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  • Posts Tagged ‘Sean Scully’

    THE MOST EXPENSIVE PAINTING SOLD IN IRELAND IN 2023

    Thursday, January 4th, 2024
    SEAN SCULLY (B.1945) – Raval Rojo (2004)

    The most expensive painting sold in Ireland in 2023 was Sean Scully’s Raval Rojo. It made a hammer price of €580,000 at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International online art sale last April. At Whyte’s total sales were just under €6 million, there was a new world record for a work on paper by Harry Clarke at James Adam and in 2023 Bonhams recorded the best every turnover in their 230 year history. Sotheby’s continued their Irish sales in Paris, along with London and Christie’s reported projected global sales for art and luxury goods in 2023 of €5.8 billion and say their is a promising pipeline of consignments already in motion for 2024.

    As we leave 2023 behind there is every reason to be optimistic about the coming year in the art, luxury and collectible end of things. At Christie’s last year there was a strong influx of new buyers (35%) and a growing participation of Millennials and Generation Z. Much of this is driven by popular culture. Think Freddie Mercury at Sotheby’s and Lady Diana’s dress at Julien’s.

    Whyte’s achieved the highest prices in Ireland in 2023 for Jack Yeats (€290,00), Sir John Lavery (€230,000) and Paul Henry (€155,000) – excluding buyers’ premium and VAT. A Seán Keating painting, The Goose Girl, made €62,000 in December. Adams sold over €500,000 worth of paintings by Paul Henry and Harry Clarke’s The Colloquy of Monos and Una, a 1923 illustration for Edgar Allen Poe’s Tales of Mystery and Imagination, made a record €70,000 and joined the collection of the Crawford Gallery in Cork, where it is now on display.

    BARCELONA BY SEAN SCULLY AT MORGAN O’DRISCOLL SALE

    Friday, October 13th, 2023
    SEAN SCULLY (B.1945) – Barcelona (1998). UPDATE: THIS MADE 60,000 AT HAMMER

    Barcelona, a 1998 watercolour on paper by Sean Scully, is lot 16 at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International online art sale which runs until October 24. The estimate is 50,000-70,000. Viewing for the sale gets underway today in Skibbereen and continues over the weekend until Monday. The sale will be on view at the Minerva Suite of the RDS from October 20-23.

    NEW WORK BY SEAN SCULLY AT THADDEUS ROPAC PARIS PANTIN

    Monday, July 10th, 2023
    Tappen Weave Green, a 2023 work by Sean Scully

    Landline Weave is the title of an exhibition by Sean Scully now on view at Thaddeus Ropac in Paris. There is new work from his Landline and Wall of Light series and work from his new Weave and Net series.  In this new series Scully draws on his early work with interlocking lines and contrasting colours to from a textural tartan with inset densely arranged rectangular shapes.   The exhibition at Paris Pantin can be viewed online at Thaddeus Ropac.  Included is a short video of the artist introducing the exhibition in which he explains that it took him decades to get the informality of seepage on the back of the works on to the front.

    SCULLY MAKES £482,600 AT SOTHEBY’S DAY SALE

    Wednesday, June 28th, 2023
    Sean Scully – Barcelona Red Mirror

    Barcelona Red Mirror by Sean Scully made £482,600 at Sotheby’s Modern and Contemporary day auction in London today. Executed on two vertical canvases it epitomises Scully’s hallmark configuration of stripes. Spanning bold alternating blocks of crimson and deep mahogany on the left panel and coal black and lilac on the left the present work creates a ruptured duality, a certain asymmetrical union. Signed and dated 04 on the reverse it brings to mind the artist’s early double canvases, at the same time paying homage to Barcelona, where Scully has had a studio since 1994.

    A €580,000 SCULLY AT MORGAN O’DRISCOLL AUCTION

    Tuesday, April 18th, 2023
    SEAN SCULLY (B.1945) – Raval Rojo (2004)

    Sean Scully’s Raval Rojo made a hammer price of €580,000 at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International online art sale this evening. It had been estimated at 400,000-600,000. Among other top hammer prices were Still Life on White with Beans by William Scott (€160,000) and A Western Landscape by Paul Henry (€75,000), George Barret Landscape with Figures and the Ruins of Melrose Abbey, Roxburghshire (€52,000) and Sir William Orpen’s Portrait of Mary, Lady Gerard in a Green Dress made €23,000. The highly successful sale saw top prices achieved for a number of contemporary Irish artists.

