Pablo Picasso – Baigneuses, sirènes, femme nue et minotaure sold for £7,044,000
June sales of Masterpieces from the Lewis Collection and Modern & Contemporary art at Sotheby’s in London realised £420,488,006 across four auctions. This is the highest result for any season of sales ever staged in Europe. There was spirited activity from around the world, with bidding from 45 countries and particularly strong participation from Asian collectors, whose purchases in The Lewis Collection evening auction accounted for over a third of the total value of the sale.
The season was led by Masterpieces from the Lewis collection. The 47 works sold in Sotheby’s rooms this week brought in £306.6 million, the highest total for any single owner sale ever staged in London. Together with the £35.8 million realised for four School of London works offered from the same collection in March, the combined total for works sold from the Lewis Collection at Sotheby’s this year now stands at £342.4 million. The Lewis evening auction realised £296.3 million for 23 work with nine breaking the £10 million barrier. La Loge, a pastel by Degas, did not find a buyer during the sale but was sold immediately afterwards to a private collector.
The contemporary day auction totalled £9.3 million and the modern day auction, with masterpieces from the Lewis collection, brought in £17.8 million.
Amadeo Modigliani – Nu assis au collier. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £48,235,000
The 25 defining masterpieces of modern figurative painting from the Lewis Collection at Sotheby’s on June 24 constitute the most valuable single collection ever offered in London.
A nude considered scandalous by Modigliani leads an auction which features stellar artists like Picasso, Schiele, Bacon, Klimt, Freud, Caillebotte and Toulouse-Lautrec. Modigliani’s sensuous Nu assis au collier (Seated nude with necklace) ranks among the most important works by the artist ever to come to market. It is estimated to make around £45 million (€52.1 million). Painted in 1917 it belongs to a series now widely regarded as pivotal in the evolution of modern art, but considered so outrageous at the time the exhibition in which they featured was shut down by the police. Modigliani is one of a rare coterie of artists to have broken the $100 million threshold at auction, not just once but twice – each time in New York. Both were works from this series. The mantle now passes to London where this is one of the highest value works of any kind ever offered in the city and the highest value work by Modigliani ever to be offered in Europe.
Pablo Picasso – Buste de Femme. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £23,855,000
A suite of seven works by Picasso spans eight full decades of his career. The group is led by a highly unusual and evocative portrait of Dora Maar, the vibrant, fiercely independent artist who first attracted his attention by playing ‘knife roulette’ between her splayed fingers on an adjacent table at Les Deux Magots in Paris. As well as becoming Picasso’s muse and lover Maar also became his indispensable intellectual and artistic sparring partner. Given both the provocative nature of their nine year relationship and the tumultuous backdrop against which it unfolded (the Spanish Civil War and the Second World War), the vast majority of Picasso’s renditions of Dora Maar are angular and jagged in form. Buste de femme, unseen for over half a century, is a rare example of something quite different – a generous, sweepingly lyrical rendition of the Dora Maar with whom Picasso was still entirely besotted in 1938 when this work was painted.
Egon Schiele – Danaë. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £17,932,500
With its jewel like surface and geometric patterning Egon Schiele’s Danaë – painted when the artist was just 19 – is seen as a key breakthrough work. Here Schiele imagines the mythological scene in which Zeus descends on Danaë in a shower of golden rain, its heaviness accentuated by the introduction of greens and blacks. Schiele died in the Spanish flu epidemic in 1918 aged just 28.
Bacon’s Two Studies for a Self-Portrait was made in 1977 and captures an artist beset by inner turmoil. Following the suicide of his love George Dyer in 1971 Bacon launched into a period of production that would become the most emotionally fraught but ambitious of his career. Behind these works lies a decade of guilt, bereavement, and self-scrutiny, marked by the deaths of many of those closest to him – not only George Dyer, but also Peter Lacey. When asked in 1979 why he made so many self-portraits, Bacon explained: “people have been dying around me like flies and I’ve had nobody else to paint but myself.”
