Late 18th/early 19th century Italian marble model of the Warwick Vase UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £6,033
This Italian marble model of the Warwick Vase – an ancient Roman marble vase excavated from Hadrian’s Villa in Tivoli around 1771 – is at Woolley and Wallis on January 20 with an estimate of £4,000-£6,000. It was previously owned by Earl-Bishop Frederick Hervey, (1730-1803), Bishop of Cloyne, Country Cork Ireland and later the Bishop of Derry, until his death. The vase was housed at the estate he built, the historic Downhill House in Northern Ireland, and remained there until 1950 when the house was sold. It was then given as a gift to prominent Belfast solicitor and connoisseur Peter Rankin (1943-2015), who amassed a large carefully curated private collection and became a leading figure in the preservation and promotion of architectural and cultural heritage in Northern Ireland and beyond. He was a founder member of the Ulster Architectural Heritage Society.
Frederick Remington (1861-1909) – Argument with the Town Marshall. UPDATE: THIS MADE $11.847,500
High Noon at Christie’s at the Rockefeller Center in New York on January 21 sees the most valuable collection of Western American art in history come under the hammer. The low estimate for the William I Koch’s collection is $50 million (€42.9 million). This more than doubles the previous record for any Western American art auction.
Bill Koch, who won the America’s Cup in 1992 with the yacht America3, feels the time has come to pass on this history to other collectors passionate about the American west. “I have been fortunate to collect things that resonate with me, The treasures in this sale are among my favourites” he said.
Charles Marion Russel (1864-1926) – The Sun Worshippers. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
Visions of the West is split into two auctions, an evening sale next Tuesday followed by High Noon on Wednesday. There are masterworks by Frederick Remington, Albert Bierstadt and Charles Marion Russell in a collection that is acclaimed around the world.
Remington’s sunset painting Coming to the Call is estimated at $6 million – $8 million (€5.1 million – €6.8 million). Other titles of art by Remington like The Broncho Buster, Argument with the Town Marshall and Coming through the Rye, set the scene firmly in the wild west.
Newell Convers Wyeth (1882-1945) – Wild Bill Hickok at the Cards. UPDATE: THIS MADE $2,210,000
Another work of great interest is Wild Bill Hickok at the Cards by N C Wyeth, patriarch of the Wyeth family of artists. It shows American legends Buffalo Bill Cody and Wild Bill Hickok in a card game gone wrong.
Alfred Jacob Miller’s The Buffalo Hunt dates to around 1850 while G Harvey’s Texas Oil Patch from 1981 focuses on the booming oil industry, the basis of much of the wealth of the billionaire businessman.
The old adage caveat emptor (buyer beware) should never be far away from the mind of any collector, big or small. When it comes to Bill Koch it is a case of the seller beware. This keen collector of art and wine demands that it must be what it says on the tin. He has served several high profile lawsuits against sellers, the most notable related to the sale of wine purported to have been owned by Thomas Jefferson. This case is reported to have been settled for $3 million (€2.58 million) in 2014.
UPDATE: The total for both sales exceeded $84 million.
Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902) – Mountain Lake. All images courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd., 2025. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
Tony O’Malley (1913-2003) – Untitled. UPDATE: THIS MADE 950 AT HAMMER
This carborundum print by Tony O’Malley is lot 7 at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Off the Wall online art auction which runs until January 19. It is signed with the artists initials and numbered 22/40. The estimate is €400-€600. More than 450 lots will come under the hammer in a sale that features artists like Graham Knuttel, Markey Robinson, Cecil Maguire, Elizabeth Cope, Majella O’Neill Collins, Louis le Brocquy, Elizabeth Brophy, Maurice Wilks, Jane O’Malley, Frank McKelvey and many more. The catalogue is online.
A masterpiece by Canaletto – Venice, the Bucintoro at the Molo on Ascension Day – will lead Christie’s Old Masters auction in New York on February 4. The Bucintoro, the official galley of the Doge and a symbol of La Serenissima, was used exclusively on Ascension Day. The Molo is the quay beside the Doge’s Palace.
The spectacular celebration was a subject Canaletto returned to frequently as he brought the pomp and ceremony of the Venetian lagoon to life. This theatrical masterpiece, his last known rendition on the theme, was commissioned around 1754 by the King family (later Earls of Lovelace) and remained in their possession for almost 200 years. The first, commissioned by Britain’s first Prime Minister Robert Walpole (1676-1745), made a new world record of £31.9 million (€36.5 million) at Christie’s Old Masters evening auction in London last July.
Among the offerings at Christie’s on February 5, during what is shaping up to be an especially strong Classics Week at Christie’s in New York, is an Old Master chalk, pen and ink drawing by Claude Lorrain.
Gerard Dillon (1916-1971) – Female Bather. UPDATE: THIS PAINTING WAS WITHDRAWN FROM THE SALE
This watercolour by Gerard Dillon is at €2,000-€4,000 the most expensively estimated lot at Adam’s timed online picture sale which runs until January 13. With 325 lots in total the sale offers art by Harry Kernoff, Gary Trimble, Stella Steyn, Lillian Lucy Davidson, Robert Ballagh, Mainie Jellett, Thurloe Connolly, Mary Swanzy, Mark Rode and a wide variety of artists. The auction is on view in Dublin from 2 pm to 5 pm on January 10 and 11, from 10 am to 5 pm on Monday and online.
The auction by R J Keighery in Waterford on Monday January 12 includes a lifetime collection of clocks, railwayana and maritime items. A longcase clock with brass dial by Alex Gordon, Dublin has an estimate of €2,000-€3,000 but estimates for many others are lower than this. A 19th century Siebbe Gorman 12 bolt diving helmen is estimated at €1,500-€2,500 and an 1894 timetable for the Dingle and Tralee light railway has an estimate of €6,000-€8,000. There is a selection of old enamel road signs and the catalogue is online.
