A Handmade Donegal Carpet After a Design by Gavin Morton, G.K Robertson. UPDATE: THIS MADE 2,500 AT HAMMER
This Lily of the Valley pattern handmade Donegal carpet comes up as lot 285 at Reilly’s auction in Prosperous, Co. Kildare on September 14. The sale of 500 lots – on behalf of renowned jockey Michael J Kinane of Eadling House, Punchestown – features a number of Donegal and Persian carpets and runners as well as fine furniture, art and collectibles. This one is estimated at €3,800-€4,000, the most expensively estimated at €8.000-€9,000 is a blue ground design by Gavin Morton and G K Robertson, who began their collaboration in the 19th century.
MAINIE JELLETT (1897-1944) ABSTRACT COMPOSITION. UPDATE: THIS MADE 7,000 AT HAMMER
This gouache on paper by Mainie Jellett, which is the opening lot at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish art online sale this evening, has already attracted much competitive bidding, with 32 bids so far. The estimate for Abstract Composition of €3,000-€5,000 has been exceeded. It is the opening lot in sale with a total of 195 lots on offer.
Berlin Suite by Cecil King (1921-1986). UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,600 AT HAMMER
At a time when Irish art seemed to exist mostly in a landscape laden time warp from around the turn of the 20th century, when Irish Modernism existed in a vacuum, IMMA was far in the future and the avant garde was regarded as deluded and possibly even heathen Oliver Dowling opened his gallery on Kildare St. in Dublin in 1975 with a focus on minimalism, conceptualism, neo-expressionism and other abstractions.
Concurring Rhythms by Alice Berger Hammerschlag (1917-1969) UPDATE: THIS MADE 360 AT HAMMER
There were controversies. This writer vividly remembers one evening paper dashing off to Lenehan’s Hardware Shop on Capel St. to purchase for a pittance a glass shelf and a water glass to demonstrate the folly of it all. Oliver was showing An Oak Tree by Michael Craig-Martin, consisting of a glass of water on a glass shelf on metal brackets and a text (the original is now in the National Gallery of Australia with an artist’s copy at the Tate). The news hounds entirely missed the conceptual point but it made for an amusing story. Oliver Dowling had a loyal following who understood how easily avant garde art could be misjudged in a world where it was so far ahead of the prevailing norms.
Untitled by Fergus Martin (b 1955). UPDATE: THIS MADE 2,600 AT HAMMER
Fast forward nearly half a century and art like this is fairly mainstream, even in Ireland, largely thanks to people like Oliver Dowling, his partner Cecil King (they were among the founders of the ROSC exhibitions), and all the other artists and gallerists who toiled in that vacuum. When I was a young journalist in Dublin Cecil King offered me a piece of advice which I’ve often quoted. Looking at a conceptual painting that consisted of not much more than a pencil dot on a large white canvas I asked what on earth it was all about. “Just look” he said, “and keep on looking”. This guidance has proved richly rewarding.
It is why I’ve been pouring over the catalogue of The Oliver Dowling Collection with such enthusiasm. It comes up at a timed online sale at James Adam on September 11. There are 163 lots – including as large a selection of work by Cecil King ever likely to be found at any sale – in an auction now on view at Adams.
Oliver Dowling died in January. His collection bears witness to a true pioneer with rigorous standards. There is art by William McKeown, Mary Fitzgerald, Josef Beuys, Michael Coleman, Fergus Martin, Felim Egan, Ciaran Lennon, Nigel Rolfe, Luis Tomasello, Willie Doherty, Jo Baer, Jerry Zeniuk, Raimund Girke, Alice Berger Hammerschlag, Colin Middleton, Eduardo Chillida, Dorothy Cross, Robert Janz, Maria Simmonds Gooding and many other acclaimed artists in this exceptional sale.
Rose Stem and Pot by Derrick Greaves (1927-2022). UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,000 AT HAMMER
A tall cloisonne garlic head vase or a Killarney wood sewing table? The choice is yours at upcoming sales by Hegartys in Bandon on September 11 and at Aidan Foleys in Doneraile on September 16 and 17. Decorated with flowers and birds in inlaid enamel the vase is estimated by Hegartys at €180-€250. The Killarney wood sewing table, last sold at Woodwards in 2010 for a hammer price of €5,200, is estimated by Aidan Foley at €4,000-€6,000.
Hegartys will offer garden furniture, antique furniture, silver, art and collectibles in an auction where feature lots include pink topaz diamond studded pendant, a late Qing Dynasty garden stool, a west of Ireland oil on canvas by Mabel Young and an etched glass jar. Aidan Foley’s sale features a country house contents from Co. Limerick and lots from a town house in Thurles.
Killarney wood sewing table at Aidan Foley’s sale. UPDATE: THIS MADE 4,400 AT HAMMER
The Armorial ‘hatchment’ for Anglo-Irish military officer, statesman and twice-serving UK Prime Minister Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (1769-1852) at Dreweatts fine furniture sale on September 10 and 11. A hatchment is a panel on which a coat of arms of a deceased person is temporarily displayed and lot 414 is estimated at £4,000-£6,000. It bears the motto ‘Virtutis Fortuna Comes’ (Fortune favours the brave). Wellesley is revered as one of the leading military and political figures in Britain during the late 18th and early 19th centuries and in his military role, was one of the pivotal commanders to end the Anglo-Mysore and Napoleonic wars – most famously he is celebrated for ending the Napoleonic Wars in victory, when the Seventh Coalition defeated Napoleon at the legendary Battle of Waterloo in 1815.
