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    CHRISTMAS GREETINGS AND SOME IRISH ANTIQUE ART

    Thursday, December 23rd, 2010

    A very early view of Cork Harbour with Spike Island, artist unknown, from the Crawford Gallery Collection in Cork. (click to enlarge)

    A mid 19th century view of Blarney Castle by John Bosanquet from the Crawford Gallery Collection in Cork. (click to enlarge)

    A very happy Christmas to all readers of antiquesandartireland.com

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    BACON BY LE BROCQUY AT BONHAMS

    Wednesday, December 22nd, 2010
    Bacon by le Brocquy is a feature lot at Bonhams first dedicated Irish art sale in London on February 9.

    Bacon by le Brocquy. (click to enlarge)

    An evocative portrait of Francis Bacon by Ireland’s foremost living artist, Louis le Brocquy, is estimated at £60,000 to £80,000.  Bonhams reckon the watercolour is one of the most significant lots to feature in the New Bond Street sale.

    Louis le Brocquy is on record as saying: “Contrary to a generally held view, I think that painting is not in any direct sense a means of communication or a means of self-expression. When you are painting you are trying to discover, to uncover, to reveal. I sometimes think of the activity of painting as a kind of archaeology – an archaeology of the spirit.”
    le Brocquy painted his friend Francis Bacon several times.  He set out to capture “the Baconness of Bacon”. The example at Bonham’s Irish sale is more representational than most.
    Penny Day, Head of Irish Art at Bonhams, says: “It is rare to find an image that combines the names and reputations of two giants of British and Irish art, in this instance as artist and sitter”.
    The worldwide reputation of Francis Bacon, who was born in Ireland, has grown steadily since his death in 1992. His South Kensington Studio has been re-constructed at the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin using the original door, walls, floors, ceiling and shelves. Over 7,000 items were catalogued on a specially designed database before their replacement.
    See antiquesandartireland.com post for September 15

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    TREASURES ABOUND AT WINTER ANTIQUES SHOW

    Tuesday, December 21st, 2010

    Pieces from the Historic Charleston Association loan exhibition. (click to enlarge)

    Treasures ranging from an ancient Egyptian relief of Akhenaten through to the mid 20th century furniture by Gerald Summers and Gio Ponti are to be showcased in America’s most prestigious antiques show.
    The Winter Antiques Show in New York provides museums, collectors, dealers, design professionals and first- time buyers with opportunities to see and purchase exceptional pieces showcased by 74 exhibitors.  Located at the Park Avenue Armory, 67th Street and Park Avenue, New York  it runs from January 21-30, 2011. This Armory Show celebrates its 57th year in 2011 with newly joined specialists in 17th to 19th century American furniture and decorative arts, old master drawings and European sculpture, and Southeast Asian art.
    The 2011 loan exhibition of masterworks is presented by the Historic Charleston Foundation and highlights more than fifty objects. Important pieces from Historic Charleston Foundation’s two museum houses will be complemented with loans from The Charleston Museum, Drayton Hall, Gibbes Museum of Art/Carolina Art Association, and Middleton Place Foundation. These include some works on view for the first time.

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    MARKEY ROBINSON’S BLUE DOOR AT FIRST IRISH ART AUCTION OF 2011

    Monday, December 20th, 2010

    The Blue Door by Markey Robinson. (click to enlarge) UPDATE: IT SOLD FOR 3,000

    Girl Looking at an Andy Warhol is the title of this limited edition print by Robert Ballagh. (click to enlarge). This was unsold.

