There is something teasingly abstract about Jug, this 1979 oil on canvas by William Scott from Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International online art auction which runs until November 23. It is exactly what the artist intended. Scott wanted his pictures to be about something. In this work he uses a dark background to create an arresting image with the subject matter reduced to the bare minimum. “I am an abstract artist in the sense that I abstract” he explained once. In the summer of 1953 Scott travelled to the US, met Jackson Pollock, Elaine de Kooning, Franz Kline and Mark Rothko and concluded that their version of abstract expressionism was not for him. Instead he made his own of the simplest domestic objects, a frying pan, eggs, a plate, a fish, green beans, a bowl, a jug. Morgan O’Driscoll has another magnificent sale coming up, with work by Yeats, Henry, Donald Teskey, Dan O’Neill, John Shinnors, Gerard Dillon, Robert Ballagh and others. Jug, estimated at €80,000-€120,000, is a highlight.
THERE is an Edwardian feel to this Interior by the late Co. Wicklow artist Liam Treacy (1934-2004). It comes up at Morgan O’Driscoll’s online art auction on November 2 with an estimate of 600-900. There is a wide variety of affordable art by Maurice Wilks, Gladys McCabe, Basil Blackshaw, George Gillespie, John Butler Yeats, Evie Hone, John Kingerlee and many others on offer. The catalogue is online. UPDATE: THIS MADE 850 AT HAMMER
Andy Warhol’s portraits of Mohammed Ali made €210,000 at hammer at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International art sale last night. With bidders from Ireland, the US, the UK and mainland Europe the online auction grossed €2 million. The Ali portrait went to an Irish collector. Among the other hammer prices were Dan O’Neill’s Summer (€125,000); Bridget Riley R2114 (€100,000); Sean Scully, 9.2.89 (€85,000); Jack Butler Yeats, A Hooker and a Nobbie (€70,000): Banksy, Morons (Sepia) (€68,000); Dan O’Neill, Girl with Flower (€60,000); Basil Blackshaw, Grey Mare (€36,000); Louis le Brocquy, Orange (€29,000); Andy Warhol, The Nun from Ingrid Bergman (€28,000) and Harry Kernoff, The Twelve Pins, Renvyle, Connemara (€25,000).
DANIEL O’NEILL (1920-1974). Summer sold for 125,000 at hammer
The Irish and International art online auction by Morgan O’Driscoll on October 27 has aroused significant interest at home and abroad. The international selection, headed by Warhol’s portraits of Mohammed Ali, is strong and includes work by Banksy, Bridget Riley, Howard Hodgkin, Ai Weiwei, Damien Hirst, Sol Lewitt and others. With 176 lots in total there is a good representation of leading Irish artists including Sean Scully, Louis le Brocquy, Jack Butler Yeats, William Crozier, John Butler Yeats, Sir William Orpen, Mainie Jellett, Kenneth Webb, Barry Castle, Tony O’Malley, Patrick Graham, Pauline Bewick and many more. There is sculpture by John Behan, Sandra Bell, Orla de Bri, F.E. McWilliam and others.
