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Procession with Lilies by Louis le Brocquy from the Independent collection at Adams. (Click on image to enlarge).  UPDATE: IT MADE 320,000.

Procession with Lilies by Louis le Brocquy is the most important piece of art in the corporate collection of Independent News and Media to be sold by James Adam in Dublin on September 26.  Painted in 1984-5 it drew its inspiration from a 1939 Evening Herald photograph showing schoolchildren with lilies blessed at the Franciscan Church at Merchant’s Quay in Dublin on the Feast of St. Anthony.  It has a top estimate of 250,000.  The work is particularly well known, and was the subject of a limited edition and popular lithograph.

The 67 pieces from the Independent’s collection were deemed unsuitable for the new largely glass walled corporate headquarters in Dublin’s city centre.  The collection was put together by the late Vincent Ferguson, well known collector and patron of artists, and a director of the newspaper company. The focus is on Irish contemporary art of the 1980’s/’90’s and it includes work by Basil Blackshaw, T.P.Flanagan, Brian Ballard, Eithne Carr and many others. Adams have put a low estimate of 350,000 on the 67 works.

Christo – Poussette empaquetée,1962 (120,000-180,000). Click on image to enlarge).  UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR 147,750

Martial Raysse, Arbre, Assemblage d’objets (1959-1960) (200,000-300,000). (Click on image to enlarge).  UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR 216,750

A rich overview of contemporary art in France since the 1960’s will come under the hammer at Sotheby’s in Paris on September 24.  Around 100 lots from the Marcel Brient Collection of Contemporary Art shows extraordinary diversity from the collection of an intuitive, free-thinking Frenchman.  It offers an insight into the work of artists in France over 40 years, discreetly amassed over the past four decades.  The collector maintained close relationships with Galerie Durand-Dessert, Galerie Maeght, Galerie de France and the dealers Claude Bernard and Yvon Lambert, among others.

A number of encounters have guided his eye down the years, the most decisive being that with Louis Clayeux, Director of Galerie Maeght in Paris from 1948-65, who took him to visit Alberto Giacometti in his studio. Other gallerists were equally influential – like Karl Flinker, who sold him a gouache by Jean Helion, and Jean Fournier, who sold him a pastel by Joan Mitchell.

Marcel Brient has the distinction of being one of the first major collectors to buy works by Jeff Koons, John Currin, Takashi Murakami and Felix Gonzales-Torres – not forgetting Georg Baselitz, Sigmar Polke and Kara Walker. The artist’s nationality was irrelevant; his taste and eye that led him to the artists he admired.

UPDATE: THE SALE REALISED 5,120,975 EURO.

A private collection of vivid 19th century marble sculpture leads Christie’s sale The Opulent Eye – 500 Years: Decorative Arts Europe.  No less than 20 lots from the collection will be included in the auction in London on September 20.  They are expected to realise more than £400,000.

The group focuses on belle époque marble statuary and genre figures. Highlights include a Belgian art nouveau marble regulateur estimated at £50,000 – 100,000,  (illustrated above centre). The marble long-case clock is attributed to the Symbolist sculptor Egide Rombaux (d.1942) and is carved in bas-relief with a figure of Atropos, one of three fates from Greek mythology who spin the thread of life, measure and cut it. The life-size marble figure of a female nude by Jacques de Braekeleer estimated at £40,000 – 60,000, (illustrated above left) is entitled `De Afwachting (The Expectation)’ and is thought to depict a maiden waiting for her lover, a fisherman, to return from sea. Its pendent, depicting the fisherman’s wife, and known as `The Wait’, is in the Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique.  Characteristic of other pieces from the collection is the marble figure of a maiden sipping nector, or wood nymph, by Angelo Bertozzi, which is from the Romantic school of 19th century Italian sculpture estimated at £30,000 – 50,000 (illustrated above right).

UPDATE:  The Belgian marble figure of a female nude made £51,650; the clock made £61,250, the maiden sipping nectar was unsold. The auction brought in a total including buyer’s premium of £4.85 million.

Sotheby’s made auction history when Edvard Munch’s The Scream sold for $119.9 million in New York in May – a new world record for any work of art at auction.

Reduced auction sales and in particular single owner sales led to a decline of 16% in total revenue at Sotheby’s in the first half of 2012.  Figures just released show total revenues of $303.9 million, down 18% over the same period in 2011. For the first six months of 2012 net income amounted to $408.9 million, down 16% on the first half of 2011. Net income in the second quarter of 2012 was $85.4 million, a decrease of 33% for the same period last year.

The resolution of a labour dispute with New York unionised art handler negatively impacted on the first half results.  Sotheby’s believes that future labour costs have been reset in an attractive and sustainable way.  The decline has been partially offset by reductions in total expenses of $8.5 million, or 3% in the first half year.

“Our operating results reflect some tremendous successes, but also reflect the challenging global economy, a tough comparison to the best quarter in Sotheby’s history a year ago, and a competitive climate for high-end consignments,” said Bill Ruprecht, President and Chief Executive Officer. “Demand and prices remain strong, especially at the high end of the market, as reflected in our highest ever sale of Impressionist and Modern Art of $373.3 million in May in New York”.  Sotheby’s financial services business grew substantially, he said. Private sales are an increasingly important contributor to revenue stream.  The slowdown in the Asian market is comparable to the economy there, but it continues to be very profitable and a source of “substantial opportunity”.

“Art appears to remain an attractive asset for collectors and our consignment pipeline for the Autumn season is very active at the moment” Bill Ruprecht said. “We remain confident in the global art market and will, as always, seek opportunities to broaden and extend the breadth and depth of our relationships with our clients.”