The sale of Fine Asian Art at James Adam in Dublin got off to a rollicking start this afternoon. Bidders on various internet platforms, Drouot and on the telephone vied for Fine Art from China and Himalaya on the first day of the sale. The most expensively estimated lot of the auction, Lot 18 – a Chinese School scroll with the signature of Giuseppi Castiglioni, known as Lang Shining made a hammer price of €110,000 over an estimate of €10,000-€100,000. A yellow glazed Hundred Shou Qing Dynasty cup with an estimate of 500-700 made a hammer price of 3,800 and most lots so far have attracted considerable competition. The auction is continuing.
(See post on antiquesandartireland.com for June 19, 2021)
THIS SCROLL BY GUISEPPE CASTIGLIONE SOLD FOR 110,000 AT HAMMER
This pair of 19th century bookcases with brass mounts comes up at Victor Mee‘s June Decorative Art sale which gets underway online at 2 pm today. Lot 95 has an estimate of €1,000-€2,000. Among other lots of note in this two day auction are; a 19th century kitchen table in elm; an oak bank of 15 shop drawers; a pair of upholstered easy armchairs in the Howard style; a Georgian four poster bed; a cast iron gothic bench and a pair of moulded sphinxes.
THIS very large coral model of a standing lady with fan and lotus sprig comes up as lot 88 at the James Adam online sale of Fine Asian Art today and tomorrow. It dates to early 20th century China and is estimated at €20,000-€40,000. Fine Arts from China and Himalaya comes under the hammer today. Tomorrow it is the turn of fine arts from Vietnam, South East Asia, India, the Middle East, Japan and Korea.
A large untitled iron sculpture by John Burke, exhibited outside the Crawford Gallery for many years, comes up at Sheppards annual Glantelwe Gardens sale in Durrow on June 30. The catalogue is online and in person viewing gets underway today. One of the most significant figures in the history of sculpture in Ireland the pioneering John Burke, who died in 2006, introduced the use of steel and welding process into an Irish world of sculpture dominated by carved marble and cast bronze. Like any artist ahead of his time his work is not always understood. Two of his best known pieces are the Red Cardinal at the Department of Health in Dublin and the large untitled piece at the Wilton Roundabout in Cork. A native of Clonmel, John Burke studied at the Crawford in Cork and the Royal Academy in London and travelled widely before setting up a workshop and studio near Blarney. He taught at the Crawford and numbered acclaimed artists like Vivienne Roche, Eilis O’Connell and Maud Cotter among his pupils. He made large and small pieces which are held in public and private collections. It is rare to see his work coming up at auction and this piece is estimated at €80,000-€120,000.
Gardens have become much more important in the lives of many of us during lockdown and in this sale Sheppards has no less than 522 lots of architectural ornament, garden statuary and about 30 lots of floral themed jewellery. There is something for every garden and every budget from a half life size bacchanal fountain by Robin Buick (€25,000-€35,000) to a 19th century terracotta chimney pot (€100-€150).
John Burke – Untitled. UPDATE: THIS MADE 110,000 AT HAMMER
The global search for collectors of rare precious objects marks one way in which the auction world has adapted very quickly to changed circumstances. In 2021 there is nothing particularly unusual about the fact that an Irish firm –James Adam – has already held a Paris preview for a sale of Fine Asian Art due to take place in Dublin on June 29 and 30.The Paris view is not entirely unconnected to the fact that Adams has created its own Asian department and appointed Thibault Duval as its Dublin based head. M Duval was latterly head of the Asian Art Department at Drouot in Paris. This appointment marks a recognition of sorts that if major auction houses in Ireland are to survive and prosper in the 21st century they must open out to the new global realities and view Brexit as an opportunity rather than a threat.
Qing Dynasty russet and white jade group. UPDATE: THIS MADE 5,000 AT HAMMER
A company like Sheppards in Durrow, Co. Laois with a track record of breaking records for Asian objects and then breaking them again has amply demonstrated that if you can produce the goods the buyers will come.