Many of the works in a sale estimated to make in the region of £200 million (€231.5 million) have been shown in major museums across the globe. They were assembled over decades by Joe Lewis and his daughter Vivienne. Born and raised in London’s East End, Joe Lewis felt a natural affinity as a collector with the School of London painters, such as Bacon and Freud, whose work confronted the human condition with an uncompromising intensity. That early passion became the foundation for what is today one of the world’s most important private collections of modern art, shaped by a fascination with the human figure in all its forms.
Over the years the collection has been re-shaped. The Lewis journey as collectors is far from over. “We remain committed to the avant garde painters of today, much of whose work is informed by the artists showcased here” a statement said.
Billionaire Joe Lewis, who left school at 15 to help his father run his father’s West End catering business, was born in 1937 to a Jewish family living above a public house in Bow, East London. He holds assets through his Tavistock Group and was previously the majority owner of ENIC Group, the majority owner of Tottenham Hotspur. Accused of tipping off associates and friends with non public information and charged with multiple counts of insider trading in New York in 2023 he pleaded guilty. Lewis was spared jail time, fined $5 million and later pardoned by Donald Trump. His art collection is estimated to be worth $1 billion.
Francis Bacon – Two Studies for self-portrait. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £8,675,000
An original Pablo Picasso painting worth more than €1 million has just been won in a charity raffle. The winner is engineer and art enthusiast Ari Hodara. More than 120,000 tickets for the draw were sold at €100 each, raising around €11 million for Alzheimer’s research. This was the third edition of the “1 Picasso for 100 euros” fundraising raffle, founded in 2013. Tête de Femme (Head of a Woman) is a gouache-on-paper portrait of Picasso’s partner and muse, the French surrealist artist Dora Maar.
“How do I know this isn’t a prank?” the 58-year-old asked when he answered a video call from Christie’s in Paris. Hodara, who lives in Paris, bought his ticket number 94,715 over the weekend after learning about the competition by chance.
The first edition of the raffle was won by a 25-year-old American from Pennsylvania in 2013, with funds raised to help preserve the Lebanese city of Tyre – a Unesco World Heritage Site. A 58-year-old Italian accountant won the second edition, in 2020, after her son bought her a ticket for Christmas. Proceeds were donated to sanitation projects in schools and villages in Cameroon, Madagascar and Morocco.
The Picasso exhibition now underway at the National Gallery in Dublin offers insightful paintings, sculpture, ceramics, works on paper and photographic work. This show places Picasso in the context of his studios and explores key locations that inspired him from his arrival in Paris at the start of the 20th century to his studio at Villa La Californie (1955-1961) at Cannes.
The personal life and work of the most innovative and influential artist of the 20th century were deeply intertwined. His homes and his studios were intimately linked and no space exemplifies this more than the Chateau de Boisgeloup in Normandy, purchased in 1930. Here during an intense love affair with Marie-Therese Walter he created some of his more iconic works. The exhibition presents renowned and lesser known pieces from captivating perspectives by placing works within the context of their creation. Photographic and audio visual work will immerse visitors in his creative spaces from rustic French farmhouses to expansive seafront villas.
Picasso: From the Studio, in collaboration with the Musée Picasso in Paris, traces his diverse phases, styles and passions over more than 50 years through more than 60 works. It runs until next February 22.
Picasso: From the Studio which opens at the National Gallery of Ireland on October 9 invites visitors to explore the relationship between maker and place in the context of one of the world’s most well-known artists. Pablo Picasso (1881 – 1973) lived surrounded by his art. His personal life and his work, his homes and his studios were always intimately linked. This exhibition highlights the various facets and phases of his art and life, exploring the key locations that defined him. From his arrival in Paris at the start of the twentieth century to his final studio Notre-Dame-de-Vie (1961-1973) in Mougins, visitors will see paintings, sculptures, ceramics, and works on paper, as well as photographic and audio-visual works.
Spanning more than 50 years of work, it is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to see so many works by one of the most influential artists of the 20th century in Ireland. The exhibition is organised in collaboration with Musée national Picasso-Paris and proudly supported by the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport and KMPG Ireland, exhibition partner. It runs until next February 22.
