Red Figure, 1957 by Deborah Brown. UPDATE: THIS MADE 2,000 AT HAMMER
A timed auction of the Deborah Brown collection is underway at Adams until October 1. This is a studio collection of her work with reasonable estimates along with art by friends and contemporaries including Mainie Jellett, Evie Hone, James Humbert Craig, Alice Berger Hammerschlag, William Scott and Basil Blackshaw whose art she admired.
Largely unknown at home Deborah Brown, who died in her mid ’90’s last year, was an artist of international repute who evolved into abstraction in the 1950’s and exhibited at the New Vision Centre gallery in London, the Free Painters Group and the Arnolfini in Bristol. A retrospective at the Ulster Museum and the Hugh Lane Gallery was held in 1982 and another at the F E McWilliam gallery in 2012-13.
A framed linen handkerchief on Michael Collins at the time of his death at Hegarty’s. UPDATE: THIS LOT WAS WITHDRAWN AND SOLD PRIOR TO THE AUCTION
As the autumn season moves into high gear an impressive selection of highly collectible lots is available to collectors up and down the country next week. The range on offer right now includes everything from a rediscovered painting by Frank O’Meara at Adams, a Rolls Royce Silver Spirit at Sheppards and a linen handkerchief which Michael Collins had in his pocket when he died at Hegarty’s in Bandon.
When the autumn art selling season kicks off at Adams in Dublin on the evening of September 25 there will be much interest in A Knitting Shepherdess painted in 1880 by Frank O’Meara. This small scale transitional work by a short lived though renowned Irish artist, unknown to researchers, has been in an Irish private collection for decades. It is estimated at €10,000-€15,000.
Frank O’Meara (1853-1888) – A Knitting Shepherdess at Adams. UPDATE: THIS MADE 24,000 AT HAMMER
The Bog Pool by Paul Henry is at €120,000-€160,000, the most expensively estimated lot in this auction of 150 lots which features work by Jack B Yeats, Paul Henry, Colin Middleton, Louis le Brocquy, Sean Keating, Frank McKelvey, Gerard Dillon and Lilian Davidson. On the contemporary side there is a large work painted in 2008 by Hughie O’Donoghue – No. 37, Stuttgart 7 Hours 20 Minutes 24.7.44 – of a Lancaster bomber during the Second World War setting the night sky ablaze (€30,000-€50,000). Painting and sculpture by Neil Shawcross, Colin Harrison, Edward Delaney, Melanie le Brocquy, John Behan and many others add enormous interest to this sale.
The petrol driven 1984 Rolls Royce at Sheppards Legacy of the Big House auction of more than 1600 lots on September 24, 25 and 26 in Durrow is estimated at €20,000-€30,000. A west Cork collection assembled in Ireland, Europe and America has a strong emphasis on 17th and 18th century furniture. An Irish 17th century leather bound marriage trunk with metal and stud decoration and domed lid, inscribed 1693, is certain to create interest. The estimate is €4,000-€6,000.
An Irish 17th century leather bound marriage trunk at Sheppards. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
An Italian 18th century carved gilt console table with marble top is estimated at €3,000-€5,000. There are Regency tables, an Irish oak rent table, a Grand Tour marble specimen table, a 17th century walnut and crossbanded chest, a Cork Regency carved giltwood mirror and a pair of early 19th century Viennese salon chairs among an appetising selection.
Curiosities include a 19th century Cork ebony and ivory octant and a bronze model of a Venetian Lion of St Mark. There is a collection of fountain pens, jewellery from Atelier Jacobi, Stuttgart and art by James Arthur O’Connor, Guido Reni, Norah McGuinness, James Humbert Craig and others. Viewing starts in Durrow today.
A framed white linen handkerchief which Michael Collins had with him on the evening of his death on August 22, 1922 comes up at Hegarty’s sale in Bandon on the evening of September 25. It is accompanied by a manuscript letter in pencil signed by Collins’ brother Sean O Coileain dated August 31 to General Sean MacMahon asking him to: ‘accept enclosed as a souvenir of Michael – in his pocket at time of death’ . The estimate is €10,000-€20,000. The provenance of the handkerchief is General Sean MacMahon and thence by descent.
The online sale features antique furniture, art, silver and jewellery including a Victorian emerald and diamond shamrock bar brooch.
