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    • WHY NOT BUY ART, CRAFT, ARTISAN OR ANTIQUE?

    December 18th, 2013

    Why not buy art, craft, artisan or antique? There is plenty of Irish art and craft on offer at a variety of shows in galleries throughout Ireland and even at auctioneering firms, where unsold lots can be purchased. With one week of Christmas gift shopping left it is well worth dropping in to see what is on offer at your local gallery. You might find a gift that is locally made by craftspeople or something by an artist or a sculptor.  No matter where you  go there will be plenty to choose from.  Here is a small selection from the Christmas show now on at the Lavit Gallery on Fr. Matthew St. in Cork.

    Tom Climent - Kite Funnel

    Tom Climent – Kite Funnel

    James McCarthy - Juggler

    James McCarthy – Juggler

    Patrick Cashin - Copper Mine at Allihies.

    Patrick Cashin – Copper Mine at Allihies.

    Martin Gale, Long Gone.

    Martin Gale, Long Gone.

    Imogen Stuart RHA, Mary, Baby Human Child.

    Imogen Stuart RHA, Mary, Baby Human Child.

    Posted in ART, COLLECTIBLES | Comments Off on WHY NOT BUY ART, CRAFT, ARTISAN OR ANTIQUE?

    NEW PORTRAITS AT THE NATIONAL GALLERY OF IRELAND

    December 17th, 2013

    Portraits of Olwen Fouéré, Bob Geldof and Brian O’Driscoll by Kevin Abosch are among the works on display in the New Portraits show now on at the National Gallery of Ireland.  The exhibition brings together recently acquired works in a variety of media: Michael Scott by Norah McGuinness; Dr Anthony Cronin by Patrick Swift; two photographs of Samuel Beckett by John Haynes; a bronze head of Dr Bethel Solomons Senior by Sir Jacob Epstein; an oil portrait of Michael Longley by Colin Davidson, and a very moving image of the much loved Seamus Heaney, by Jackie Nickerson. Most of the works featured in this display have been specifically acquired for the National Portrait Collection.

    Kevin Abosch is an Irish artist, based in Paris, who specialises in portrait photography, and counts many of the world’s most distinguished political and cultural figures among his sitters. His work will be familiar through his striking series of large-scale photographs on display at Dublin Airport. The exhibition continues until February 9.

    Jackie Nickerson (b.1960) Seamus Heaney (1939-2013), Poet, Playwright, Translator, Nobel Laureate, 2007 Digital C-print © Jackie Nickerson. Photo © National Gallery of Ireland

    Jackie Nickerson (b.1960) Seamus Heaney (1939-2013), Poet, Playwright, Translator, Nobel Laureate, 2007
    Digital C-print
    © Jackie Nickerson. Photo © National Gallery of Ireland

    Kevin Abosch (b.1969) Olwen Fouéré, Actor, Writer, Theatre Artist, 2012 © Kevin Abosch

    Kevin Abosch (b.1969)
    Olwen Fouéré, Actor, Writer, Theatre Artist, 2012 © Kevin Abosch

    Posted in ART | Comments Off on NEW PORTRAITS AT THE NATIONAL GALLERY OF IRELAND

    SULLIVAN BEQUEST OF MODERN CHINESE ART TO ASHMOLEAN

    December 16th, 2013

    The art historian Professor Michael Sullivan has bequeathed his private collection of modern Chinese art to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.  Professor Sullivan, who died last September aged 96 just one month after visiting Shanghai, was a world authority on modern and contemporary Chinese art.  The collection of more than 400 works includes pieces by Qi Baishi, (1864– 1957), Zhang Daqian (1899–1983), and Fu Baoshi (1904–1964) amassed by Michael Sullivan and his wife Khoan from the 1940’s.  More recent acquisitions include Landscript (2002) by Xu Bing  who was born in 1955. A large part of the collection has never been seen in public.  The Museum will display a new selection of works in a small commemorative exhibition, ‘Michael Sullivan: a Life of Art and Friendship’ next March.

    The Ashmolean has contained the only gallery dedicated to Chinese painting in Britain since the 1950’s.  Some of the bequeathed works have been loaned and displayed over the years at the Ashmolean in the Khoan and Michael Sullivan Gallery which opened in 2000. (Click on any image to enlarge it).