Pablo Picasso (Spanish 1881-1973) Jeune couple accroupi, l’homme avec un tambourin at Lynes and Lynes. UPDATE: THIS MADE 5,000 AT HAMMER
A marine chronometer, a Picasso etching, a c1730 bureau bookcase or a modern burr poplar and satinwood side cabinet inlaid with mother of pearl? The choice is yours at upcoming sales at James Adam in Dublin on Wednesday August 27 and Lynes and Lynes in Carrigtwohill, Co. Cork next Saturday (August 30).
The etching of a young couple by Picasso is the top lot at Lynes and Lynes. Published by Vollard in Paris in 1939 and signed in pencil from an edition of 260 it is from a private source in Cork. The estimate is €5,000-€8,000. Lynes and Lynes will offer three ships chronometers, one by Whyte Thompson and Co., makers to the admiralty, Glasgow (€900-€1,200), another by Thomas Mercer (€700-€1,000) and a third manufactured by the First Watch Company, Moscow (€300-€500).
A c1730 bureau bookcase at James Adam. UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD
Antique furniture is more difficult to sell nowadays. A c1730 bureau bookcase at the At Home sale at Adams might break the mould. Capable of lending grace and utility to many modern homes it comes with twin mirrored panel doors, a fall front, desk, shelves and drawers and measures just 103 cms wide. The estimate is €1,500-€3,000. By way of contrast an inlaid demi lune side cabinet by Restall Brown & Clennell at Adams is a modern piece with an estimate of €2,000-€3,000.
With nearly 900 lots in total each sale offers a wide variety of lots at affordable price points, online catalogues and in person viewing.
Marine chronometers at Lynes and Lynes. UPDATE: THESE MADE 1,300, 850 AND 260
Lynes and Lynes will include contents from the recently sold Montenotte House and lots from the estate of late surgeon Tom Burke and his wife Kay of Blackrock, Cork. There are tables to choose from including a large 19th century dining table, a Cork Regency tea table and a Georgian wine table. There are Cork 9-bar chairs and Arts and Crafts dining chairs, a Cork Regency linen press and a fine painted cabinet. The sale offers silver and jewellery, a specialist collection of antique continental dolls and old advertising signs including one for the Metropole Hotel in Cork. Viewing gets underway in Carrigtwohill today and continues all next week.
A pair of red ground 19th century Chinese silk scroll wall hangings and a George V silver epergne feature among the lots adding interest to the At Home sale by James Adam in Dublin. The auction offers silver, furniture, a longcase clock, paintings, a 19th century gilt surround continental headboard, sofas, rugs, lamps, mirrors and an Irish silver Art Deco style three piece coffee service.
A c1960 Louis Vuitton train vanity case at James Adam. UPDATE: THIS MADE 460 at hammer
Or how about a Louis Vuitton c1960 train vanity case identified as reference model M23820 (€500-€800), a 20th century Aubusson style needlepoint tapestry, an Anglo-Indian carved ebony side chair or a brass dinner gong?
Auctions like these offer endless variety and objects to suit all tastes. Go on. Be inspired….
Miss January dated 1997 by Marlene Dumas became the most expensive painting by a living female artist ever sold when it made $13.6 million (€11.96 million) at Christie’s in New York.
The global art market is not immune to the trade winds of change blowing us all over the place right now. Even though they brought in $1 billion the slimmed down May sales in New York failed to reach their targets.
On the minus side a bust by Alberto Giacometti of his brother Diego, estimated at around $70 million (€61.57 million), failed to find a buyer at Sotheby’s. On the plus side the collection of Barnes and Noble founder Leonard Riggio and his wife Louise made $272 million (€239.46 million) at Christie’s, the only collection to realise this total in the last 18 months.
It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good. Marlene Dumas, South African born Netherlands based 71 year old set a new auction record for a living female artist with Miss January, 1997. She has explored portraiture for 40 years and this monumental nine feet tall work of a beauty queen naked from the waist down apart from a pink sock sold for $13.6 million (€11.96 million) at Christie’s. There were records too for previously overlooked 20th century women artists like Grace Hartigan, Dorothea Tanning, Remedios Vara and Kiki Kogelnik.