    The Blue Door by Markey Robinson dates from the 1960’s.  It is among the 250 works to feature in an affordable Irish art auction by Matthews Fine Art at Oldcastle, Co. Meath on Sunday January 2 at 3 p.m. Estimates range from 200 to 8,000.
    Artists whose work will feature include Percy French, Peter Collis, Colin Davison, Robert Ballagh, J.P. Donleavy, Markey Robinson, Patrick O’Reilly, Graham Knuttel, Sean Scully, Brian Ballard and Gladys McCabe.
    There is a collection of around 100 framed decorative oil paintings from the liquidator of an hotel group.  The Blue Door has an estimate of 3,000-5,000.  Robert Ballagh’s limited edition print entitled Girl looking at an Andy Warhol is estimated at 1,500-2,500.
    There will be viewing on New Year’s Eve from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m., from noon to 5 p.m. on New Year’s Day and from noon to the start of the sale at 3 p.m. on January 2.
    UPDATE:  Percy French ‘Sunset over the Bog’  made 3,900, Markey Robinson ‘The Blue Door’ made 3,000, Elizabeth Brophy ‘The Grassy Beach’ made 1,800, Alice Maher ‘Night Garden Series’ 60″ made 3,800, Neil Shawcross ‘Standing Nude’ 26″ made 1,700, Ted Jones, ‘The Reader’, made 2,400, Breon O’Casey, ‘Abstract with Red’ made 1,850, Patrick O’Reilly, ‘A conference of Crows’ Bronze, Unique 23″ made 4,800 and Colin Davison, ‘Standing Nude, Morning Light,’ made 3,000.


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    CANADIAN MONA LISA AT DULWICH PICTURE GALLERY

    Sunday, December 19th, 2010

    The Canadian Mona Lisa is a moniker that has been applied to Tom Thomson’s  The Jack Pine (1916-1917) pictured on the left. It is one of many paintings that will brighten up the 200th anniversary celebration at London’s Dulwich Picture Gallery in 2011.  To mark the anniversary the gallery will exhibit twelve masterpieces from around the world, one each month. Included are works by Velazquez, Vermeer, El Greco, Veronese, Rembrandt, Ingres, Van Gogh, Gainsborough, Constable and Hockney.  The main summer exhibition will focus on work by Nicolas Poussin and Cy Twombly. In October the gallery will show Thom Thomson and the Group of Seven, 20th century  landscape painters seeking to find the language of the Canadian wilderness.
    The gallery was set up in 1811 when Sir Francis Bourgeois left a newly established collection to Dulwich College.  He and his business partner Noel Desenfans were asked in 1790 by the King of Poland to form a royal collection from scratch. During the five years they devoted to building it the King was forced to abdicate and the independent state of Poland ceased to exist.  So a boys school in south London became owner  of a national collection of old masters with no nation to claim it.  The gallery became independent from the school in 1994.

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    NEW AUCTION RECORD FOR SIR STANLEY SPENCER AT SOTHEBY’S

    Thursday, December 16th, 2010

    Sir Stanley Spencer's Hilda and I at Pond Street, dating from 1954, sold for £1,430,050. (click on image to enlarge)

    There was a new auction record for a work by Sir Stanley Spencer at Sotheby’s in London on December 15.  Hilda and I at Pond Street, dating from 1954, sold for £1,430,050 ($2,249,612), far in excess of its pre-sale estimate of £400,000-600,000. James Rawlin, senior director in 20th century British art at Sotheby’s, said the result helps establish Spencer as one of the central figures of figurative art in Britain in the 20th century.

    Works by Frank Auerbach, Dame Barbara Hepworth, L.S. Lowry, Christopher Wood and Lynn Chadwick also performed well in the sale of 20th century British art.  It realised a total of £8,255,625.  Sotheby’s pointed out that there is a higher price in US dollars for a work by Spencer.  His Christ Preaching at Cookham Regatta; Listening from Punts made £1,237,600 / $2,270,852 in June 2004.

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    LUKE GARDINER BY JOSHUA REYNOLDS ECHOES GRACEFUL DUBLIN AND BLOODY REBELLION

    Saturday, December 11th, 2010

    Sir Joshua Reynold's fine portrait of Luke Gardiner.

    This very fine portrait of Luke Gardiner, 1st Viscount Mountjoy, by Sir Joshua Reynolds went way over estimate at Christie’s evening Old Masters sale on December 7.  The subject sat for this portrait in 1773. Gardiner (1745-1798), an Irish landowner and MP for County Dublin, was killed at the Battle of New Ross in 1798.  One of the bloodiest battles of the 1798 rebellion in Ireland was followed by an appalling massacre in the town of  New Ross.

