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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.
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.
A 1932 Austin Six Saloon, an exceptional pair of Buhl pier cabinets and a set of chairs once in the collection of the Dukes of Leinster at Leinster House are among the delights awaiting collectors at auctions around the country in the coming week. The Chatsworth autumn fine art sale by Fonsie Mealy in Castlecomer next Tuesday and Wednesday will run concurrently with three days of sales from Hatherton House, Dartry, Dublin and other clients by Sheppards in Durrow on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Meantime Aidan Foley’s three day antique and home interior sale at Sixmilebridge gets going tomorrow.
The Austin Six at Fonsie Mealy is petrol driven and estimated at €10,000-€15,000. The sale includes a George III breakfront bookcase by Thomas Graham of Clonmel once in the collection of the Villiers-Stuart family (€6,000-€8,000) and a set of 18th century giltwood armchairs in the manner of John Trotter (€4,000-€5,000). The provenance here relates to the Dukes of Leinster at Leinster House and Carton.
Sheppards will offer more than 300 lots of furniture, 100 lots of Chinese ceramics, hundreds of paintings, mirrors and some architectural salvage. Appetising antique furniture includes a pair of exceptional 19th century Buhl pier cabinets (€5,000-€8,000). A Chinese blue and white Leys jar is estimated at €8,000-€10,000. More unusual lots include a pair of Balinese hardwood windows and shutters, and a Balinese door. Library bookcases, Persian rugs, Victorian sideboards and ga
A small pencil sketch of a country fair by Jack B. Yeats is similar in size to one Aidan Foley sold recently for €2,000 at Sixmilebridge. It comes up among about 180 lots of art at Foley’s sale on August 14 including work by Mark O’Neill, Arthur Maderson, John Morris, Markey Robinson, John Kingerlee and the British born Co. Tipperary based Michael Hales. The appetite for art at auction in Ireland is undiminished and paintings will be to the fore at Foley’s sale at Kilcolgan, Co. Galway and at Hegarty’s in Bandon on August 17. Both sales are online.
Michael Hales, whose abstract art is gathering a growing band of admirers, has his studio at Emly and cites Bridget Riley, Gerhard Richter and Sean Scully as influences. His work can be seen as part of a group show at the Kenmare Windows exhibition until August 28 where exhibitors are displayed in the windows of local businesses and Kenmare Butter Market as well as the Carnegie Arts Centre. He has had various shows around Tipperary, at Cahir, Cashel and Tipperary Town and was recently at the Royal Ulster Academy’s 140th annual exhibition.
If art is hot the same cannot be said for much of the antique furniture that surfaces at sales like Aidan Foleys. The auctioneer is offering a mahogany four drawer chest tomorrow that would fit in any house or apartment. It will, he predicts, go for €100 or less. Demand for lots like Georgian drop leaf tables, a cross banded Victorian pembroke table, cheval mirrors and rosewood card tables, all of which feature in the sale tomorrow, remains weak even though antique furniture is the ultimate buy for those who want to go green and save the planet.
Noted for the naturalness of his drawing and his play on light and shade the British watercolourist Samuel Prout (1783-1852) is credited with elevating the art of architectural drawing to new heights. Among his pupils was the critic John Ruskin who once remarked: “Sometimes I tire of Turner but never of Prout”. A definitive collection of over 60 works by Prout as well as by his son Samuel Gillespie Prout (1822-1911) and his nephew John Skinner Prout (1805-1876) will kick off the sale at Hegarty’s on Wednesday. One of the more expensively estimated works by Samuel Prout is The Mill, a watercolour which depicts a house and watermill overlooking a stream. It is estimated at €2,500-€4,500. There are many less expensively estimated works by the Prout family from €300 up. A Quayside Scene by Samuel Prout is estimated at €300-€600 and a watercolour of Ratisbon Cathedral (modern day Regensberg) by Samuel Gillespie Prout is estimated at €500-€700. The Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery holds a collection of work by Samuel Prout. Among other lots of note at Hegarty’s is a portrait of a young female by John Butler Yeats (1839-1922) from the Yeats family collection. It is thought to be of his daughter Lily who often sat for her father and is estimated at €1,000-€2,000. Poppies in Sunlight by Kenneth Webb is estimated at €3,000-€5,000. Kenneth Webb is to be the subject of an exhibition at Gladwell and Patterson, Beauchamp Place, London next month.