Composition with Large Red Plane, Bluish Gray, Yellow, Black and Blue made $47.6 million (€41.87 million) at Christie’s.
Christie’s global president Alex Rotter said that what we are seeing is an emphasis on individual taste among collectors. “The market is no longer about following the crowd. It is about individual taste and passions. What art makes you feel. That is a very interesting and exciting development for the market”.
The global downturn is influenced by factors like a decline in the number of Asian buyers and the absence of Russian wealth. These do not affect the market for Irish art. Underlying global uncertainty does play into the Irish market but not at a level where the highs are stratospheric and the lows catastrophic. Our very conservative market is characterised by slow, steady growth. It operates in a relatively low value segment which shows up in all current statistics as most immune to all that is going on.
Homme assis by Picasso made $15.1 million (€13.28 million) at Sotheby’s.
One segment that has proved to be not at all immune is the market for young contemporaries. Entirely absent from the sales this month were prices in the millions for young artists that few people had ever heard of. One possible explanation is that buyers of mid-career artists can afford to wait as this work will continue to be available in the future, especially at a time of uncertainty.
The top lot of the week was Mondrian’s Composition with Large Red Plane, Bluish Gray, Yellow, Black and Blue from the Riggio collection. It made $47.6 million (€41.87 million) . Magritte’s L’Empire des Lumieres from the same collection made $35 million (€30.79 million). There was a record at Christie’s for Monet when his Peupliers au bord de l’Epte, crepuscule, sold for $43 million (€37.82 million) and set a new record for his celebrated Poplars series.
At Sotheby’s Picasso’s Homme Assis from 1969 made $15.1 million (€13.28 million) and Georgia O’Keeffe’s Leaves of a Plant made $12.9 million (€11.35 million). Roy Lichtenstein’s Reflections – Art made $5.4 million (€4.75 million), one of nine Lichtenstein’s which collectively made $29 million (€25.51 million).
Leaves of a Plant by Georgia O’Keeffe made $12.9 million (€11.35 million) at Sotheby’s.
James Arthur O’Connor – The Avenue, A View in the Parc de Bruxelles. UPDATE: THIS MADE 19,000 AT HAMMER
A surprisingly strong sense of the contemporary belongs to an 1835 work by James Arthur O’Connor at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International art sale on April 8. There is something almost surreal in the calm atmosphere of this depiction of a park with a neo classical building in the background. It antecedes the much later work of European greats like Rene Magritte and Giorgio de Chirico.
With its diagonal splash of blue sky “The Avenue, A view in the Parc de Bruxelles” was one of the highlights of the James Arthur O’Connor exhibition at the National Gallery of Ireland in 1985. The neo classical building shown now houses the US Embassy in Brussels and the painting – one of a number of highlights in this auction – is estimated at €20,000-€30,000.
The sale is headed by Connemara Hills by Paul Henry, featured on these pages last Saturday and described by Peter Murray as one of Henry’s best paintings. There is impressive work by artists like Roderic O’Conor, Colin Middleton, Donald Teskey, Louis le Brocquy, John Behan and John Shinnors.
Pablo Picasso – Visage Noir (Black Engraved Face)(1953). UPDATE: THIS MADE 18,000 AT HAMMER
Visage Noir (Black Engraved Face) (1953) by PIcasso is a highly sought after Madoura Pottery vase, the result of a collaboration that began in 1947 between the artist and the pottery in the South of France. This one is number 98 from an edition of 100 and is estimated at €15,000-€25,000. Among other highlights are a Famine Ship and a Swans sculpture by Behan and a set of 25 hand coloured acquatints of Malton’s Views of Dublin.
Lady Beatrice Glenavy – The Prayer. UPDATE: THIS MADE 8,500 AT HAMMER
Horses by the Boyne by Nano Reid is estimated at €10,000-€15,000 and Irish women artists and sculptors including Evie Hone, Lady Beatrice Glenavy, Letitia Hamilton, Majella O’Neill Collins, Gladys McCabe, Elizabeth Cope, Norah McGuinness, Elizabeth Brophy, Mary Swanzy, Orla de Bri and Helen Walsh are all represented.