A Cork Regency carved giltwood mirror at Sheppards. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
Midleton Very Rare Whiskey – 1988. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
This bottle of 1988 Midleton Very Rare Whiskey will lead the James Adam timed online sale of wines and spirits on September 25. The estimate is €10,000-€20,000. This is the most elusive release of the series with only 16 bottles known at auction since 2009. At Sotheby’s in New York last week a bottle of Knappogue Castle whiskey distilled in 1951 and bottled in 1987 made a hammer price of $1,500 (€1,353) over a top estimate of $900 (€811).
Only two Master Distillers have had the privilege of preserving the legacy of the world’s most sought-after Irish Whiskey – Barry Crockett and Brian Nation. Created in 1984 by Master Distiller Emeritus Barry Crockett, Midleton Very Rare is the ultimate expression of his art and expertise. Once a year, Master Distiller Brian Nation honours Barry’s vision by handpicking only the finest and rarest whiskeys from the Midleton Distillery warehouses and carefully blends them to create each annual vintage of Midleton Very Rare. Each bottle is individually numbered and signed by the Master Distiller, the mark of a true whiskey masterpiece. Midleton Very Rare is consistently awarded the highest honours at the world’s most respected whisky awards. The individual nature of the selection process means that each year’s vintage provides its own unique character. Viewing for this sale gets underway today.
Deborah Brown (1927 – 2023) – The Harper, 1952/53. UPDATE: THIS MADE 4,400 AT HAMMER
A timed auction of the Deborah Brown collection will be held at Adams in Dublin on October 1. Deborah Brown was an artist of international repute mostly unheard of in her own country even though her work was regularly included in survey exhibitions of contemporary Irish art, including a number of major touring exhibitions and at ROSC. A 1982 retrospective exhibition was shown at the Ulster Museum and in Dublin at the Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery of Modern Art and there was a retrospective at the F.E. McWilliam Gallery in Banbridge in 2012/13.
The sale is a fascinating collection of works by artist friends and contemporaries, those who particularly influenced her career and the studio collection of Deborah’s own work. There is art by James Humbert Craig; Mainie Jellett, Evie Hone, Alice Berger Hammerschlag, T.P. Flanagan, William Scott and Basil Blackshaw.
After studying at Belfast College of Art and the NCAD in Dublin Deborah Brown moved to Paris in 1950. Experiences of modern French painting transformed her work. In 1951 she was invited to hold a one-person exhibition in Belfast, with a subsequent exhibition organised in Glasgow in 1955 by the British Council. This in-turn led to her 1956 solo exhibition at the Ulster Museum. In 1953, Deborah Brown began to exhibit with Victor Waddington in Dublin and the Mayfair Gallery in London in 1954. She exhibited with the Ulster Academy of Arts between 1946 and 1976 and the Society of Women Artists in London, the Women’s International Art Club and the Ulster Society of Women Artists. In the late 1950s, Deborah Brown’s work became completely abstract and she exhibited increasingly outside Ireland at the New Vision Centre Gallery, in London, the Free Painters Group and at the Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol. The catalogue for the sale is online.
PAIR OF TURQUOISE ‘SWEET ALHAMBRA’ EARSTUDS by VAN CLEEF & ARPELS. UPDATE: THESE MADE 2,600 AT HAMMER
Jewellery auctions are for everyone, not just the super rich. This pair of Van Cleef & Arpels turquoise Sweet Alhambra earstuds come up as lot 5 at the Fine Jewellery and Watches sale by James Adam in Dublin on September 10 with an estimate of just €700-€900. A number of lots in this sale have estimtes of under €1,000. The most expensively estimated piece is a brilliant cut diamond pendant at €40,000-€50,000.
Berlin Suite by Cecil King (1921-1986). UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,600 AT HAMMER
At a time when Irish art seemed to exist mostly in a landscape laden time warp from around the turn of the 20th century, when Irish Modernism existed in a vacuum, IMMA was far in the future and the avant garde was regarded as deluded and possibly even heathen Oliver Dowling opened his gallery on Kildare St. in Dublin in 1975 with a focus on minimalism, conceptualism, neo-expressionism and other abstractions.