This Victorian walnut clock comes up as lot 176 at Aidan Foley’s three day antique and home interiors auction in Sixmilebridge, Co. Clare on April 3, 4 and 5. It is estimated at 200-300. With a total of 1,866 lots the selection on offer is extensive. The sale is built around contents from three properties in Kenmare. There is antique furniture, Irish and European art, silver and collectibles. The catalogue is online and viewing at Sixmilebridge gets underway today.
The hectic pace of 2021 continues as the auction world zooms into December. A number of stunning sales in the offing next week in Ireland offer collectors a wide range of stellar choices in the fields of antiques, art and collectibles. Fonsie Mealy’s Christmas Rare Books and Collectors sale is at the Talbot Hotel, Stillorgan on Tuesday and Wednesday, four days of sales with amazing contents from the Cronin collection at Seafield House, Donabate, Co. Dublin get underway at Sheppards in Durrow next Tuesday and the Outstanding Irish Art sale at James Adam on Wednesday evening will follow a strong sale of fine jewellery and watches at Adams on Tuesday. And Aidan Foley will offer more than 2,000 lots at three days of online sales from tomorrow with viewing in Sixmilebridge today.
Among more than 1,000 lots at Fonsie Mealy is a prized first edition of Ulysses by James Joyce and full replicas in silver plate of both the Liam McCarthy Cup and the Sam Maguire Cup There will be international interest in.an original engraved facsimile copy of the American Declaration of Independence issued by Order of Congress in 1823 when it was noted that the ink on the original document was fading. This particular copy has direct provenance by family descent to Charles O’Connor, the Irish American democratic lawyer who in 1872 became the first catholic to be nominated for a US Presidential election. With everything from the antiquities of Ireland to Monty Python this auction is on view at the Talbot Hotel, Stillorgan on tomorrow and Monday.
Sheppards have a pair of museum quality 19th century satinwood bookcases from the collection of Cork businessman Liam Cronin. There is a Mannerist Mannerist painting of The baptism of Christ by John the Baptist, once owned by Augustine Roche, Lord Mayor of Cork. His dispersal sale by Marshs, Cork in 1916 had to be postponed from April to July because of the Easter Rising. This is an online sale of 1,637 lots with everything from a Chinese Meiping vase to a 19th century neoclassical overmantle. The auction is on view in Durrow on today, tomorrow and Monday.Adams will offer lots of diamonds, as well as rubies, sapphires, emeralds and all sort of gemstones at their fine jewellery sale in Dublin at 4 pm next Tuesday. Viewing for this dazzling sale is now underway in Dubin.
The Adams sale next Wednesday is particularly strong in mid 20th century art. Through the Streets to the Hills by Jack Yeats from 1950 is a view of Fitzwilliam St., Dublin where Yeats lived from 1919 until he retired to the Portobello Home. It is estimated at €100,000-€150,000. There will be much interest too in a contrasting work, Portrait of Lucian Freud in Patrick Swift’s Hatch St. (€20,000-€30,000) which depicts the young artist in Dublin.Other Modernist works include Edward McGuire’s Barn Owl (€6,000-€8,000) and How Many Miles to London Town (€30,000-€50,000), Trojan Horse (€15,000-€20,000) and Abstract with Toy Train (€20,000-€30,000) all by Colin Middleton.
The contents of Lotaville, Lower Glanmire Road, Cork will be included at a live and online three day sale by Aidan Foley in Sixmilebridge, Co. Clare on September 26, 27 and 28. Among them are a watercolour by Joseph Carey of Blackrock Castle, Cork (€400-€600), A View on the Thames by Augustus Burke (€6,000-€10,000), a set of 12 Cork mahogany dining chairs (€3,000-€5,000) and a tennis bracelet (€12,000-€16,000). Viewing gets underway today. The sale of 2,000 lots will include contents from houses in Adare and Nenagh.
