There was a new world auction record for Sir Winston Churchill at Christie’s in London this evening when his Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque(1943) sold for £8,285,000. The only work Churchill created during the Second World War was once in the collection of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, who are divorcing. It was offered for sale by the Jolie Family Collection. Churchill painted it in Marrakech following the Casablanca Conference in January 1943. and gifted it to Franklin D. Roosevelt. This act was seen not only as an indication of their friendship but of the special relationship between the UK and the USA.
Sir Winston Churchill began painting scenes of Morocco after being encouraged to visit the country by his painting tutor, Sir John Lavery. Upon his first visit in 1935, he felt that the light and scenery were unrivalled, creating some 45 paintings of the country.
(See post on antiquesandartireland.com for February 2, 2021)
Sir Winston Churchill, Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque. Painted in January 1943, it made £8,285,000
Nassau St. and Trinity College, Dublin by Colin Gibson is lot number 23 at Whyte’s timed spring online art sale which gets underway in Dublin at 6 pm today (March 1). The oil on board is estimated at €700-€1,000. More than 260 lots with estimates from 60 to 5,000 are on offer. UPDATE: THIS PAINTING MADE 1,000 AT HAMMER
More than 20 works by L.S. Lowry will highlight the Modern British Art sale at Christie’s on March 2. They range from seascapes and crowd scenes to portraits including Man in a Trilby from the estates of L.S. Lowry and Carol Ann Lowry. There is work by Pauline Boty, Patrick Caulfield, Peter Blake, Michael Craig-Martin’s and the St Ives School is represented by Terry Frost ,Roger Hilton, Ben Nicholson and Alfred Wallis.
Ben Nicholson, 1946 (Tibetan) (estimate: £100,000-150,000) and L.S. Lowry, Man in a Trilby (1960, estimate: £150,000-250,000). UPDATE: THE NICHOLSON MADE £118,750 AND THE LOWRY SOLD FOR £150,000
Afterimage is the title of this acrylic on board by Bridget Flannery. It comes up as lot 6 at the James Adam timed online art auction which runs to March 3 with an estimate of 1,000-1,500. The online catalogue lists 193 lots and bidding will begin to close at 2 p.m. on March 3. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR 700
Anyone for a prototype of Bono’s Gretsch Irish Falcon model 6136 electric guitar? The Gretsch family, one of the most celebrated names in the music industry, is opening up their archive for the first time to benefit their music foundation. On offer live and online at Juliens Auctions, Beverly Hills, on March 26 and 27, is part of their collection of guitars. These were used as early generation prototypes of signature instruments by music legends like Bono, George Harrison, Tom Petty, Chet Atkins, Brian Setzer and many more. Gretsch has been the premier manufacturers of the worlds finest guitars and drums since 1883. Among the highlights of the sale is Bono’s prototype, which comes complete with green finish, two pickups with The Goal is Soul on the pickguard and gold hardware. The estimate is $8,000-$10,000.
No matter what your area of interest happens to be there is much in Fonsie Mealy’s Collectors’ Sale online from Castlecomer on March 3 to keep you occupied during this long lockdown. Literature, local and national history, sport and cinema all feature. These sales always throw up lots that offer insights into the day to day working lives of people like Michael Collins or the late Victorian and Edwardian Corkonians who mounted what seems to me to be the best show this city ever produced, the Cork Exhibition of 1901-02. A typed letter from the Aire Airgead (Minister for Finance) of 1920 is in fact a typically businesslike response from Michael Collins to a request from Skibbereen. Peadar Ó hAnnracháin (1873-1965), Gaelic League organiser, poet and Volunteer, had sought assistance for local fishermen. Collins, as minister, promised action but advised that the first thing to be done was to set up a co-operative society “as we deal only with Societies and not with individuals”. The letter, lot 407 in a sale of 673 lots, is estimated at 400-600.A letter of June 2, 1920 from Terence MacSwiney, Lord Mayor of Cork, to the Superintendent, Great Southern and Western Railway, supports a request from Messrs. Henry Ford of Cork for two sleeping carriages to be attached to the mail train between Cork and Kingstown (Dun Laoghaire). The letter, estimated at €450-€650, is on black bordered official notepaper following the assassination of Lord Mayor Tomas MacCurtain. By any standards the Cork Exhibition was a magnificent event. Insight into the largely forgotten organisers might be found in lot 378, a 1911 book entitled Cork and County in the 20th century, Contemporary Biographies by Rev. R.J. Hodges edited by W. T. Pike, estimated at €200-€300.Lot 315 is a Maharajah’s photo album gift to engineer Vincent Hart. It is inscribed; “To V. Hart Esq., Superintending Engineer, Madras. With the best compliments of Ramchandra, Maharajah of Jeypore”. He was responsible for building the Mettur Dam on the River Cauvery, at that time the biggest solid gravity dam in the world. He retired to Cork and died at his house at Lotabeg on the Lower Glanmire Road in 1939. The album is estimated at 1,000-€1,500. A selection of sporting memorabilia includes lot 616, the match programme for the 1945 All Ireland Football Final between Cork and Cavan (Cork won by 2-5 to 0-7) and some Munster Championship official programmes. Among the cinema memorabilia are posters for The Field, Ryan’s Daughter and Michael Collins.
