 |
 |
Spring by William Crozier. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £10,880 including premium.
A collection of artworks by William Crozier will lead Bonhams Modern British and Irish art sale at Knightsbridge in London at noon on July 15. The leading lot is a classical Crozier work entitled Spring, an oil on canvas painted in 1998. The estimate is £10,000-£15,000 (€12,000-€18,000). The sale offers five from a group of six oils by Crozier commissioned by corporate collection in the UK, along with art by Nicholas Hely Hutchinson, Augustus John, Gwen John, Sir William Orpen, Micheal MacLiammoir and Anne Magill.
UPDATE: The most expensive of the Croziers sold was The Plant Room which made £15,360, The Entrance made £10,240, New Field made £8,320 and Meon Valley made £5,120. All prices quoted include premium. A watercolour pen and ink drawing by Michael MacLiammoir made £2,816 over a top estimate of £1,700.
A pair of large Italian Tuscany villa gates at Victor Mee. UPDATE: THESE MADE 4,000 AT HAMMER
A fine pair of large forged iron gates from a villa in Tuscany might set the scene nicely now that climate change is upon us. This decorated and atmospheric pair, complete with two side pedestrian entrance gates and scroll design side pillars, is at Victor Mee’s online summer garden sale on July 15 with an estimate of €6,000-€8,000.
An original red telephone box, an 18th century industrial cast iron cider press, 21 square metres of Bert and May reclaimed floor tiles in a geometric Art Deco pattern of predominantly greys and an early 19th century metal three legged pot are among the collectibles at this sale of 733 lots. A large bronze buddha, sandstone troughs, fountains, granite seats, bronze fighting hares, sculpture, stone walls, seated stone lions, urns, gazebos, planters, spheres and staddle stones will come under the hammer.
Reclaimed geometric floor tiles at Victor Mee. UPDATE: THESE WERE UNSOLD
The market for collectibles is strong in Ireland and internationally. The late billionaire Jim Irsay, owner of the Indianapolis Colts, collected all sorts of objects with wealthy discrimination. His collection made more than $100 million over five sales at Christie’s this year, the largest sale total in history for memorabilia. At the last of those sales last week the foundation document for Alcoholics Anonymous made $2.39 million (€2.09 million) with proceeds going to charitable causes. He had amazing stuff, like a signed letter from George Washington to Thomas Jefferson ($2.7 million – €2.36 million) and a pair of used dress circle theatre tickets for the night of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination ($330,000 – €262.17).
In Ireland the market for collectible memorabilia has grown and grown. Everything from old road signs to enamel cigarette advertising panels to petrol pumps and vintage toys are features at auction up and down the country. Uniqueness and rarity add value, but many items can be picked up for a song.
A Shell fibreglass petrol pump globe at Aidan Foley’s sale. UPDATE: THIS MADE 240 AT HAMMER
Pints to Pistons is the title of Aidan Foley’s online evening sales in Doneraile on July 13 and 14. There is a strong focus on pub and motor trade memorabilia with a big selection of enamel signs, oil stands, original petrol pump globes, advertising signs, mirrors and prints. All are highly reflective of an Ireland that was up to quite recently and now is no more.
Without any doubt there will be much interest in lots like an original enamel Paddy Whiskey advertising sign in a wooden frame, a Shell fibreglass petrol pump globe, a Michelin Man ashtray, a Player’s Please jug, a Duckham’s metal forecourt oil display stand and an Esso Extra two litre can. Once ubiquitous items like these have all but disappeared from life in Ireland.
With signs for everything from Agfa Photos and Robin Starch to Capstan cigarettes, St. Bruno Flake and Churchman’s Noted Counter Shag there is plenty here to reminisce about and encourage a trip down memory lane. Catalogues for all sales are online.
An enamel double sided tobacco sign at Aidan Foley’s sale. UPDATE: THIS MADE 190 AT HAMMER AND WENT TO A BUYER IN AUSTRALIA
One of the largest and most complete T Rex specimens ever discovered is set to become the most valuable dinosaur ever at auction at Sotheby’s in New York on July 14. Gus, a 67 million year old Tyrannosaurus Rex, is estimated at $20 million – $30 million (€17.48 million – €26.22 million). Excavated over field seasons in 2021, 2022, and 2023 the fossil was discovered by Thomas Heitkamp and his team on land owned by the late Gary “Gus” Licking, a cattle rancher in Harding County, South Dakota. After years of finding teeth and bone fragments on his land Licking brought in the professionals, who named discovery after him. Gus has a body length of around 38 feet and a height of twelve and a half feet. Photo credit Matthew Sherman.
UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR $50,130,000
A silkscreen print by John Ffrench (1928-2010) at Adams. UPDATE: THIS MADE 460 AT HAMMER
The timed online picture sale at Adam’s which ends from 11 am on July 14 offers a highly affordable selection of everything from pencil drawings by Mainie Jellett and prints by Anne Madden and Alice Maher to mixed media and charcoal works by Barrie Cooke and a lithograph by Tony O’Malley. The sale kicks off with a selection from Swedish born ceramicist, sculptor, graphic artist and designer Marianne Agren McElroy (1926-2006), an original creative voice in the Ireland of the 1950’s, ’60’s and ’70’s. Auction estimates range from €50 to €5,000. The silkscreen print by John Ffrench illustrated here has an estimate of €200-€400. Many lots are offered without a reserve.
