (Click on image to enlarge). UPDATE: THIS FAILED TO SELL.

A small le Brocquy to be sold at Sotheby’s in London in November offers a measure of how deeply the recession has reduced expectations for Irish art prices. Tinkers Enter the City, a pen, ink and watercolour drawing from 1946, changed hands at a Dolan’s Irish Art sale in Galway for 165,000 euro in 2006.  At Sotheby’s the work is now estimated at just £18,000-25,000.

Tinkers Enter the City is lot 163 at Sotheby’s sale of Modern & Post-War British Art on November 15-16 next.  It features in the second day of this auction. The same work was sold at Sotheby’s Irish Sale in May 2006 for £78,000. Afterwards it featured in the Louis le Brocquy exhibition at the Hunt Museum in Limerick.  Subsequent to that it was sold at Dolans in what turned out to be the most successful Irish art sale ever to take place west of the Shannon.  In those heady days Tinkers Enter the City was the top lot in a sale which realised over one million euro.

Louis le Brocquy, who turns 95 on November 10, 2011, must be regarded as one of the most bankable of Irish artists.  He is one of a very select group of Irish and British artists whose works have made more than £1 million in their own lifetime. Tinkers Enter the City is a work of immense appeal to le Brocquy collectors. In this buyer’s market the lower estimate might not be everything sellers hoped for but it is at least good news for lovers of Irish art as it underlines the value to be had right now.

L. S. Lowry, The Railway Platform, 1953, (£1-1.5 million). (Click on image to enlarge). UPDATE: THIS MADE £1,161,250.

William Roberts, The Boxing Match, 1919-25, (£200,000-300,000). (Click on image to enlarge). UPDATE: THIS MADE £217,250 A WORLD RECORD FOR THE ARTIST AT AUCTION.

WHAT may be the first British depiction of a film crew at work is among the remarkable works on offer at Sotheby’s evening sale of Modern and Post-War British Art  on November 15. Highlights include paintings by L.S. Lowry and Sir Stanley Spencer. William Robert’s The Boxing Match circa 1919-1925 (on the middle left) offers an image of a film crew at work.  The sale includes paintings by artists including Ben Nicholson and Christopher Wood, to be sold on behalf of The Dartington Hall Trust.  The sale comprises 37 lots and is estimated to reach a combined total of £7.2 – £10.8 million.

The Modern and Post-War British day sale November 16 features the most exceptional group of Wyndham Lewis watercolours and drawings ever to be offered for sale at auction. The works range in date from 1910 – 1949 and are estimated to fetch a combined total of more than £270,000.

UPDATE:  THE sales realized a combined total of £8.5 million.

Christopher Wood, Pony and trap, Ploaré, Brittany , 1930, (£150,000-250,000). (Click on image to enlarge).

Stanley Spencer, Beatitude 2: Knowing, 1937 (£600,000-£800,000). (Click on image to enlarge).