The programme for 1945 All Ireland Football Final between Cork and Cavan. UPDATE: THIS MADE 600 AT HAMMER
A cased pair of Japanese porcelain tea bowls decorated with foliage and the gilt mythological bird known as Fenghuang presented to Princess Michiko at a tennis tournament come up at Hegarty’s online only auction of antique furniture, art, jewellery and collectibles in Bandon on February 28. The lot includes a black and white photograph of the princess inscribed with the year 1961. Four years earlier Michiko Shoda played a game of mixed doubles against then Crown Prince Akihito. It was and it wasn’t a love match. The Crown Prince lost the match and his heart. Michiko won the prince and the game. Their wedding marked the first time in the 2,600+ years of the Yamato dynasty that someone born neither a princess nor an aristocrat married into the Imperial household. The bowls are estimated at €400-€600. If that story has struck some sort of romantic chord then how about a vintage square cut yellow sapphire and diamond ring. Hegarty’s has just the one, estimated at €5,000-€7,000. Among other lots of note is a pair of matching 19th century inlaid cutlery urns (€8,000-€10,000) and a watercolour by Douglas Alexander titled Among the Crohyboyle Mountains (€2,000-€4,000). There is an Art Deco peridot and diamond ring (€5,000-€9,000), an Italian Art Deco silver ice bucket (€3,500-€7,000) and an Edwardian Sheraton Revival sideboard (€1,000-€2,000). The sale offers one of the first three printings of the trade editions of The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter (€800-€1,500). The March 1903 version includes all 30 illustrations, mostly by Quentin Blake, reduced to 27 thereafter.
Cased pair of Japanese bowls. UPDATE: THESE MADE 420 AT HAMMER
The most significant collection to come to auction for years comes up at various sales at Sotheby’s in New York next May. At the heart of Anne Marion’s collection are masterworks by three of the greatest American artists of the post-War period: Andy Warhol’s iconic Elvis 2 Times, Richard Diebenkorn’s sublime Ocean Park No. 40; and Clyfford Still’s staggering PH-125 (1948-No. 1). All three works are estimated to achieve in excess of $20 million.
Legendary Texan rancher and businesswoman Anne Marion (1938-2020) was celebrated for her generous support of cultural institutions, critical contributions to education and healthcare, and her passion for the life and traditions of the American Southwest where her family had been rooted for generations. The treasures of her own private collection have remained – until now – largely unknown. It is estimated in the region of $150 million.
The great-granddaughter of Captain Samuel Burk Burnett (1849-1922) she was heiress to the historic, world-renowned Four Sixes Ranch in King County, Texas. Samuel took the unusual step of willing the bulk of his estate to his 22-year-old granddaughter, ‘Big Anne’, to be held in trust for her unborn child (the future ‘Little Anne’ Marion), thereby launching the tradition of female leadership of one of Texas’ greatest family businesses. Following her mother’s death in 1980, ‘Little Anne’ took over management of the business and ran it for the next forty years. She was a trusted board director and benefactor of the Kimbell Art Museum for four decades, and a trustee of the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
Hugh Hildesley, who joined Sotheby’s in 1961 and played an integral role in the company’s formative years in the US, was a longstanding colleague of Sotheby’s eminent chairman and auctioneer John L. Marion, Anne’s husband for the last 32 years of her life. He remembers: He remembers: “The sheer scope of Anne’s astounding achievements will prove influential and transformative for generations to come: from her role as President of the Burnett Foundation to founding the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum; donor of the Marion Emergency Care Center in Fort Worth, to tireless Trustee of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Kimbell Art Museum and the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. Anne knew quality when she saw it”.
A poster for True Grit, the film for which John Wayne won an Oscar, comes up at Fonsie Mealy’s Collectors’ Sale online from Castlecomer on March 3. Directed by Henry Hathaway the film starred John Wayne, Glen Campbell and Kim Darby. The poster is estimated at 120-180 in a sale of collectibles including literature, local and national history, sport and cinema.
After a century in the same private collection a painting by Vincent Van Gogh will make its auction debut in Paris in March with an estimate of 5-8 million. Painted in the Spring of 1887 – during Vincent van Gogh’s two-year sojourn in Paris – Scène de rue à Montmartre is from his series depicting the legendary Moulin de la Galette in Montmartre. The work has remained in the same family collection for over 100 years, and despite having been published in seven catalogues, it has never been exhibited until now. Sotheby’s and Mirabaud Mercier will present it to the public for the first time; with exhibitions to be held in Amsterdam, Hong Kong and Paris ahead of the Impressionist & Modern Art auction on March 25.
Vincent van Gogh Scène de rue à Montmartre (Impasse des deux frères et le Moulin à Poivre), 1887. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR €13,091,250