Concurring Rhythms by Alice Berger Hammerschlag (1917-1969) UPDATE: THIS MADE 360 AT HAMMER
There were controversies. This writer vividly remembers one evening paper dashing off to Lenehan’s Hardware Shop on Capel St. to purchase for a pittance a glass shelf and a water glass to demonstrate the folly of it all. Oliver was showing An Oak Tree by Michael Craig-Martin, consisting of a glass of water on a glass shelf on metal brackets and a text (the original is now in the National Gallery of Australia with an artist’s copy at the Tate). The news hounds entirely missed the conceptual point but it made for an amusing story. Oliver Dowling had a loyal following who understood how easily avant garde art could be misjudged in a world where it was so far ahead of the prevailing norms.
Untitled by Fergus Martin (b 1955). UPDATE: THIS MADE 2,600 AT HAMMER
Fast forward nearly half a century and art like this is fairly mainstream, even in Ireland, largely thanks to people like Oliver Dowling, his partner Cecil King (they were among the founders of the ROSC exhibitions), and all the other artists and gallerists who toiled in that vacuum. When I was a young journalist in Dublin Cecil King offered me a piece of advice which I’ve often quoted. Looking at a conceptual painting that consisted of not much more than a pencil dot on a large white canvas I asked what on earth it was all about. “Just look” he said, “and keep on looking”. This guidance has proved richly rewarding.
It is why I’ve been pouring over the catalogue of The Oliver Dowling Collection with such enthusiasm. It comes up at a timed online sale at James Adam on September 11. There are 163 lots – including as large a selection of work by Cecil King ever likely to be found at any sale – in an auction now on view at Adams.
Oliver Dowling died in January. His collection bears witness to a true pioneer with rigorous standards. There is art by William McKeown, Mary Fitzgerald, Josef Beuys, Michael Coleman, Fergus Martin, Felim Egan, Ciaran Lennon, Nigel Rolfe, Luis Tomasello, Willie Doherty, Jo Baer, Jerry Zeniuk, Raimund Girke, Alice Berger Hammerschlag, Colin Middleton, Eduardo Chillida, Dorothy Cross, Robert Janz, Maria Simmonds Gooding and many other acclaimed artists in this exceptional sale.
Rose Stem and Pot by Derrick Greaves (1927-2022). UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,000 AT HAMMER
Paul Henry RHA (1877-1958) – The Bog Pool (c.1921-22). UPDATE: THIS MADE 160,000 AT HAMMER
The Bog Pool by Paul Henry is the most expensively estimated lot at the James Adam Important Irish Art sale in Dublin on September 25. It was exhibited at The Dublin Painters Gallery in 1922 and in New York in 1930. The setting is most likely Achill. The estimate is €120,000-€160,000. The catalogue, with 150 lots, is online.
Van Cleef & Arpels diamond brooch c1945-50. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
This Van Cleef & Arpels diamond brooch is among the leading lots at the James Adam auction of fine jewellery and watches in Dublin on September 10. It is designed as two elongated stylised leaves, both set with brilliant, baguette and tapered baguette-cut diamonds of 8.0 – 10 carats in total. Signed VCA it is mounted in platinum and 18 carat gold. There are French assay marks and a partial indistinct maker’s mark. The estimate is €35,000-€40,000. There are 220 lots in total in the sale.
Upholstered Howard style sofa and some maritime art. UPDATE: THE SOFA MADE 2,600 AT HAMMER, THE PAINTING BY HERMAN DIETZ MADE 3,600
In their appealing catalogue for an At Home sale in Dublin on August 28 Adams has very consciously set out to stage antique pieces in fresh contemporary settings. The aim is to highlight the versatility of antique furniture and show how easy it is to adapt to a 21st century interior, not to mention sustainability in a country where the EPA reckons over 1.2 million reusable bulky items, primarily furniture, go into landfill each year.
So how about it? Take a long look at this photograph of an upholstered Howard style sofa (lot 22, estimated €400-€600) in a New England style painted panelled setting under a maritime oil on canvas of the clipper Manalope painted in 1889 by the Russian American artist Herman R Dietz (1860-1923) (lot 21, estimate €2,000-€3,000). Howard & Sons created this iconic chair design in 1866. It is not old and stuffy – timeless and classical is a description that would fit the bill, which in any case will not be large.
The online only sale, on view in Dublin from August 24, presents 394 lots of interesting and affordable furnishings for the home. The idea that you do not need an old house to own antiques should not be a novel one, but at a time of crisis in the antique furniture trade not nearly enough auctioneers in Ireland market furniture in a way that shows this.
