Gem set and diamond bracelet, Eugène Fontenay, circa 1870. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR CHF156,000
Royal jewellery from the collection of Tsar Ferdinand of Bulgaria (1861-1948) will highlight Sotheby’s Royal and Noble jewels sale in Geneva on November 13. With 114 lots, spanning nearly a century in the history of the family of Tsar Ferdinand of Saxe-Cobourg-Gotha, the collection is testimony to Tsar Ferdinand’s exquisite taste, nurtured by his mother, Princess Clementine of Orleans, daughter of the last French King Louis Philippe – herself an avid jewellery collector.
Along with pieces owned by Tsar Ferdinand and heirlooms from his mother there ius jewellery passed down through generations of the Tsar’s immediate lineage as well as pieces made for his children – especially his daughters Princesses Eudoxia and Nadezha.
The top lot is a yellow gold tie pin with a fleur-de-lis motif set with a 2.08 carat pear-shaped Fancy Gray-Blue diamond and four coloured diamonds, including a 0.65 carat Fancy Pink diamond, a 0.52 Fancy Green diamond, a 0.47 carat Fancy Deep Brown-Orange diamond and a 0.13 carat Fancy Intense Green-Yellow diamond. The estimate is US$500,000$700,000. The bracelet illustrated above is estimated at $40,000-$60,000.
Fancy Gray-Blue diamond and coloured diamond tie pin, early 20th century. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR CHF516,000
Stephen McKenna PPRHA, 1939-2017 – City by the Lake. UPDATE: THIS MADE 2,600 AT HAMMER
This 2006 oil on canvas by Stephen McKenna is lot 25 at de Veres Irish art sale online until October 15. The estimate is 3,000-5,000. The sale features work by Colin Middleton, Donald Teskey, Mainie Jellett, John Shinnors, Geraldine O’Neill, Gerard Dillon, Patrick Hennessy, Camille Souter, Cecil King and many more artists. There is sculpture by Cathy Carman, Sonja Landweer, John Coen, Sandra Bell, Anna Campbell, Michael Foley and Peter Killeen. Viewing is now underway at de Veres on Kildare St. in Dublin and the catalogue is online.
After more than 100 years hidden in the icy waters of Antarctica, Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ship Endurance has been revealed in extraordinary 3D detail. The vessel, which sank in 1915, lies 3,000m down at the bottom of the Weddell Sea. A digital scan made from 25,000 high resolution images was captured when the ship was found in 2022. The model reveals how the ship was crushed by the ice – the masts toppled and parts of the deck in tatters – but the structure itself is largely intact. Pictured here is a flare gun that’s referenced in the journals the crew kept. and fired by Frank Hurley, the expedition’s photographer, as the ship that had been the crew’s home was lost to the ice.
The Irish explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton led the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expeditn, which set out to make the first land crossing of Antarctica. The mission was doomed when their ship Endurance became stuck in pack ice within weeks of setting off from South Georgia. Shackleton and his men were forced to travel for hundreds of miles over ice, land and sea to reach safety – miraculously all 27 of the crew survived. A documentary on The Endurance will premiere at the London Film Festival on October 12. It will be released in cinemas on October 14.
ALEXANDER CALDER (1898-1976) – Cantilever. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £1,028,500
The London art scene moves into full throttle this week and Bonhams will feature this perfectly balanced work by Alexander Calder in its 20th/21st century evening sale on October 10. Cantilever dates to 1973 and was acquired by the present owner from Perls Gallery, New York in 1974. The work was exhibited in 2022 at a show at the Heather James Gallery, Palm Desert entitled Alexander Calder: Painting the Cosmos. It is described as one of the finest standing mobiles to come to market and estimated at £1 million – £1.5 million.
David Hockney – L’Arbois, Sainte-Maxime. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £13,150,000
L’Arbois, Sainte-Maxime by David Hockney is among the highlights of Sotheby’s Contemporary evening auction in London on October 9. Executed in 1968 it is part of a celebrated series inspired by the South of France which represents his first serious use of his own photographs as inspiration. The estimate is £7 million to £10 million. The sale features artworks that capture the seismic shifts that occurred in art in the latter half of the 20th century and the artists that paved a radical new mode of art-making altering the course of art history.
Andy Warhol – Eggs. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £1,800,000
Monumental in scale and rigorous in conceptual wit, Andy Warhol’s Eggs from 1982 is a graphically impactful and cleverly inventive expression of the artist’s perpetual experimentation within his own unique brand of imagery. The estimate is £2.2 million – £3.2 million.
Tourus Buoyancy is the title of this unique sculpture by Michael Quane. Made this year from Bordiglio marble it is from his much anticipated solo show “Belonging” at Solomon Gallery in Dublin until October 19. His work is immensely tactile not least because of his method of tooling the surface with a claw chisel which delivers a textured result. Tourus Buoyancy will look familiar to many people because numerous public sculptures by Michael Quane are to be found in various locations around Ireland. The Crawford graduate was elected a member of Aosdana in 1998, has been an RHA since 2004 and is one of Ireland’s most highly regarded contemporary sculptors.
A pair of mid 18th century card tables. UPDATE: THESE WERE UNSOLD
A pair of mid 18th century folding top card tables one of which was in the renowned collection of Simon Sainsbury – scion of the famous retailing family who died in 2006 – and a c1750 Irish side table will lead Adams annual Country House Collections at Townley Hall sale on October 14 and 15. Each lot is estimated at €30,000-€40,000.