    Huang Binhong (1865–1955) Waiting for the Ferry in Sichuan c. 1948–9 © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

    Huang Binhong (1865–1955) Waiting for the Ferry in Sichuan c. 1948–9 © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

    Fu Baoshi (1904–1965) Album page from Landscpaes of the Four Seasons 1950 © Ashmolean Museum

    Fu Baoshi (1904–1965)
    Album page from Landscpaes of the Four Seasons 1950 © Ashmolean Museum

    Zhao Wuji (1921–2013) 18.0I.95 Triptyque 1995 © Ashmolean Museum

    Zhao Wuji (1921–2013)
    18.0I.95 Triptyque 1995 © Ashmolean Museum

    Posted in ART | Comments Off on SULLIVAN BEQUEST OF MODERN CHINESE ART TO ASHMOLEAN

    UNIQUE IRISH TESTIMONIAL AT QUEENS UNIVERSITY BELFAST

    December 15th, 2013

    The Morpeth Roll, a singular testimonial signed by over 160,000 people in Ireland in 1841, is on display at the Naughton Gallery, Queen’s University, Belfast until next January 26.  The roll, which is 420 metres long, was created as a public tribute to George Howard, Lord Morpeth, on his 1841 departure from Ireland after six years as Chief Secretary.  A Liberal, he later served as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. It is seen as a tribute both to his popularity and to the reforming Whig government which he served. Re-discovered in the archives of Castle Howard in Yorkshire it was conserved at NUI Maynooth and digitised for its wealth of pre-Famine information by ancestry.com

    Posted in Miscellaneous | Comments Off on UNIQUE IRISH TESTIMONIAL AT QUEENS UNIVERSITY BELFAST

    RARE EARLY WORK INSCRIBED BY SAMUEL BECKETT SELLS AT MEALY’S

    December 12th, 2013
    Samuel Beckett, Whoroscope (poem) published in 1930 together with a photograph sold for 4,200.

    Samuel Beckett, Whoroscope (poem) published in 1930 together with a photograph sold for 4,200.

    Samuel Becketts first separately printed work, Whoroscope, sold for 4,200 at Fonsie Mealy’s rare book sale in Dublin this week.   The first edition, one of just 100 copies, is signed and inscribed by Beckett to his college friend Billy Cunningham.  It is dated December 1930, the year in which the poem was published by The Hours Press, Paris. It was sold with a photograph showing Cunningham, second from left, beside Beckett on a golf links.

    A selection of pen an ink drawings by Brinsley le Fanu for publications by Downey and Company of London also sold for 4,200. A c1508 illuminated Book of Hours printed in Paris sold for 4,000.

    Posted in AUCTIONS, COLLECTIBLES | Comments Off on RARE EARLY WORK INSCRIBED BY SAMUEL BECKETT SELLS AT MEALY’S

    FIRST EDITIONS OF SOMERVILLE AND ROSS IN DEMAND AT FONSIE MEALY

    December 11th, 2013
    A collection of Somerville and Ross first editions sold for 750.

    A collection of Somerville and Ross first editions sold for 750.

    A collection of first editions of Somerville and Ross spanning more than 50 years made 750 at Fonsie Mealy’s rare book auction in Dublin on December 10.  With plain cloth bindings the collection ranged from the publication in 1893 of Through Connemara in a Governess Car to Maria and Some Other Dogs of 1949.  It included their classic Further Experiences of an Irish R.M. in 1908.

    Irish literary figures featured strongly in a sale which realised more than 250,000 at hammer.  A signed copy of Patrick Kavanagh’s Collected Poems made 750, a “Choice” Irish Poetry Anthology including work by Beckett, Heaney,Boland,  Clarke and Kinsella, made 2,700, a first English edition of James Joyce’s Ulysses with errata sold for 1,500 and an original recording of James Joyce reading Anna Livia Plurabelle made 3,000.

    The top lot of the auction related to Tipperary during the Great Famine and comprises an important record of the administration of a Tipperary workhouse during the famine.   The five manuscript volumes of workhouse minute books sold for 4,200 over a top estimate of 1,600.

    Posted in AUCTIONS, COLLECTIBLES | Comments Off on FIRST EDITIONS OF SOMERVILLE AND ROSS IN DEMAND AT FONSIE MEALY

    SHARP PAINTING MAKES 19,800 AT HEGARTY’S IN BANDON

    December 11th, 2013
    Dorothea Sharp (1875-1955) - The Young Goatherd - sold for 19,800.

    Dorothea Sharp (1875-1955) – The Young Goatherd – sold for 19,800.

    A painting by the English artist Dorothea Sharp (1875-1955) was the top lot at Hegarty’s sale in Bandon last night.  The Young Goatherd was new to market and had emerged from a collection in Schull in west Cork.  It sold for 19,800 at hammer.

    Sharp, who exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1901 to 1948, was an honorary member of the St. Ives Society of  Artists.

    A landscape by the French artist Felix Ziem from the same collection sold for 5,800.

    (See post on antiquesandartireland.com for December 9, 2013)

    Posted in ART, AUCTIONS | Comments Off on SHARP PAINTING MAKES 19,800 AT HEGARTY’S IN BANDON

    DEFINING IMAGE OF JANE AUSTEN EXCEEDS ESTIMATE AT SOTHEBY’S

    December 10th, 2013
    Jane Austen Portait with frame.

    Jane Austen Portait with frame.

