The Window with a view of the town by Jack B Yeats at Adams. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD AT THE AUCTION AND SOLD LATER FOR €250,000
The record for an Irish artwork sold in 2024 was broken three times in quick succession at Sotheby’s and Christie’s this month. It was a similar story on the global market. Expectations around sales of Irish art at Whyte’s, Adams and Bonhams next week are high.
First Orpen’s portrait of Evelyn St. George made £720,000 (€864,010) at Sotheby’s, then The Thinker on the Butte de Warlencourt by Orpen made £756,000 (€907,210) at Christie’s followed later in the sale of the Hobart collection by O’Connell Bridge by Jack B Yeats which made £886,000 (€1,063,210).
The art market is proving to be robust in the face of two years of downturn and continuing global uncertainty. The global market breached the $100 million barrier only once this year when Magritte’s Surrealist masterpiece L’empire des lumieres made $105,000,000 ($121,160,000 with fees) at Christie’s last week. The more conservative and resilient Irish market got a million euro plus artwork in 2024.
On the home front the combined top estimate of €2.5 million for the top four lots at the James Adam sale of Important Irish Art in Dublin on December 4 speaks volumes about the current state of the Irish art market. The four, three by Yeats and one by Orpen, are from the collection of Jacqueline and Vincent O’Brien. Horsemen (1947) (€500,000-€800,000) and He Reads a Book (1952) (€500,000-€700,000) both feature horses, a subject by Yeats that is particularly prized by collectors.
Old John’s Cottage, Connemara by Sir William Orpen at Adams depicts an American wake in 1908. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD AT THE AUCTION AND LATER SOLD FOR €250,000
There is much excitement around these works, and no wonder. They are from the collection of Ireland’s greatest trainer, voted the greatest influence in horse racing history in a worldwide poll in 2003. Orpen’s Old John’s Cottage, Connemara is estimated at €300,000-€500,000 as is another Yeats from their collection, The Window with a view of the Town from 1951.
John Joseph Tracey (1813-1873) – THE IRISH PEASANT’S GRAVE, 1843 AT WHYTE’S. UPDATE: THIS MADE 9,000 AT HAMMER
Paul Henry and Jack B Yeats share the top billing at Whyte’s sale of Irish and International art in Dublin next Monday evening (Dec 2). Killary Bay by Paul Henry and The Dust on thy Chariot Wheel by Yeats are each estimated at €100,000-€150,000. A self portrait by Roderic O’Conor has an estimate of €70,000-€90,000.
The sale at Whytes includes nine lots from the Bank of Ireland collection including Colin Middleton’s Evening Star, Clonelly, Co. Fermanagh from 1970 (€18,000-€22,000). There is art by Maurice MacGonigal, William Crozier, Michael Farrell and Peter Collis. Amongst other lots Walter Osborne’s Girl Feeding a tortoiseshell cat is estimated at €60,000-€80,000 and the sale offers art by Nano Reid, Flora Mitchell, Letitia Hamilton and many more artists. The large sculpture section includes work by Rowan Gillespie, John Coll, Eamonn O’Doherty and Linda Brunker.
The Irish Sale: Vision and Voice online at Bonhams until December 5 features work by Sir John Lavery, Mainie Jellett, Mary Swanzy, John Doherty, Dan O’Neill and a collection of 20 works by Norah McGuinness consigned by her family.
The Long Memory (Westerness Series) by Colin Middleton at Whyte’s. UPDATE: THIS MADE 30,000 AT HAMMER
In New York last week Standard Station – Ten cent Western being torn in half by Ed Ruscha sold for $68.5 million at Christie’s. A monumental Water Lilies by Claude Monet made $65.5 million at Sotheby’s.
The question now is will more records be broken in Ireland in December?