Born into Irish aristocracy (his grandfather was Richard Wesley, 1st Baron Mornington, who served in the Irish House of Commons representing Trim in County Meath), his childhood was spent between the family homes of Mornington House in Dublin and Dangan Castle near Summerhill in County Meath.
Paul Henry RHA (1877-1958) – The Bog Pool (c.1921-22). UPDATE: THIS MADE 160,000 AT HAMMER
The Bog Pool by Paul Henry is the most expensively estimated lot at the James Adam Important Irish Art sale in Dublin on September 25. It was exhibited at The Dublin Painters Gallery in 1922 and in New York in 1930. The setting is most likely Achill. The estimate is €120,000-€160,000. The catalogue, with 150 lots, is online.
Heart of Darkness – an etching by Sean Scully UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,000 AT HAMMER
Bidding on the current Irish art online auction by Morgan O’Driscoll runs until September 9. The sale features work by Sean Scully, Mainie Jellett, Donald Teskey, Francis Tansey, Kenneth Webb, Nano Reid, Dan O’Neill, Graham Knuttel and many other artists. The catalogue is online.
A surreal collection described by Christie’s as a true theatre of the imagination that perfectly captures its founders’ creativity and intellectual curiosity comes up in Paris on September 24. A total of 150 lots from the collection of Paul and Jacqueline Duchein of Montauban will come under the hammer. Artists featured include Marie Toyen, Yves Tanguy, Max Ernst, Wolfgang Paalen, André Breton, Salvador Dalí, Victor Brauner, Josef Sima and Man Ray. Their collection combines Surrealism with folk art, Art Brut, and tribal art and their home, illustrated here, would become a cabinet of curiosities, rapidly earning a reputation as the city’s second major museum alongside the Musée Ingres Bourdelle. Highlights of the sale include Flux et reflux de la nuit by Marie Cermínovà, also known as Toyen (€800,000–1,200,000), and Trois monstres ou la Horde, a remarkable oil on canvas painted by Max Ernst in 1927 (€400,000–600,000). The global estimate is €4.6-7 million.
Saint Joseph with the Christ Child, c.1637, Artist: Guercino (1591-1666). National Gallery of Ireland, Purchased 1882
Guercino & Gris: Conserving Canvas from Different Eras, which explores historical and modern conservation treatments on works of art, has just been released by the National Gallery of Ireland. It focuses on three works from the National Gallery of Ireland’s collection: Saint Joseph with the Christ Child (c.1637), by Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, known as Guercino (1591-1666), and two collages A Guitar, Glasses and a Bottle and Carafe, Cups and Glasses (1914), by Juan Gris (1887-1927), which was initially one double-sided artwork.
The 64-page hardback publication explores structural conservation treatments on works of art and the changing approaches to these treatments over time. It discusses treatments and processes informed by research carried out by the National Gallery of Ireland’s new Scientific Research Laboratory, and how scientific advancements in conservation are contributing to the care of the collection. The publication marks the completion of the conserving canvas project at the National Gallery, made possible by a grant from the Getty Foundation. It is available to purchase online and in-shop at the gallery priced €29.50.
Sir John Lavery – The Ratification of the Irish Treaty in the House of Lords, December 1921
A re-discovered study by Sir John Lavery of The Ratification of the Irish Treaty in the House of Lords, December 1921 will come up at auction in England in November. The Treaty passed for ratification from the Commons to the Lords on December 16, 1921. It was a moment when the British Empire changed from the rapid expansion from the 1870’s to steep decline in the 20th century.
By then in his ’60’s Lavery, who had been knighted for his services as an official war artist, sought assistance from Sir Patrick Ford and Lord Birkenhead to paint while the house was in session. Armed with these sketches he began work immediately on the large version now in the Glasgow Museums. Lavery frequently gifted his preparatory sketches and gave this one to sculptor George Henry Paulin in gratitude for his portrait of Lavery, a cast of which is in the Glasgow Museums. The study has remained with the family and it will lead Bellmans auction of Modern British and 20th century art on November 21 with an estimate of £20,000-£30,000 (€23,460-€35,190).
It could make more. At Dreweatts in the UK earlier this year a Lavery study for The Hearing of the Appeal of Sir Roger Casement sold for £155,200 with fees (€182,050) over a top estimate of £25,000 (€29,330) after a long bidding battle.
Lavery’s view on Irish independence was clear. In 1910 he wrote to his friend and pupil Sir Winston Churchill, then Minister for the Colonies, that he believed Ireland: “will never be ruled by Westminster, the Vatican or Ulster without continuous bloodshed … and leaving Irishmen to settle their own affairs is the only solution”.
This study by Sir John Lavery of The Hearing of the Appeal of Sir Roger Casement sold for £155,200 with fees (€182,050)
