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The Sunlit Valley, The Rosses, Co. Donegal by James Humbert Craig. UPDATE: THIS MADE 9,000 AT HAMMER

Art as an event in the Olympic Games was abandoned after 1948 because artists were considered to be professional and the games were for amateurs.  That was then and this is now so our professional golfers Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry, both qualified to represent Ireland at the games this year which get underway in Paris on July 26, have nothing to worry about.

At a time from 1912 to 1948 when medals were awarded for painting and sculpture inspired by sport, as well as to musicians, writers and architects, the northern Irish artist James Humbert Craig (1877-1944) was part of the Painting Event at the 1932 summer olympics in Los Angeles.  He did not win but his landscapes are very highly regarded. One of them, an oil on canvas titled The Sunlit Valley, Rosses, Co. Donegal, will lead Fonsie Mealy’s Chatsworth summer art sale in Castlecomer on July 10 with an estimate of €6,000-€8,000.  It is the most expensively estimated artwork at the sale.

The auction, on view in Castlecomer next Monday and Tuesday, features 345 lots of Irish and international art and sculpture along with Georgian, Victorian and Edwardian paintings.

Athlone Castle by James Lawson Stewart. UPDATE: THIS MADE 300 AT HAMMER

A topographical View of Athlone in 1853 from an elevated site attributed to George Vincent Cole is estimated at €300-€400 and a watercolour of Athlone Castle by  British artist James Lawson Stewart (1829-1911) shows many features now disappeared (€400-€500).  A hand coloured print of Edinburgh Castle from Holyrood House by Charles Windsor, now King of England, signed and dated on the lower right, is estimated at €800-€1,000.  There is a similar estimate on an abstract landscape attributed to Andre Lhote.

Lot 261 is a bronze bust of Roger Casement attributed to Marshall Hutson.  Though unsigned it is similar in style to the work of the Cork artist who died in 2001 and is estimated at €1,000-€1,500.  Among his sculpted works is the stone crest of the City of Cork at the headquarters of Cork Harbour Commissioners at Custom House Street in Cork.

Ar an Costa by Daniel Corkery (1878-1964). UPDATE: THIS MADE 360 AT HAMMER

Ar an Costa is a watercolour of a coastal scene with figures on a beach by Daniel Corkery (1878-1964), a close friend of Terence McSwiney who became Professor of English at UCC in 1930.  One of a group who established the Cork Dramatic Society in 1908 he wrote plays and short stories, played the cello, took night classes in painting at the Crawford and was author of The Hidden Ireland, a 1924 study of the poetry of 18th century Irish language poetry in Munster.  Lot 44 at Mealy’s is estimated at €180-€220 and was formerly in the collection of  An t’Athair Eric Mac Fhinn (1895-1987) of Galway.

There is a portrait of Walter Osborne by Augustus Burke (€3,000-€4,000), a pencil sketch of John O’Leary at trial by John Butler Yeats (€400-€500), a watercolour of the Rock of Cashel by Patrick Hennessy (€400-€600) and an oil of Country Cottages, Ireland c1810 by William Mulready (€700-€1,000) among a selection on offer that is both varied and affordable.  

The sale will be on view in Castlecomer on July 8 and 9 and will begin at 2 pm on July 10.  The catalogue is online. Nowadays the Venice Biennale is often referred to informally as the Olympics of art.