    Julia Cameron's portait 'Stella', a study of Mrs Herbert Duckworth (1867) Cameron's goddaughter and the mother of Virginia Woolf

    Julia Cameron’s portrait ‘Stella’, a study of Mrs Herbert Duckworth (1867) Cameron’s goddaughter
    and the mother of Virginia Woolf

    THE definitive portrait of Jane Austen made £164,500 at Sotheby’s in London today. An engraving of the watercolour by James Andrews will appear on the Bank of England’s new £10 note from 2017, the author’s bicentenary. It was purchased on the telephone by an anonymous private collector. The top estimate for the work was £150,000.  It was commissioned in 1869 by Jane Austen’s nephew, Rev. James Edward Austen-Leigh to illustrate his Memoir of Jane Austen, the hugely influential first full-length biography which was crucial in transforming her from a novelist into a national figure. 

    Earlier in today’s sale, a previously completely unknown album of photographs by Julia Margaret Cameron sold for £242,500  – establishing a new auction record for an album of photographs by the artist. It is one of only 11 known albums compiled by Cameron who is considered the leading female pioneer of 19th century photography. Alongside carefully chosen portraits of her friends and celebrities of the Victorian era, the album contains two prints which are previously unrecorded and possibly unique.

    (See post on antiquesandartireland.com for November 4, 2013).

    Posted in ART, AUCTIONS, COLLECTIBLES | Comments Off on DEFINING IMAGE OF JANE AUSTEN EXCEEDS ESTIMATE AT SOTHEBY’S

    IMPORTANT SYMBOLIST WORK BY BURNE-JONES AT CHRISTIE’S

    December 10th, 2013

    An important Symbolist work by Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones (1833-1898) comes up at Christie’s sale of Victorian and British Impressionist Art in London on December 12.    Entitled “Evening” it  has been in the same private collection since it was acquired from the artist.  It belongs to a group of works in which Burne-Jones explored the idea of representing cosmic subjects by allegorical figures floating in the night sky.  The estimate is £300,000-500,000.

    The sale features 104 works from the Victorian and Edwardian eras. Estimates are from £2,000.  Here is a small flavour of what is on offer:

    Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, Bt., A.R.A., R.W.S. (1833-1898) Hesperus, The Evening Star (£300,000-500,000). Courtesy Christie's Images Ltd., 2013

    Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, Bt., A.R.A., R.W.S. (1833-1898) Hesperus, The Evening Star (£300,000-500,000). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd., 2013  UPDATE: THIS MADE £506,000

    John Singer Sargent, R.A., R.W.S., H.R.S.A. (1856-1925) A Bridge in Venice - pencil and watercolour (£100,000-150,000). Courtesy Christie's Images Ltd., 2013

    John Singer Sargent, R.A., R.W.S., H.R.S.A. (1856-1925) A Bridge in Venice – pencil and watercolour (£100,000-150,000). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd., 2013  UPDATE: THIS MADE £98,500

    Sir Edwin Henry Landseer, R.A. (1802-1873) Neptune (£300,000-500,000). Courtesy Christie's Images Ltd., 2013

    Sir Edwin Henry Landseer, R.A. (1802-1873) Neptune (£300,000-500,000). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd., 2013  UPDATE: THIS MADE £566,500

    Posted in ART, AUCTIONS | Comments Off on IMPORTANT SYMBOLIST WORK BY BURNE-JONES AT CHRISTIE’S

    CELTIC REVIVAL VASES AT BANDON AUCTION

    December 9th, 2013

    Among the more unusual lots at Hegarty’s sale in Bandon, Co. Cork on December 10 is a rare pair of Irish Celtic Revival two handled vases.  They were made in Youghal and are stamped Youghal A.M.W.  The estimate is 1,000-2,000.  Another rarirty is an upholstered black carriage with original fittings.  The sale of over 400 lots is online. Here is a small selection.

    A pair of Irish Celtic Revival two-handled vases, stamped Youghal A.M.W. (1,000-2,000).

    A pair of Irish Celtic Revival two-handled vases, stamped Youghal A.M.W. (1,000-2,000).  UPDATE: UNSOLD AND UNDER NEGOTIATION.

    A black carriage, upholstered in leather, with original fittings

    A black carriage, upholstered in leather, with original fittings UPDATE: WITHDRAWN TO NEXT AUCTION

    Oil on canvas by FELIX ZIEM [French 1821-1911] (5,000-10,000).

    Oil on canvas by FELIX ZIEM [French 1821-1911] (5,000-10,000).  UPDATE: THIS MADE 5,800

    A satinwood display cabinet by Maple and Co. (3,000-5,000)

    A satinwood display cabinet by Maple and Co. (3,000-5,000)  UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,800

    Posted in AUCTIONS, COLLECTIBLES | Comments Off on CELTIC REVIVAL VASES AT BANDON AUCTION

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