Adams has some interesting goods to offer in its sale on Tuesday and Wednesday week. Notable consignments include a collection of rare Chinese antiques from the estate of Carlos Alfredo Tornquist Altgelt (1885-1953), a hound scroll painting inscribed with the signature of Jesuit painter Giuseppe Castiglione, also known as Lang Shining, from the collection of Juan Carlos Katzenstein (1925-2018) who served as Ambassador to the Holy See and a wooden ruyi scepter from the collection of Nadezhda, widow of the Russian composer Rimsky-Korsakov. There is a famous portrait of Madame Rimsky-Korsakov by Franz Xaver Winterhalter in the collection of the Orsay Museum. In Chinese Buddhism a ruyi can be a ceremonial scepter or a talisman symbolising power and good fortune in Chinese folklore.
Chinese School scroll by Giuseppe Castiglioni known as Lang Shining (1688-1766). UPDATE: THIS MADE 110,000 AT HAMMER
There are Chinese jades last seen at auction at Drouot in 1925 and a jade horse formerly in the collection of Baron Pierre DeMenasce who contributed to an exhibition at the V & A Museum in 1975. A collection of Chinese Republican Period porcelains and an 18th century Meiping vase will feature among the 550 lots on offer.
The sale at Sotheby’s of the manuscripts, first editions, letters and bindings that make up the legendary Honresfield Library – assembled with passion by self-made Victorian industrialists William and Alfred Law at the turn of the 20th century – has been postponed. The Honresfield library contains a treasury of English and Scottish literature including the most important Bronte material to come to light in a generation.
Working together with the UK charity Friends of the National Library (FNL), Sotheby’s has agreed to postpone the commencement of the auctions to allow for negotiations for the entirety of the library to be acquired by a consortium of institutions for the nation. The FNL has launched an appeal with an additional donation from its own resources and will be working over the next months to fundraise with the public and private philanthropists. Institutions involved include the Bodleian Libraries, the British Library, The National Library of Scotland, Brontë Parsonage Museum, Robert Burns Birthplace Museum, Brotherton Library (University of Leeds), Abbotsford (The Home Of Sir Walter Scott) and Jane Austen’s House, among others.
(See post on antiquesandartireland.com for May 25, 2021)
Walter Scott manuscript of The Lay of the Last Minstrel
This diamond and sapphire cluster ring is lot 245 at O’Reilly’s of Francis St., Dublin sale of fine jewellery, watches and silver which runs online until June 18. It is estimated at 2,000-3,000. The sale of 581 lots is now underway. UPDATE: THIS MADE 2,000
This Irish School portrait of Robert Rochfort (1661-1727) features the Great Irish Mace, which represented the authority of the English King in the Irish House of Parliament. The portrait is lot 2453 at Matthews four day online sale from June 19-22. The Great Irish Mace, over five feet in length, had finely chased floral designs with rose of thistle and fleur-de-lis motifs. Matthews attribute the portrait to George Morphy (1655-1715). King James II is believed to have melted down the mace to help pay his war debts.
Portrait Robert Rochfort (1661-1727). Attorney General of Ireland and Speaker in the Irish House of Commons 1692-1703. UPDATE: THIS MADE 30,000 AT HAMMER
The source code for the World Wide Web from their creator Sir Tim Berners-Lee are to be auctioned by Sotheby’s as an NFT. Unique on the Ethereum blockchain it is composed of four elements; the original time-stamped files containing the source code written by Sir Tim; an animated visualisation of the code; a letter written by Sir Tim reflecting on the code and the process of creating it ; as well as a digital “poster” of the full code created by Sir Tim from the original files. The British computer scientist invented the world wide web in 1989. The original time stamped files will be offered in a standalone auction titled ‘This Changed Everything’. It is the first historical artefact relating to this landmark moment to be sold. The online sale will run from June 23-30 with bidding starting at $1,000. The sale will benefit initiatives that Sir Tim and Lady Berners-Lee support. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR $5.4 MILLION.
A copy of Ulysses presented by James Joyce to H.G. Wells comes up at Bonhams sale of fine books, manuscripts and photographs in London on June 24. From the 9th printing it is inscribed: “To H.G. Wells respectfully James Joyce, 5 November 1928 Paris” .
Wells was an important early advocate of Joyce, writing a highly favourable review of his first book A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and describing it as “a book to buy and read and lock up, but it is not a book to miss. Its claim to be literature is as good as the claim of the last book of Gulliver’s Travels… No single book has ever shown how different they [English and Irish sensibilities] are, as completely as this most memorable novel” (The New Republic, 10 March 1917). It is estimated at £20,000-30,000.