    Though he died suppressing Irish rebels he had, in 1778, introduced legislation in the Irish House of Commons aimed at alleviating many of the economic difficulties faced by Catholics.
    He also promoted the interest of Dublin and its surrounding areas. Like his father and grandfather he developed the Gardiner estate. In the 1770s he was responsible for the development of Temple, Eccles and North Great George’s Streets, and later in the 1790s for Mountjoy Square and Rutland Square.
    The portrait made £553,250 against an estimate of £200,000-£300,000.

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    GREAT YEAR FOR OLD MASTERS AT SOTHEBYS

    Saturday, December 11th, 2010

    GEORGE STUBBS, A.R.A. LIVERPOOL 1724 - 1806 LONDON BROOD MARES AND FOALS FROM THE COLLECTION OF THE EARL OF MACCLESFIELD. (click to enlarge)

    Sotheby’s December series of Old Master & British Paintings sales in London made an overall total of £27,991,125. This brings the total for worldwide sales of Old Master & British Pictures at Sotheby’s in 2010 to just over £153,000,000.  The highlight of the latest series  was George Stubbs’s Brood Mares and Foals which made a new auction record price of  £10,121,250.  The previous record for Stubbs of £3,191,500 was made in 1995 by his Portrait of The Royal Tiger.

    Alex Bell, head of the International Department, remarked : “Our sales this week end what has been another very successful year for the Old Master market at Sotheby’s. As in New York in January and London in July, we’ve once again this week seen exceptional works of art – with strong and again striking images and good provenance – perform very well and in many cases establish new benchmark prices. In July we led the Old Master sales season with Turner’s Modern Rome – Campo Vaccino (see antiquesandartireland.com post for July 7) while Stubbs’s Brood Mares and Foals has been the undoubted star of the show this week. We’re delighted to see that the Old Master market is experiencing an even greater international reach, with buyers from Russia and China, in particular, showing an ever increasing interest in the field.  These are exciting developments for the Old Master market.”

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    AFFORDABILITY THE KEY AT CHRISTMAS SALE AT JAMES ADAM

    Friday, December 10th, 2010

    This limited edition screenprint by Patrick Scott, entitled Christmas Greeting, dated '89, is estimated at 300-400. (click to enlarge) UPDATE: SOLD FOR 280

    Ger's Field is the title of this oil and wax on canvas by Coilin Murray at Adams. It is estimated at 300-500. (click to enlarge) UPDATE: SOLD FOR 320

    The Christmas sale at James Adam in Dublin on Tuesday, December 14 at 6 p.m. is made up of 318 affordable lots of paintings, prints, sculpture and literature.  There are sketches by artists like Estella Solomons, Thomas Ryan and Peter Curling, watercolours by Alexander Williams and Douglas Alexander, more contemporary works from artists Andrew Folan, Patrick Scott, Tigue O’Donoghue Ross, Paddy Lennon, Michael Mulcahy and Brian Maguire, Andy Warhol screenprints of Marylin Monroe, sculpture by Patrick McElroy and a small section with books, sketchbooks and catalogues of Irish interest.  Estimates range from ten and twenty euro upwards.

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    DAN O’NEILL TOPS THE POLL AT de VERES IRISH ART

    Thursday, December 9th, 2010

    Fishermen's Wives by Dan O'Neill was the top lot at de Veres. (click on image to enlarge)

    Abstract Composition by Evie Hone made 11,500 at de Veres. (click to enlarge)

    Dan O’Neill’s Fishermens Wives was the top lot at de Veres Irish art auction in Dublin on December 8. It made 28,000.  A second O’Neill, entitled “And yet another” made 15,500.
    Evie Hone’s Abstract Composition sold for 11,500 and Yellow Head by Basil Blackshaw made 10,500.
    About 60 per cent of 140 lots of affordable Irish art found buyers.  The sale brought in 325,000.
    (see post on antiquesandartireland.com for December 2)

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