THIS summer of auctions is continuing at a brisk pace. A variety of interesting and one off lots will come under the hammer in Ireland over the next few days. More than 600 lots will come under the hammer at Fonsie Mealy’s sale of contents from Osberstown House, Naas on July 27. Osberstown is an elegant country home with all the trappings that make such places special. Hunting through the catalogue you will find everything from a four poster bed and garden statues to antique furniture and rugs, a console mirror and even an Irish silver replica of the Phoenix monument at Phoenix Park. There are comfortable button back leather library armchairs, painting and limited edition prints by Pauline Bewick, a Victorian breakfront wardrobe, a walnut dining suite, an Arts and Crafts five drawer chest, a selection of artworks, a cylinder bureau, a cheval mirror and much more to choose from.Viewing by appointment will be available on Monday. The catalogue is online and the sale will be online only from Castlecomer.
UPDATE: The Osberstown House sale realised over €370,000 on the hammer. The top lot was a massive pair of recumbent Great Danes by Triton 2001 in a limited edition 21/100 which made €5,800 at hammer.
If you picture yourself as a Viking warrior slashing and burning your way through oodles of Covid restrictions and combatting bureaucratic enemies more fearsome and confusing than any ancient dragons then Sean Eacretts auction in Ballybrittas, Co. Laois on July 26 is for you. He is selling MGM props from Vikings and Game of Thrones online on Monday. International interest is guaranteed but estimates are reasonable. A pair of tall metal candleabra from Game of Thrones is estimated at €400-€800 and King Ivor’s throne from Vikings season four is estimated at €300-500. Or you might prefer King Alfred’s throne from season five. There are special tables and boat chairs along with a selection of axes, cabinets and chests in highly decorative hardwood from the Great Hall of Kattegat as filmed in Ashford, Co. Wicklow. The sale features fine art, antiques and collectibles as part one and MGM props as part two.
Meantime Aidan Foley’s summer sale of antiques and interiors online from Kilcolgan, Co. Galway takes place today and tomorrow. There is art by George Gillespie, Maurice Wilks, Graham Knuttel, Arthur Maderson, John Skelton, Colin Middleton and others. The auction offers Persian rugs, antique furniture, silver, Waterford Crystal, a pair of 19th century military epaulettes, old banknotes and garden furniture.The pub section, which is always popular, includes a Bendigo Tobacco mirror from a pub clearance in Ballyhaunis as well s prints, collectibles and glassware. The online sale is on view today in Kilcolgan and the online auction is at 11 am tomorrow and on Monday.
A blue and white jug with an image of Bearforest House in Mallow is among the lots at Aidan Foley’s online only sale in Doneraile, Co. Cork on September 5. Bearforest was designed by Sir Richard Morrison, the architect of many notable country houses in Ireland including Fota in Cork, Kilruddery near Bray and Ballyfin in Co. Laois. There is Cork and Irish silver, antique furniture including a French 19th century walnut display cabinet, a Victorian breakfast table and games tables and a wide variety of collectibles. Art includes work by Arthur Maderson and Marie Carroll and a selection. of hunting prints.
There will be three days of online sales by Aidan Foley at Sixmilebridge in Co. Clare on July 5, 6 and 7. Around 1,500 lots are to come under the hammer including house contents from Blackrock in Cork city, Ennis, Castleconnell and Limerick city. There is Irish art by James Humbert Craig, George Gillespie, Arthur Maderson and Markey Robinson. Antique furniture lots include a pair of Victorian library bookcases, a Victorian five leaf dining table and a collection of wing back library chairs. There are light fittings, pub memorabilia, posters, Waterford Crystal, Persian rugs, musical instruments, books, garden statuary and jewellery. The sales will be online at Easy Live Auctions.
