Some of the most celebrated Irish artists including Yeats, le Brocquy, Paul Henry, Tony O’Malley, Barrie Cooke, Nathanial Hone, Donald Teskey and many more feature at the evening sale of Irish and International art by Whyte’s in Dublin on March 9. There is a selection of American artists from the defunct Anglo Irish Bank collection, a print from a box set by Banksy and Mastiff from the renowned Polish artist Tadeusz Brzozowski (1918-1987). The catalogue is online.
UPDATE:Mastiff by Polish artist Tadeusz Brzozwski was the top lot of the sale. It made 190,000 at hammer. This price equals the world record set in 2017 by Desa Unicom in Warsaw. Rusty Gates by Jack B. Yeats made 120,000 and The Bog Road by Paul Henry made 54,000. The auction grossed €1.1 million with 82% of lots sold.
Wedding at Joy St., Belfast c1923 by William Conor. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
There is history, travel, sporting memorabilia and much more at Fonsie Mealy’s Rare Book sale in Castlecomer on March 11. The catalogue lists more than 900 lots covering a broad range of interests including literature, history, racing, an 1820 book on zoology from the library at Doneraile Court, folklore, local history and legends, maps, military history, postcards, sporting programmes and a miniature stamped sample of a hurley signed by Ollie Walsh. Travel may be going off the menu right now but the sale boasts a rare travel guide from the last days of the Georgian period. The first English (1832) edition of Tour in England, Ireland and France in the years 1828-29 by the German nobleman Prince Hermann Ludwig Heinrich von Puckler-Muskau is estimated at €300-400. He observed the manners and customs of the inhabitants and offered anecdotes about distinguished public characters in a series of letters.
A catalogue for the 1952 All Ireland Hurling Final between Cork and Dublin, the first of the Leesiders three in a row, has an estimate of €80-100. There is an estimate of €3,000-4,000 on a scrapbook of a collection of rugby material from Karl Mullen (1926-2009) regarded as Ireland’s first “professional” captain who won 25 caps between 1947-1952. There are news cuttings and tickets relating to Ireland’s 1948 Grand Slam and the 1950 Lions Tour to Australia and New Zealand, match programmes, action shots and pen pictures.There is about 60 boxed lots for foragers. The catalogue is online.
The words “Charity” and “Bank” are hardly synonymous but the first sale devoted entirely to Irish banknotes by UK specialist auctioneers Dix Noonan Webb in London on March 12 will include 120 lots from the archive of AIB (formerly the First Trust Bank) to be sold in aid of charity. There are around 200 other lots from various other sources. The archive includes proofs, specimens and high grade issued notes from the Provincial Bank, AIB and First Trust Bank. Among the most prized lots are four uncut sheets of 35 First Trust Bank £10 proofs from the 1994-96 issue estimated at £2,000-2,600 and three uncut sheets of 24 First Trust £100 dating from March 1, 1996 (£1,500-2,000).
Adrian Moynihan, Head of AIB (NI) said: “With a long and proud history of supporting the Northern Ireland community, AIB is delighted to bring forward for auction its banknote archive in the hope and anticipation that it will raise significant money for two local charities.” Proceeds will be split between Age Northern Ireland and the Alzheimer’s Society.
Prime lots from other sources include a rare and attractive high denomination Bank of Ireland £20, dating from November 1915, which is expected to make £3,000-£3,600. The auction will be preceded on March 11 by A sale of Irish Coins and Medals at Dix Noonan Webb which includes an extremely rare Free State (1921-1937) Proof Florin from 1934.
Provincial Bank of Ireland £5 note proofs. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £900
Francis Bacon – Triptych Inspired by the Oresteia of Aeschylus
Francis Bacon’s large-format Triptych Inspired by the Oresteia of Aeschylus will highlight the Contemporary Art evening auction at Sotheby’s in New York on May 13. It will be offered with an estimate in excess of $60 million.
Inspired by Aeschylus’s trilogy of Greek tragedies dating to the 5th century B.C. this dates to 1981. The artist revisits the same classical text that inspired Three Studies for Figures at the Base of the Crucifixion at the Tate Collection, London. It is one of the 28 large-format triptychs Bacon created between 1962 and 1991 and reveals in a single work the entire range of an iconography developed over three decades of painting. Sotheby’s describe it as one of his most ambitious, enigmatic, and important works.