    A SCULLY TO GOBSMACK AT MORGAN O’DRISCOLL’S SALE

    Thursday, March 30th, 2023
    SEAN SCULLY (B.1945) – Raval Rojo (2004). UPDATE: THIS MADE 580,000 AT HAMMER

    Raval Rojo by Sean Scully comes up as lot 31 at Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish and International online art sale on April 18 with an estimate of €400,000-€600,000. Just one day after the catalogue went online it has already received 25 bids and is currently standing at €105,000. It is signed by Scully and dated 9.04. It was purchased by the current owner at the Kerlin Gallery in Dublin in 2005. If memory serves me correctly it was displayed in that show to gobsmacking effect on the rear wall of the rectangular white space at Kerlin. In a catalogue note Aidan Dunne explains: “The Red Ravine referred to in the Catalan title, and the simmering palette of warm earth hues, relate the painting to his Barcelona studio”.

    The sale offers many other fine examples of the work of prominent Irish and international artists.

    SCULLY WALL OF LIGHT WORK MAKES £1.1 MILLION AT SOTHEBY’S

    Sunday, March 5th, 2023
    Sean Scully – Wall of Light Red

    Sean Scully’s Wall of Light, Red sold for £1,137,000 at Sotheby’s Modern and Contemporary evening auction in London on March 1. The monumental work from his most celebrated and instantly recognised Wall of Light series was made in 1998 and is among the largest and earliest works in the series. The oil on linen is on two joined canvases. The inspiration came from a visit to Mexico in the early 1980’s where he was fascinated by the stones of ancient walls on the Yucatan peninsula. When animated by light they seemed to reflect the passage of time.

    “I can’t exactly explain it, but seeing the Mexican ruins, the stacking of the stones, and the way light hit those facades, had something to do with it, maybe everything to do with it” the artist is quoted as saying in an exhibition catalogue at the Metropolitian Museum, New York in 2005.

    FLOATING DIPTYCH BY SEAN SCULLY AT SOTHEBY’S NEW YORK

    Tuesday, February 21st, 2023
    Sean Scully – Floating Diptych Black White. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR $279,400

    Floating Diptych Black White by Sean Scully comes up at a timed online sale running at Sotheby’s in New York on February 23. The oil on aluminium in two parts was acquired by the present owner at Galerie Lelong, New York in 1997, the year in which it was executed. Lot 114 at Part II of the Mallin Collection is now estimated at $30,000-40,000.

    The sale embodies Joel and Sherry Mallins’ unique and innovative curatorial eye. Incorporating a variety of media and artists, from sculptures by Robert Irwin, Michael Heizer, Tau Lewis, and Tara Donovan to video artworks by Marina Abramovic and Ann Hamilton. The sale provides a glimpse into the remarkable works of art that emerge from the Mallin’s legendary Buckhorn Sculpture Park and Artbarn in Pound Ridge, New York.

    CHARITY AUCTION OF UNIQUE RUGS MAKES €156,000

    Wednesday, February 8th, 2023
    DOROTHY CROSS (B. 1956) – GLOW

    Glow, a magical carpet hand tufted with pure wool and luminescent filament designed by Dorothy Cross made €19,000 at a charity sale by Whyte’s entitled Island. On offer was a series of 13 unique one off rugs or wall hangings by some of Ireland’s best known artists and designers. Each piece was hand tufted by Ceadogán Rugmakers at their studio in South East Wexford. Whyte’s conducted the timed on-line sale free of charge in order to maximise the proceeds for The McVerry Trust and For The Birds. The total hammer price for the 13 works was €156,000. Every one sold. Seán Scully’s Wall Fez which made €85,000.

    Glow appears plain white in daylight but an image of a tangle of trees emanates as darkness falls. Dorothy Cross lives and works in Connemara, Ireland. Her work ranges from object to opera: working with sculpture, photography and video. 

    (See post on antiquesandartireland.com for January 25, 2023)

    BRISK BIDDING AT MORGAN O’DRISCOLL SALE WHICH ENDS TONIGHT

    Monday, January 30th, 2023
    SEAN SCULLY (B.1945) – Coloured Wall (2003). UPDATE: THIS MADE 3,200 AT HAMMER

    Bidding is brisk on Morgan O’Driscoll’s current Irish art auction, which draws to a close this evening. The auction features works by William Scott and Jack B Yeats which have attracted spirited bidding. Pictured here is a 2003 lithograph by Sean Scully, Coloured Wall, number 30 out of an edition of 150, where bidding is already past the top estimate of €3,000.