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This oak Jacobean chair comes up at the fine interiors sale at Hegarty’s online in Bandon on November 1. The estimate is just 100-200 and includes cushions and covers in upholstery fabric from Haggastrand, Sweden. The online auction features Swedish furniture and Middle Eastern rugs from the private collection of a Swedish diplomat who retired to Ireland after serving in several countries in Asia, the Middle East and in the US and items from a Cork collection.
With global participation the sale of the Ann and Gordon Getty Collection at Christie’s made more than $150 million. This firmly established the collection, sold across ten auctions which concluded in New York yesterday among the top three fine and decorative art sales at Christie’s. It ranks alongside the collections of Yves St. Laurent and Pierre Berger and that of Peggy and David Rockefeller. Records were set for Mary Cassatt’s Young Lady in a Loge Gazing to Right ($7,489,000); Jacques-Émile Blanche’s Vaslav Nijinsky in ‘Danse Siamoise’ ($2,700,000); Jules Bastien-Lepage’s Portrait de Sarah Bernhardt ($2,280,000) and Jean-Antoine Watteau, Three Head Studies Of A Girl Wearing A Hat (work on paper) ($3,420,000).
$3,420,000
Lot 290 at Sheppard’s Gentleman’s Library sale online at in Durrow on October 27 is a set of eight Qing watercolours. They depict figures at various pursuits within a walled garden. The set is estimated at €8,000-12,000. Lot 289 is a folder of 24 Qing watercolours depicting indigenous peoples. There is a similar estimate on this. The sale, which is on view in Durrow today, offers 368 lots in total with an afternoon session devoted to musical instruments headed by some Froggy Bottom guitars.
(See posts on antiquesandartireland.com for October 22 and October 14, 2022)
This MKI Massey Ferguson 65 tractor made a hammer price of 4,100 at Aidan Foley’s two day sale of agricultural bygones in Co. Cavan on October 24. A 1947 David Brown tractor made 3,100. There was much competitive bidding for agricultural implements and memorabilia of all sorts gathered over seven decades by Tommy Shannon. The second day of the auction of 1,354 lots continues tomorrow.
A total of 21 pieces from the historic Cork Mansion House service brought in a total hammer price €11,900 at Woodwards sale in Cork today. The set, from a private collection, was broken up into 13 lots and all were sold after competitive bidding. A tureen, plate and lid made €420, a platter made €400, soup bowls made from €250-€380 and pairs of dinner plates sold for from €540-€580. The dinner service was designed by renowned Cork based architect Richard Pain (1793-1838), who was a pupil of John Nash. The service is decorated with the Cork Coat of Arms, darts and mace.
Aidan Foley’s sale of Agricultural Bygones in Cavan next Monday and Tuesday will attract enthusiastic collectors of a different sort. He anticipates more interest in collectible lots like vintage tractors, a four wheeled horse drawn carriage, mill stones, Coalbrookedale garden seats, nostalgic enamel signs, antique hammers, old road signs, ploughs, iron gates, scales, wringers, skillets than for much of the antique furniture at auction nowadays. Memorabilia is big business. There is a large and varied selection of 1,308 lots which long time collector Tommy Shannon has amassed over seven decades and is selling due to illness. The sale is on view at Shannon’s Yard near Killeshandra today and tomorrow and the auction is to take place at MacSeains Pub, Cornafean, Co. Cavan. The catalogue is online.
Wonderful antique furniture, art including a folder of 24 Qing watercolours, unusual collectibles like a pair of Howdah flintlock pistols and customised guitars all feature at the Gentleman’s Library sale at Sheppards in Durrow on October 27. A late 19th century Louis XVI style inlaid commode with breccia marble top by G. Durand in the style of Jean Henri Riesener is, at €15,000-€20,000, the most expensively estimated lot. Other furniture lots include an 18th century library pole (€500-€800), a 19th century French terrestrial globe (€1,500-€2,500), a French Empire library chair (€4,000-€6,000), two George III Dublin brass bound peat buckets (€2,500-€2,500), a Regency library bookcase (€5,000-€8,000), a leather Chesterfield couch (€2,000-€3,000), a Regency rent table (€1,500-€2,500), an Irish 18th century bureau (€800-€1,200), a French bureau plat (€4,000-€6,000), various Gainsborough chairs and bureaux and plenty of other pieces to choose from.This is an auction to browse through and savour at leisure, either at viewings in Durrow which get underway today or online. On offer is 367 lots from The Smithwick Collection and other clients.
A c1688 oval portrait of James FitzJames Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormonde is attributed to Sir Godfrey Kneller (€3,000-€5,000). Other art pieces include a folder of 24 Qing watercolours (€8,000-€12,000), four oils on canvas of a Fete Galante after Watteau (€10,000-€15,000), Irish School portraits, sporting pictures, engravings, lithographs and drawings.There are black basalt Wedgwood lamps and urns, a 17th century stucco bust of an unidentified Roman after an original from Herculaneum, Presbyterian minute books from 1734-1834, a Killarney wood specimen cabinet, mantle clocks, a c1800 pair of Howdah flintlock pistols by Charles Moore of London amd a Burmese arched harp on stand.Among 69 lots of musical instruments are Froggy Bottom customised guitars and guitars by C.F. Martin and Co., Collings, Taylor and other makers. There is a concert harp by Sebastian and Pierre Errard, a Challen baby grand piano, a Paragon tenor banjo and a French violin.
(See post on antiquesandartireland.com for October 14, 2022)
The first in a series of four live sales and six online sales of the Ann and Gordon Getty Collection at Christie’s in New York realised $79,408,900 with 100% of lots sold for 128% hammer above low estimate. There was lively bidding from around the globe and the auction drew nearly 2 million viewers via social media. In the hours leading up to the auction, Christie’s announced the private sale of Venice, the Grand Canal looking East with Santa Maria della Salute by Giovanni Antonio Canal, called Canaletto, to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, enabled through a generous donation by Diane B. Wilsey.
Mary Cassatt’s Young Lady in a Loge Gazing to Right was the top lot, bought by The Pola Museum of Art in Hakone, Japan for $7,489,000, breaking a 15 year-old record. The sale generated strong results across a wide variety of collecting categories, including English furniture and Chinese works of art. A Royal Early George III Mahogany China Cabinet by William Vile made $2,700,000 and a pair of massive Chinese Cloisonné and Champlevé Enamel Crane-Form Censers made $1,620,000, more than 20 times the low estimate.
(See post on antiquesandartireland.com for May 3, 2022)
This Irish 18th century silver mounted marine ivory scrimshaw made a hammer price of £1,400 at Warren and Wignall Auctioneers sale in Lancashire today. It had been estimated at £200-£300. One side is decorated with a galleon and inscribed ‘St Claire’. There is a sailor on the other side. It is dated 1798 with Dublin marks and an MK makers mark. This is the mark of Michael Keating who had a shop at Cole Alley, Castle St., Dublin. It is scheduled to go on display at the Waterford Irish Silver Museum early in 2023.
The handle to the side is the giveaway. This is what an antique washing machine looks like. This one comes up at the sale of the Tommy Shannon Collection by auctioneer Aidan Foley in Co. Cavan on October 24 and 25. On offer is a collection of farm machinery gathered over the last seven decades and farm implements used to tend the land in bygone days in Ireland feature. They will all be on view at Tommy Shannon’s Yard at Killeshandra from October 20-23. The auction 1,310 lot by Aidan Foley will take place at MacSeains pub in Cornafean, Co, Cavan and online. He anticipates enormous interest from collectors from right around the country. The washing machine is estimated at €100-€200.