Victorian harewood and satinwood Carlton House Desk at Adams. UPDATE: THIS MADE 1,600 AT HAMMER
Antique furniture is beautiful and serviceable yet an entire generation of younger buyers appear to be uninterested. In an era when many fine old pieces are practically given away at auction new ways of selling day to day antiques must be found to get this cohort back to the saleroom. A presentation which demonstrates that antique pieces can stylishly embellish a contemporary setting might be the answer. Maybe a sale presented and marketed like this one points to a better way forward.
You could build an atmospheric and comfortable room around a Chesterfield sofa like the one in this sale (€ 800-€1,200) and if you must have a big brand and only a big brand there is a Louis Vuitton trunk on offer (€2,000-€3,000). With estimates from €60 (for a Victorian stationary box) to €3,000-€5,000 for an oil of an American Clipper in full sail by Henry Scott and everything from silver goblets to hall chairs to a Chinese camphor wood blanket chest in between there is much to choose from here.
The Camilla Mirror at de Veres. UPDATE: THIS MADE 750 AT HAMMER
Many lots will be sold without reserve at de Veres house contents auction of antique and designer modern furniture, art, collectibles and garden pieces at 25 Wellington Road, Dublin at 2 pm on August 27. The online auction embraces everything from the Camilla mirror designed by Christopher Guy to commemorate the hat Camilla Parker Bowles wore at her royal wedding (€600-€1,000) to a watercolour of Wexford by Maurice MacGonigal, an Afghan carpet and a club fender. There is viewing at the house from August 24 and the catalogue is online.
This Empire style pier table made €160 at Adams in June.
Beautiful, green, sustainable and unwanted …. good antique furniture continues to offer spectacular value to consumers. Armed with just €100 euro you can pick something up at many sales. The choice widens considerably with €300, €500 or €1,000. Disinclined to believe me? There are lots of examples from auctions in the first half of the year in Ireland as follows:
An Empire style circular pier table with brass sphinx head capitals sold for a hammer price of just €160 at the last At Home sale at James Adam in Dublin in June. At the same auction a 19th century circular convex mirror surmounted by an eagle with outstretched wings made €320, a Victorian walnut and parquetry games table made €130 and a Victorian mahogany hall chair made €170.
This George III bureau made €150 at Sheppards in May.
At Sheppards Great Irish Interiors sale in May a 19th century pine pedestal plant stand made €50 at hammer, an Irish 19th century drop leaf kitchen table made €90, a George III mahogany wash stand made €160 and a George III writing bureau sold for €150.
At Woodwards in Cork in April an Edwardian occasional table on tripod base made €40, a Victorian Sutherland table made €90, a Victorian chest on stand made €120 and a Victorian lowboy with herringbone crossbanding made €140. At Marshs in June a two tier centre table made €40, a French escritoire made €120 and a Victorian lady’s work table made €160.
This Victorian lowboy made €140 at Woodwards in April.
An Edwardian oak hall stand made €90 at Lynes and Lynes in April, a Victorian dressing table made €100, an antique side table made €160, a Victorian circular dining table made €50 and a Victorian dumb waiter made €140.
An Edwardian four tier waterfall what not sold for €40 at Fonsie Mealy in February, while at an auction in Castlecomer in May a Georgian glazed bookcase made €210, a Pembroke table made €170 and a Victorian walnut lady’s work table made €180.
The late Cork auctioneer Joe Woodward once remarked that: “There is a bargain at every auction”. That was then and this is now. When it comes to good serviceable antique furniture that has already given years of service and is ready for much more many bargains can be found at every sale nowadays. The prices quoted here are hammer prices and do not include auctioneers fees, but fees on €100 euro do not amount to much. Some auctioneers will even refuse to accept some furniture for sale. Who can blame them? When pieces do not attract any bids and are unsold they must be returned and carriage costs money.
This Victorian dining table made €50 euro at Lynes and Lynes in April.
Not everything is unwanted. Some furniture is sought after and some particularly good pieces make lots of money. Just last October a pair of c1760 George II carved giltwood armchairs, one with a Strahan label, made $152,400 (€139,949) at Sotheby’s in New York. It helps when something is exceptional, with impeccable provenance and preferably a celebrity owner or two.