Acquired in 1984 by the Norwegian Collector Hans Rasmus Astrup the triptych has been in the care of Astrup Fearnley Museet in Oslo since 1993. Hans Rasmus Astrup explained that the museum; “is meant to be a lasting resource for the public, as it builds on the existing collection and grows beyond it. With this single sale we can ensure that the museum and collection are here in perpetuity.”
Bacon’s theme of divine punishment is found in Aeschylus’ most famous trilogy, The Oresteia, in which Clytemnestra murders her husband Agamemnon in revenge for the sacrifice of their daughter, Iphigenia. When the son Orestes finds out, he kills his mother to avenge his father’s death, provoking the avenging Furies, also called the Eumenides, who determine to drive Orestes insane as punishment.
An image of Samuel Beckett by Louis le Brocquy is among the lots at Whyte’s sale of Irish and International Art in Dublin on March 9. The watercolour on tissue paper is signed and dated 1992 and is estimated at 15,000-20,000. The sale features work by Jack Yeats, Paul Henry, William Conor, Beatrice Glenavy, William Sadler, Nathaniel Hone The Elder, Louis le Brocquy, Tony O’Malley, Donald Teskey and many other Irish artists. Viewing gets underway at the RDS tomorrow.
UPDATE: THIS MADE 19,000 AT HAMMER
(See post on antiquesandartireland.com for March 1, 2020).
Louis le Brocquy (1916-2012) – Image of Samuel Beckett
A facsimile of The Book of Kells – the most precious illuminated manuscript of the early Middle Ages – is among the lots at Fonsie Mealy’s Spring rare book sale in Castlecomer on March 11. It is from the first and only complete fine art facsimile, a limited edition of 1,480 books published by authority of the Board of Trinity College, Dublin. Published by Verlag, Luzern it comes in a specially created presentation box and is estimated at 6,000-8,000. More than 900 lots will come under the hammer.
More than 450 lots will come under the hammer at Morgan O’Driscoll’s auction of affordable art on Tuesday March 10. Artists whose work will feature are Jack B Yeats, Harry Kernoff, Banksy, Salvador Dali, Antony Gormley, John Kingerlee, Georges Braque, Kenneth Webb and John Butler Yeats. The catalogue is online.
JACK BUTLER YEATS (1871-1957) Roadside Thatched Cottage (1,200-1,800). UPDATE: THIS MADE 1,600 AT HAMMER
An advertising print featuring New York and Chicago baseball players estimated at €80-100 sold for a hammer price of €17,500 at Sheppards in Durrow today. The print, for E and J Burke Finest Pale Ales and Extra Foreign Stout depicted the two players drinking companionably, one with ale from a barrell, the other with stout.
The brothers Edward (1827?-1887) and John Burke (1829-1892) were Irish distillers, brewers, bottlers and importers, cousins of Benjamin Lee Guinness and grandsons of the first Arthur Guinness. The company they founded in. 1847 was in business in New York City from 1874 to 1953. A six story brick warehouse at 616 W 46th St. served as headquarters and storage from 1913-1922.
A Chinese Qing hardwood and silk throne screen with six embroidered panels made €42,000 at hammer. It had been estimated at €30,000-60,000.
A rare complete set of Beethoven screenprints by Andy Warhol comes up at Sotheby’s sale of prints and multiples in London on March 19. This year marks the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth. Warhol spared no effort in transforming the idealised and iconic portrait of the composer by Karl Stieler, into the rock star persona portrayed within this set of four screenprints. Created shortly before Warhol’s death in 1987 they are estimated at £200,000-300,000.
A foiled armed Belfast bank raid in 1974 is recalled in a lot to come under the hammer at Dix Noonan Webb in London on March 4. A group of three Queen’s Gallantry Medals awarded to RUC Detective Constable James Patrick Hardy will be offered with an estimate of £4,000-5,000. He was one of two policemen who spotted the getaway car speeding away from a robbery at the Trustee Savings Bank at Glengormley in November 1974. Tbey gave chase and the getaway car crashed into the security fence at the Corr’s Corner Roadhouse.
A newspaper account quoting the second RUC man, Detective Sergeant George McMullen is included. Sgt. McMullen said: “When the car stopped four armed men got out and we ordered them to halt. After repeated warnings we drew our pistols and opened fire, hitting and wounding one man. He and one of the others stopped and after a further chase we caught all four.” More than £1,800 in cash was recovered and the robbers were subsequently brought to trial.