Yeats Family Violin. Labelled D. Nicolas Ainé Mirecourt’ c1810-20. UPDATE: THIS MADE £5,000
Lot 479 at the sale by Dominic Winter auctioneers in Cirencester on July 16 is an early 19th-century French Mirecourt violin, from the private collection of the family of Nobel Prize-winning Irish poet W. B. Yeats. The violin was acquired by ‘Chapel Violins’ from the Yeats Family Collection auction conducted by Fonsie Mealy Auctioneers in Castlecomer in November 2017. It was from the Dalkey home of Michael Yeats (1921–2007), a former senator and the son of W. B. Yeats (1865-1939) and his wife the harpist Gráinne Yeats (1925–2013). Since its acquisition, the violin has remained on display within the ‘Chapel Violins’ workshop as part of its private collection, where it has served as an example of exceptional early French violin-making and also as an instrument connected with one of Ireland’s most celebrated literary families. The estimate is £6,000-£8,000.
LIAM O’NEILL – TURNING THE SOD UPDATE: THIS MADE €23,000 AT HAMMER
This oil on canvas by Liam O’Neill is at Morgan O’Driscoll’s online sale of Irish art which runs until July 20. Turning the Sod is estimated at €10,000-€15,000. The auction offers 255 lots including work by Donald Teskey, John Behan, Dorothy Cross, William Crozier, George Campbell, Tim Goulding, Martin Finnin, Kaws, Louis le Brocquy, Arthur Maderson, Charles Tyrrell and John Shinnors. The catalogue is online.
An Italian 1970’s mobile cocktail trolley. UPDATE: THIS MADE 360 AT HAMMER
f you are dreaming of outdoor summer drinks in warming up Ireland then a striking mobile cocktail trolley on casters might fill the bill. The selection of vintage mid century modernist furniture at the online art and design auction at de Veres until July 15 includes a retro Italian 1970’s mobile cocktail bar which with little effort could be wheeled to a patio in the heat. The estimate is just €400-€600.
A 1960’s rosewood Italian sideboard with an estimate of €800-€1,200, a pair of Magis Bombo aluminium bar stools (€400-€600), a pair of French space age floor lamps (€400-€600), a burr walnut dining table attributed to Willy Rizzo (€600-€900) and a circular table by Arne Jacobsen (€200-€300) all feature at de Veres. There is no in person viewing thugh lots can be viewed by appointment. The auction of 242 lots features a large selection of artworks and the catalogue is online.
A 1960’s rosewood Italian sideboard. UPDATE: THIS MADE 650 AT HAMMER
Oliver Barker, chairman of Sotheby’s Europe, conducting the sale of the Lewis collection.
Cool art generated real heat in the midst of a scorching London heatwave. All sorts of records were broken at Sotheby’s night to remember sales of the Lewis Collection and Modern and Contemporary art.
Four auctions realised £420,488,006 (€487,177,483), the highest total for any season of sales ever staged in Europe.
Sotheby’s sales were led by Masterpieces from the Lewis Collection where 25 paintings made £296 million (€342.95 million). Modigliani’s Seated Nude with Necklace sold for £48.2 million (€55.84 million) and led the nine works which sold for over £10 million (€11.59 million). Among them was art by Picasso, Klimt, Egon Schiele, Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon.
Amedeo Modigliani – Nu assis au collier sold for £48.2 million (€55.84 million).
Competitive and deliberate bidding from around the world lasted for nearly two hours. This was the most valuable single owner sale in London’s auction history. Bidders came from 45 countries. Asian collectors accounted for over one third of the value of the sale.
The collection was assembled over more than two decades by 89 year old former Tottenham Hotspur owner Joe Lewis, noted for his significant impact on the art market through his extensive collection and strategic transactions, and his daughter Vivienne. The Lewis collecting philosophy is centred on assembling museum quality masterpieces. Lewis sold his stake in Christie’s, where he was the largest single shareholder, to Francois Pinault in 1998 after a share price surge. Committed to the avant-garde painters of today the Lewis family intend to continue their collecting journey into the future.
Claude Monet – Nymphéas sold for £40.8 million (€47.27 million).
Fuelled by stellar works by Monet, Rothko, Hockney and Kandinsky the Modern and Contemporary auction which followed the Lewis auction brought in another £97 million (€112.38 million). Bidding was again deliberate as opposed to speculative and 40 lots took two hours to sell. The top lot was Monet’s Nymphéas (water-lilies) which made £40.8 million (€47.27 million) to become the most valuable Impressionist work sold at auction in Europe in over a decade.
The combined total of £393.4 million (€455.79) for the two sales set a new single night auction record for Europe. Next day the Modern day auction including art from the Lewis collection totalled £17.7 million (€20.51 million) and the Contemporary day auction added another £9.3 million (€10.77 million).
Gustav Klimt – Portrait of Gertrud Loew sold for £36.1 million (€41.83 million)
The extraordinary Lewis collection traced a line from Viennese portraiture to the painters from the School of London with modern figurative painting at its core. The overall total of 47 works sold from the collection came to £306.6 million (€355.23 million). Together with the £35.8 million (€41.48. million) for the four School of London works sold at Sotheby’s in March led by Francis Bacon’s 1972 self portrait the combined total for the Lewis collection sold at Sotheby’s this year is £342.4 million (€396.7 million).
These sales continued an emerging trend where growth in the global art market is concentrated at the top. Single owner collections of museum quality works continue to be the market driver.
Pamela Leonard (B.1940) – Evening in Howth Etching 18/30. UPDATE: THIS MADE 150 AT HAMMER
This etching by Pamela Leonard is lot 89 at Adam’s timed online picture auction which runs until July 14. The estimate is 300-500. The sale of 230 lots features a wide variety of artists including Oisin Kelly, Graham Knuttel, Markey Robinson, Nano Reid, Barry Cooke, Mainie Jellett, Patrick Scott and Tony O’Malley and many more at very affordable prices. The catalogue is online.