An oil on canvas by George Mounsey Wheatley Atkinson features a shipwreck on a rocky coastline and dates to 1850 and there is a painting of Shipping off Dover by Edwin Hayes. A watercolour by Christy Brown entitled A Village Stroll, a view of Inishlackin by Gerard Dillon, a portrait of an Aran Islander by Sean Keating, an abstract by John Kingerlee and a portrait of Rolling Stone Keith Richards in London in 1982 by John Minihan give some idea of the depth and breadth of subject matter in this sale of 161 lots.
There are etchings and lithographs by artists including Andy Warhol, Sonia Delauney, Joan Miro, Louis le Brocquy, Sean Scully and Georges Braque among an appetising selection of highly affordable art. The auction is on view in Skibbereen from March 29 – 31 and at the RDS in Dublin from April 4-7. The online sale draws to a close from 6.30 pm on April 8.
Sonia Delauney – Morning Light UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,200 AT HAMMER
PIET MONDRIAN (1872-1944) Composition with Large Red Plane, Bluish Gray, Yellow, Black and Blue, 21 ¼ x 21 in. (54 x 53.3 cm.) Painted in Paris in 1922. UPDATE: THIS MADE $47.6 million
Art by Mondrian, Magritte, Picasso, Giacometti, Warhol and other luminaries will come under the hammer at Christie’s in New York in May in a single owner evening sale. The Leonard and Louise Riggio collected works will be offered during Spring Marquee Week. The founder of Barnes and Noble died last year and his widow is downsizing from her Manhattan apartment on Park Avenue. With more than 30 works that represent an anthology of changing ideas, the works in the collection range from Surrealist musings to reflections on the influence of Classicism. Collectively, the artworks in the sale are expected to realise in excess of $250 million. The collection will be toured to London, Hong Kong, Paris, Dubai and Los Angeles.
The Mondrian is expected to be the top lot with an estimate that is expected to top the $51 million record for a work by the artist set in 2022. The selection also features two exemplary Surrealist paintings by René Magritte, including the first work from his most highly coveted series, L’empire des lumières, and Les droits de l’hommes completed just a year prior, in January 1948. Further highlights include a 1937 Pablo Picasso portrait of the renowned photographer Lee Miller and three Alberto Giacometti sculptures, includingFemme de Venise I, conceived in 1956 and cast in 1958.
Bonnie Brennan, Christie’s Chief Executive Officer, said: “It is an honour to be entrusted with this inimitable collection, a tribute to Leonard and Louise Riggio and their enduring legacy as patrons of the arts and passionate collectors. Each artwork included in this encyclopedic collection is exemplary, demonstrating the Riggios’ deep appreciation for human creativity. Christie’s strives to present exceptional art and objects, and this seminal collection, to be offered to a global audience this spring, will be a highlight of the year.”
René Magritte – L’empire des lumières. UPDATE: THIS MADE $35 million
Aidan Foley will offer this Bentley at Ashford auction. UPDATE: THIS MADE 26,000 AT HAMMER
Not every kitchen clear out yields a Bentley, the bronze front doors once at Harrods and lithographs by Miro, Picasso and Dali. But Ashford Castle is not your average kitchen and all these lots will be included in Aidan Foley’s online auction of contents from the kitchens and lodge there on January 20 and 21.
The luxury hotel is carrying out a refit. Among masses of catering equipment and rare once off collectibles is a pair of plate glass doors in their bronze surround originally at Harrods. The large doors were acquired for Ashford Castle as part of a scheme that was never realised. Each one is a single plain glass panel.
The Bentley is estimated at €10,000-€20,000 and there is significant interest in it already. There is a Porsche too. A selection of around 50 lithographs by Miro, Picasso and Dali will whet the appetites of collectors. Around 700 lots will come under the hammer. The catalogue is online and the auction is on view for three days from January 17 in Cong, Co. Mayo at the Old Mill just outside the back gate of the castle.
A Miro woodcut from Ashford Castle. UPDATE: THIS MADE 220 AT HAMMER