BANKSY (20TH/21ST CENTURY) BRITISH – Morons (Sepia), 2007 (20,000-30,000). UPDATE: THIS MADE 68,000 AT HAMMER
Ireland by William Crozier (1930-2011) is from Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International art evening auction online on Tuesday, October 27. A Dublin viewing planned for this weekend had to be postponed due to the latest Covid-19 government restrictions but the sale will go ahead. This small work is signed and titled verso and is estimated at 1,500-2,500. There are 176 lots in the sale, which is headed by Andy Warhol’s portraits of Mohammed Ali. UPDATE: THE CROZIER SOLD FOR 3,200 AT HAMMER
Global icon Mohammed Ali was ahead of the curve and larger than life. He looms large in Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International online art auction which runs until October 27. A portfolio of four screenprints of Ali by Andy Warhol is, at €200,000-€300,000, the most expensively estimated lot in the sale.Long before Black Lives Matter, when Mississippi was burning, Ali embarked on a search for a more just society. His questioning, talented and interesting character made him a fascinating study for a portrait. Warhol conveys a strong sense of his persona using face, arms and clenched fists. Ali was 37 at the time, an icon of the game. One of the portraits shows him looking down, as if in humility.In a note to the catalogue Peter Murray, the former Crawford Gallery curator, recounts how in 1977 Warhol was commissioned by Richard Weisman to paint silkscreen portraits of ten famous athletes. The resulting prints, titled Athletes, are among the artist’s best-known works. Warhol took polaroid photographs of the boxer in fighting poses and at rest. The resulting images transferred to canvas using acrylic and silkscreen ink transformed into art that was instantly popular amongst art collectors and the public. The paintings were produced in a limited edition of eight, while the subsequent print edition, of which this is one, was limited to one hundred and fifty. It is just one of a number of treasures, Irish and international, in an auction of 179 lots. Harry Kernoff’s treatment of a landscape in Connemara (€20,000-€30,000) could not be more different than the paintings of Paul Henry. Banksy’s Morons (Sepia) from 2007 is a send up of the art auction business estimated at €20,000-€30,000. Sean Scully’s 9.2.89 has an estimate of €80,000-€120,000 and Hughie O’Donoghue’s Red Earth VI (1995) (€30,000-€50,000) is positively scorching. An original gouache by Bridget Riley is estimated at €100,000-€150,000 while a 2019 papercut portfolio by Ai Weiwei has an estimate of €14,000-€18,000. This is a serious sale, which will be of huge interest to collectors in Ireland and abroad. Through viewings in London and New York in pre-pandemic times Morgan O’Driscoll has built up a following for his major sales that has a long international reach. In the process he has given Irish art and artists a welcome shot in the arm.
ANDY WARHOL – MOHAMMED ALI. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR 210,000 AT HAMMER.
Fresh from the success of an online art auction on September 14 at which works by Donald Teskey and Markey Robinson each made 15,000 at hammer Morgan O’Driscoll will hold an online sale of affordable Irish art on September 21. The catalogue for the sale lists 420 lots. There is work on offer by Arthur Maderson, Liam Treacy, Evie Hone, Mark O’Neill, Maurice Wilks, Arthur Armstrong, Desmond Carrick and many more well known artists.
Markey Robinson – North African Village sold for 15,000.
The catalogue for Morgan O’Driscoll’s online auction of Irish art, which runs until September 14, lists 248 lots. There is a wide selection of art by well known and much loved artists available. Among them is Coastline by Donald Teskey.
Donald Teskey – Coastline (8,000-12,000). UPDATE: THIS MADE 15,000 AT HAMMER
Going Quietly to Post by Peter Curling is among the lots at Morgan O’Driscoll’s online sale of affordable Irish art which runs to the evening of July 27. Based in Cashel, Co. Tipperary the artist is widely appreciated for his hunting and horse racing paintings. The 1973 watercolour and pen drawing is estimated at 1,000-1,500. The catalogue for the sale is online and it features work by Arthur Maderson, Jack B. Yeats, Cecil Maguire, Tony O’Malley, Barbara Warren, Graham Knuttel, Markey Robinson, Majella O’Neill Collins and many other artists.
Peter Curling – Going Quietly to post. UPDATE: THIS MADE 1,900 AT HAMMER
The Garden of Orpheus, Summer (1985) by Tony O’Malley is among the highlights at Morgan O’Driscoll’s current sale of Irish and International Art. The online auction runs to the evening of July 20 between 6.30 p.m. and 10 p.m. The catalogue is online.
TONY O’MALLEY (1913-2003) The Garden of Orpheus (Summer) (1985) (30,000-40,000). UPDATE: THIS MADE 60,000 AT HAMMER