Paul Henry (1876-1958) – A Grey Day on the Bog (1928). UPDATE: THIS MADE 44,000 AT HAMMER
This oil on board by Paul Henry leads Morgan O’Driscoll’s current Irish art auction which runs online until January 12. It was acquired by the original owner from the 1928 exhibition in London. The estimate is €50,000-€70,000. A total of 288 lots of art are on the catalogue including work by Yeats, Stephen McKenna, Mr. Brainwash, Markey Robinson, James Humbert Craig, Patrick Collins and Frank McKelvey.
IF what you really really wanted somehow did not arrive then Victor Mee’s December decorative interiors sale on December 30 might provide the answer. A full size snooker table complete with lights, cue holder, cues, a set of six caricature paintings, snooker and billiard balls and a plaque with the rules of snooker are on offer. Lot 293A is estimated at 2,000-4,000. The catalogue for the sale is online.
Pieter Brueghel the Younger – The Census at Bethlehem c1604. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £5.2 million
The Census at Bethlehem by Pieter Brueghel the Younger places the Holy Family within a bustling Flemish winter landscape. Villagers queue to register for the census, children skate, throw snowballs and drag sledges across the frozen ground and drinkers gather around a makeshift tavern carved into an oak tree. The sacred is blended into the everyday as the Holy Family at the centre pass quietly through the crowd in a moving nod to the Nativity. The c1604 work exemplified Brueghel the Younger’s ability to capture the divine in the rhythms of ordinary life and is one of the largest known depictions of the subject.
The composition derives from a painting of the same name made in 1566 by the artist’s father, Pieter Brueghel the elder now in the Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. It is one of the most revered works of the Northern Renaissance. Brueghel the Younger was only a child at his father’s death and he devoted much of his career to preserving and re-interpreting these masterful inventions with his own acute observation of daily life and meticulous detail. The Nativity has always been a favourite subject for artists and this work sold for an above estimate £5,164,000 (€5,903,300) at Sotheby’s Old Masters and 19th century paintings auction in London this month.
Gustav Klimt – Portrait of Elizabeth Lederer sold for $236.4 million
The recovery in the international art market which became apparent in the latter end of 2025 is driven by real art lovers, not speculators or peddlers of bitcoin looking to make a quick buck. The big November art sales in New York generated $2.2 billion (€1.89 billion) in just one week.
At Sotheby’s first auction at their new hq at the Breuer Building, previously the Whitney Museum, Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Elizabeth Lederer made $236.4 million (€203 million), the second highest price ever paid for a work of art at auction as well as the most expensive painting sold this year. The first auction at their new home in New York brought in €706 million (€606,450), the highest total ever achieved by Sotheby’s for a one night auction.
Mark Rothko No. 31 (Yellow Stripe) made $62.1 million
Opening night sales at Christie’s in the same week totalled $689,795,000 (€592.45 million). Mark Rothko’s No. 31 (Yellow Stripe) made $62.1 million (€53.34 million) and Claude Monet’s Nymphéas made $45.4 million (€39 million).
No less than 12 paintings sold for more than $20 million each. This follows three years of layoffs at auction houses, closing galleries and sales which in 2024 were down by 12%. Aided by a booming stock market the November art sales in New York generated a 77% increase over the same sales last year.
Frida Kahlo – The Dream (The Bed) made a new world record for a female artist of $54.6 million
Prices for women artists were up. Frida Kahlo’s 1940 self portrait The Dream, the Bed sold for $54,660,000 (€46.9 million) at Sotheby’s to become the most expensive work by a female artist ever sold at auction. Kahlo surpassed the record for Georgia O’Keeffe’s Jimson Weed/White Flower No. I which made $44.4 million (€38.14 million) in 2014.
Earlier this year a painting by Marlene Dumas became the most expensive painting by a living female artist ever when it sold for $13.6 million (€11.68 million) at Christie’s in New York. This month the Louvre in Paris announced that the South African born Amsterdam based Dumas has completed a commission for a vast wall on the Porte des Lions atrium. Liasons consists of nine paintings of faces in canvases of a size that match the marble low reliefs that once hung on the wall. “My faces are a mixture of the past and the present. I cannot paint the horrors of the ongoing genocides of our times directly, but their shadows did affect the mood under which these faces were made” she said in an interview.
Marlene Dumas – Liasons at the Louvre.
The president director of the Louvre, Laurence des Cars described Dumas as one of the greatest painters of our time. “When we were thinking about a work for the entrance to the Portes des Lions, which is both the access to the Gallery of the Five Continents and the Department of Paintings, she seemed the obvious choice: she defends and illustrates the medium of painting like few others, and her work is conceived as a space for bringing together different sensibilities and origins. That is exactly what we aimed for to do with this redesigned space. We are proud of the outcome of this magnificent project. Marlene Dumas’ work is a repertoire of ways of painting and drawing, as well as an invitation to confront our humanity” he said.
The art market always needs new buyers. Right now the omens are good. In October Christie’s achieved the highest total of £106.9 million (€121.93 million) for a Frieze week London evening sale in seven years, with world records for Paula Rego, Suzanne Valadon, Annie Morris and Esben Weile Kjaer. In Paris in October the Modernist and Surrealism and its Legacy sales brought in €89.7 million at Sotheby’s, up more than 50% on the same series in October 2024. These are among the trends that continued into the big November auctions. Another emerging trend is for art by women. More female artists are going to get more recognition as galleries strive to become less stale and white male and more inclusive of artists of any gender and ethnicity.