With portraits, hard to come by collectible silver, beautiful furniture and collectibles this annual extravaganza of a sale abounds with rare and rich lots and is a magnet for collectors in Ireland and beyond. Two 18th century Irish School views of the Barne Estate between Clonmel and Cahir, a commanding presence to this day, carry an estimate of €10,000-€15,000. The online catalogue is brimful of items of interest. Viewing gets underway at Townley Hall near Drogheda on October 12. An online only sale with 245 lots gets underway on October 14 and there will be a live auction of 460 lots at Adams headquarters at St. Stephen’s Green in Dublin at 11 am the following day.
Two 18th century Irish School views of the Barne Estate, Co. Tipperary. UPDATE: THE PAIR MADE 9,500 AT HAMMER
The Rory Gallagher Collection headed by his legendary 1961 Fender Stratocaster guitar will be exhibited at Bonhams, New Bond St., London from October 12-17, when it will be auctioned. The incredible musical legacy of the legendary blues rock guitarist is celebrated by the release on October 11 of a new boxset of his recorded performances at the BBC.
Rory Gallagher The BBC Collection is a 20 disc set that includes 18 CD’s of radio concerts and sessions from 1971 to 1986 and two Blu Ray discs of BBC TV concerts and studio performances from 1973 to 1984. Though possibly the most recorded musician by the BBC in the 1970’s more than three quarters of the audio recordings have not been released before. Two CD and triple LP sets – The Best of Rory Gallagher at the BBC – will also be released.
Rory Gallagher’s iconic 1961 Fender Stratocaster. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £700,000
In Cork a crowdfunding campaign has been underway since July to bring his iconic Fender Stratocaster back home. This treasured instrument became synonymous with Gallagher and its wear and worn finish have made it one of the world’s most instantly recognisable electric guitars. It has featured in a number of landmark exhibitions, appeared on the cover of countless guitar magazines, and has been played by the likes of Johnny Marr and Joe Bonamassa.
The crowdfunder was initiated by Sheena Crowley of Crowleys Music Shop where Rory bought the guitar for £100 on an instalment plan in 1963. Sheena’s dream is that it might become the centrepiece of a new music museum on the banks of the River Lee.
Rory Gallagher’s Fender Esquire electric guitar (1959). UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £95,650
The auction consists of guitars, amps and accessories from Rory Gallagher’s life and career. It will include a Fender Player Stratocaster HSS electric guitar donated by Fender to benefit the Music Venue Trust, a charity chosen by the Gallagher family dedicated to protecting, securing and improving grassroots music venues. This has been signed by a number of musicians who cite Rory as an influence, including David Gilmour, Johnny Marr, Ed O’Brien, Nile Rodgers and James Bay.
Highlights include a Fender Telecaster electric guitar (1966), a 1958 Fender Stratocaster known as Rory’s backup strat, a Fender Esquire electic guitar (1959), a Martin D-35 flat top acoustic guitar (1968), a Martin mandolin (1942), a Gibson Les Paul junior electric guitar (1958), a National Triolian resonator guitar (1930) and a Gretsch Corvette electric guitar (1963).
Rory’s brother and former manager Donal commented: ““After nearly thirty years since my brother Rory’s passing, I now believe it’s time for other people to cherish Rory’s ‘orphaned’ 1961 Fender Stratocaster and the rest of his incredible instrument collection. Since 1995, I have always felt that there was a mission to be fulfilled to cement Rory’s legacy and widen the knowledge of his music”.
The live auction on October 17, now open for bidding, consists of 94 lots. A timed online sale with 91 lots with guitars, amps, pedals, instruments, flight cases and accessories runs from October 7-18.
A rare Tychobrahe Octavia 1976/77 from the Rory Gallagher collection. This is an effects pedal designed for Jimi Hendrix and made by the Tychobrahe Sound Company in California. UPDATE: THIS MADE £3,840.
A solo presentation by Ailbhe Ni Bhriain who is represented by Kerlin Gallery, Dublin is among the international avant-garde historical and contemporary artists at Offscreen Paris from October 16-20 at Grand Garage Haussmann. At Offscreen two large-scale Jacquard tapestries by Ni Bhriain titled Interval III and Interval VIII – woven with wool, cotton, silk and lurex – are on display. Originating in collage, they are a composite of fragments, brought together to create a visual world that is at once precise and enigmatic. Both works are underpinned by loose categories of imagery: early photographic portraiture, underground caves and architectural ruins. The formal construct of the group portrait, with its projection of status and stability, is punctured at once by the deep time of geological formations and the crumbling structures of the contemporary. The resulting scenes of threshold and collapse are inhabited by an unlikely cast of creatures – animals which thread an imagined line between present-day threats of extinction and ancient narratives of the underworld. Both tapestries belong to an ongoing body of work which also encompasses a forthcoming film titled The Dream Pool Intervals. Collectively these works seek to locate the looming consciousness of climate crisis within an odd, hallucinated world, where colonial and industrial legacies fuse with our most ancient storytelling and fears.
Golds – an exhibition exploring one of the most symbolic colours in the history of art, and how it has been used and represented in the work of significant artists from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries – opens tomorrow at Ordovas on Savile Row in London. The exhibition, featuring 11 works of art, represents a diverse group of artists including Carl Andre, Lucio Fontana, Donald Judd, Giuseppe Penone, Edmund de Waal and Andy Warhol. These modern works are shown alongside a masterpiece of medieval art: an exceptional champlevé enamel chasse from Limoges, France, created circa 1200 and believed to have housed and protected one of the most precious relics: a piece of the True Cross. This is the latest in a series of exhibitions held over recent years exploring the use of a single colour; previous editions were dedicated to white in 2017 and blue in 2020. It runs until December 13.
Limoges, France, circa 1200 – A champlevé enamel chasse showing the Crucifixion Photo courtesy Sam Fogg, London.
