A collection of Irish Music posters from the personal library of Lyric FM DJ Lorcan Murray is to be included in Aidan Foley’s two day live internet sale from Sixmilebridge, Co. Clare on April 13 and 14. They will come up on day one of the sale along with a large collection of rare vinyl records, musical instruments and collectible musical ephemera.
The sale on April 14 will feature 40 lots of rugs including Persian handwoven carpets and runners, 60 lots of Irish art from artists including Arthur Maderson, Markey Robinson, John Butler Yeats and Annie Robinson, 100 lots of antique furniture and collectibles and 50 lots of jewellery and silver. Around 300 lots will come under the hammer on each day. The catalogue is under preparation and online bidding will be through Easy Live Auctions.
THE exhibition I most enjoyed last year – when you could still travel – was Hockney Van Gogh at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. This video with David Hockney on Van Gogh was part of a show which demonstrated how the two are allied artistically.
Now on lockdown in Normandy David Hockney is in his garden most days, drawing spring awakening. He has shared current images with the BBC including this one, which shows connection with Van Gogh.
David Hockney believes that we have lost touch with nature, “rather foolishly”.Van Gogh’s Almost Blossom at the Van Gogh Museum
And here is Hockney on Van Gogh and The Joy of Nature. You will have to click on the link it contains to watch in on You Tube. Enjoy.
This portrait miniature of Edward Smyth (1749-1812) is by John Comerford (1773-1832). An architect Smyth worked with James Gandon on most of his major projects including The Four Courts, the House of Lords and the King’s Inns in Dublin. It sold for £2,875 at the sale of the collection of his descendants John and Pauline Comerford at Chiswick Auctions in London last week. Their collection of 121 works demonstrates the evolution of miniature painting in Ireland, Britain and Continental Europe from the late 16th to the 19th century. The entire collection was bought privately and will be displayed at the Silver Museum of the Waterford House of Treasures due to open later this year.
Property from the estate of Doris Day will be sold online by Julien’s Auctions in Hollywood on April 4 and 5. Here is a video preview with Martin Nolan from Doris Day’s home in Carmel by the sea. There will be no public exhibition but the sale will be on julienslive.com
UPDATE: The sale smashed the top estimate of $600,000 and brought in just over $3 million.
A van Gogh painting was stolen in an overnight raid at the Singer Laren museum in Holland. The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring 1884” by was taken in the early hours of Monday from the museum which is located about 30 kms from Amsterdam and was closed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. The institution houses the collection of American couple William and Anna Singer. The stolen van Gogh was on loan from the Groninger Museum in the northern Dutch city of Groningen.
A private collector in Ireland acquired The Comerford Collection of predominantly Irish Miniatures at Chiswick Auctions in London last week and has offered it for display at a Waterford Museum. The collection of 121 lots achieved a total of £98,000 and attracted strong interest from Irish collectors. It was compiled over forty years by the late John and Pauline Comerford, who descended from the Irish miniaturist John Comerford (c.1770-1832).
The couple’s love of the art form led them to source works by some of the leading Irish miniaturists of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The entire collection of 121 lots sold, achieving a total of £98,000.
The collection was studiously added to over many years and demonstrates the evolution of miniature painting in Britain, Ireland and the Continent from the late 16th to the 19th Century. It features the work of some of the greatest exponents of the portrait miniature art form including Christian Friedrich Zincke, Jean Andre Rouquet, Nathaniel Hone, Jeremiah Meyer, Charles Robertson, George Engleheart, Abraham Daniel, William Wood, John Smart and Richard Cosway. It will go to the Waterford Museum House of Treasures and be displayed in the new silver museum. This had been scheduled to open in late May in Waterford and will now open sometime in the autumn. The collection was bought under the guidance of the curator by a private buyer.
Specialist in charge of the sale Suzanne Zack commented: “We were delighted with the results of this first stand-alone sale of Fine Portrait Miniatures, which included the spectacular Comerford Collection. Good results throughout the sale show that the portrait miniature market is very much alive.”
Highlights included lot 143, a portrait of the Pre-Raphaelite painter Holman Hunt by Edward Robert Hughes, which sold for £9,375 against a pre-sale estimate of £8,000-12,000. Other high prices were achieved for a fine portrait miniature of a dashing Officer (lot 18), dating from circa 1765/70 by Jeremiah Meyer R.A. (British 1735-1789), which achieved £4,500 and a portrait miniature of an unknown Lady, circa 1790 (lot 36), by Horace Hone A.R.A. (Irish 1754/6-1825), which sold for £4,125.
The Pre-Raphaelite painter Holman Hunt by Edward Robert Hughes,
Like so many auctioneers de Veres in Dublin postponed their Irish art sale scheduled for April 7. But the catalogue had been published online and the auction house is continuing to receive plenty of inquiries about the works it contains. So they have taken the unusual decision to open the catalogue to offers. These will be relayed to vendors, who will be advised accordingly. No bids below estimate will be considered at this point. And all bids should be made by e-mail to roryguthrie@deveres.ie
UPDATE: The open to offers sale closed with the sale of 60 lots and brought in more than €100,000. The Gerard Dillon below received an offer at the low reserve which was not accepted and it will feature at an auction in the future.
Lot 79 is The Space Circus by Gerard Dillon (1916-1971) (15,000-20,000)
The show must go on but not in all circumstances. At home and abroad many sales are being postponed and rescheduled. Among the postponements last week was Sotheby’s much vaunted London sale of the Patrick Kelly Collection from 44 Fitzwilliam Square in Dublin. This was a loss and the sense of disappointment was palpable but the auction will no doubt eventually go ahead.The sale of Important Irish Art at James Adam was postponed last week and among the auctions not going ahead in the coming week are sales at Lynes and Lynes in Carrigtwohill, Mullen’s Collectors Cabinet sale at Laurel Park in Bray and a planned sale of pub memorabilia at Victor Mee’s in Co. Cavan. These auctions are set up and ready to go at a moments notice whenever the all clear is given. Even where an auction is scheduled to go ahead right now it is advisable to check at the last minute before travelling. All sales at Bonhams are postponed until April 21, there is a revised schedule at Christie’s, Sotheby’s has reduced the schedule, all auctions at James Adam in Dublin are temporarily postponed and Fonsie Mealy is open by appointment only. Whyte’s offices are closed but business continues behind closed doors and this is the case with many leading auctioneering firms right now.
Salvador Dali’s Rhinocerous dressed in lace from 1981 comes up at Morgan O’Driscoll’s online sale of Irish and International Art on April 14. The signed bronze is number 238 from an edition of 499. Dali’s interest in the rhinoceros stemmed from Durer’s celebrated etching of the animal. Dali claimed a connection between the growth pattern of the rhinoceros’s horn, the pattern sewn in Vermeer’s The Lacemaker and the growth pattern of the sunflower. All of these speculative connections come into play in his sculpture of rhinoceros dressed in lace. It is estimated at 4,000-6,000. The catalogue is online.
Masterpiece, the leading British antiques fair which was scheduled to take place in London from June 25 until July 1, has been cancelled. A statement issued today said: “We are grateful for the support and hard work of our exhibitors, partners and staff in preparation for this year’s edition of the Fair; however the health of everyone involved in Masterpiece London is our absolute priority during these unprecedented times”.
