antiquesandartireland.com

A fascinating auction of Irish art with a strong emphasis on the 1970’s is due to come under the hammer at James Adam in Dublin on November 24. This is the first of what will be a series of sales in

coming years of the Bank of Ireland Art Collection.

Long before the foundation of the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) the bank developed one of the largest and most impressive corporate collections in the country. Bank of Ireland started to collect Irish art in the 1970’s and won a European award in 1978 for the quality of its collection. In latter years the group donated significant pieces, including its only work by Yeats, a late oil entitled Eileen Aroon, to IMMA.

Proceeds from the first major Irish corporate collection to be sold will go to charity. Overall the collection of around 2,000 works is valued at between four and five million euro.  The rest of the collection is to be auctioned piecemeal over a number of years.

When putting together the lots for this first sale Adams set out to be comprehensive.  “We wanted to be representative of what was in the collection and to ensure there would not be a large number of works by one particular artist”, Adams Director Stuart Cole said. Highlights are to go on view at the Ava Gallery, Clandeboye, Belfast from October 21 to November 11, and around 50 works will be toured to the Glucksman Gallery in Cork from October 28 to October 31.  The entire sale will be on view at James Adam in Dublin from November 20 until the auction on Wednesday, November 24.