Previous Posts: entries 2023
From Sleeper to Museum Wall
January 24 2011
I was interested to see this fine portrait of a gentleman by Quentin Metsys in the Metropolitan Museum in New York on Sunday. Not so long ago it had appeared in an auction in Switzerland with a very low estimate and called something like 'Flemish School' (I can't remember exactly).
I had it eagerly flagged up, but the picture was withdrawn from the sale. It then reappeared at Christie's in London correctly described and with an estimate of £700,000 - £1m. Now, it hangs happily reunited (on loan) with its pendant, which has belonged to the Met since 1931.
The New York viewings
January 23 2011
Here are some of the pictures I liked and didn’t like in the Christie’s and Sotheby’s sales. Generally a good offering, with Sotheby’s having the better pick of the two. If you have queries about anything else, please get in touch.
In catalogue order, pictures I liked were;
New Director for the Wallace Collection
January 22 2011
Congratulations to Dr Christoph Vogtherr, who has been appointed the new Director of the Wallace Collection. He takes over from Dame Rosalind Savill later this year. More here.
Off to New York...
January 22 2011
6.30 am. BA aren't on strike. My excellent colleague Sara has swung me an upgrade. All is well.
I'll post some thoughts on the sales tomorrow.
'Lot 31 - The Stolen Degas'
January 21 2011
A c.1870 painting by Edgar Degas stolen in 1973 has been returned to the French Government by US authorities after it was spotted in an auction catalogue. The picture, estimated by Sotheby's at $350,000 to $450,000, had slipped through a check on the Art Loss Register.
U.S. customs officials, working with authorities from Interpol, said the painting was consigned to French art collector Ronald Grelsamer.
Grelsamer said his father gave him the painting as a gift, but was unaware it was stolen, the statement said.
'Lost Rubens' faces Export Ban
January 18 2011
Picture: Sotheby's.
A portrait believed to be by Rubens has been stopped for export by the government's Reviewing Committee. The picture was offered at Sotheby's in December 2009 with an estimate of £4-6m, but failed to sell and is now priced at £1m.
The 'striking portrait of a very real, although unidentified, woman', according to the Committee's Chairman Lord Inglewood, must have presented the panel with a tricky dilemma. The so-called Waverley Criteria, by which a picture is judged to be of national importance, are;
The perils of not getting that export paperwork right...
January 17 2011
Picture: Sotheby's
A US court has seized 'Leda and the Swan' by Lelio Orsi, after apparent irregularities in Italian export procedures. The picture had been sold at auction in New York for $1.5m in 2008.
This is not just a photo of some shoes...
January 15 2011
Picture: Christie's
I'm fascinated by the language used by dealers and auctioneers to describe contemporary art, particularly when it's on sale with a hefty price tag.
Here's a good example from Christie's Spring 2011 'Highlights' magazine, describing a photograph by Andreas Gursky, 'Untitled V' (colour-print, no.2 of 6, estimate £800,000-£1,200,000):
Gleaming with spiritual beauty, the monumental scale and pure aesthetics of Andres Gursky's Untitled V makes this work one of the most powerful and arresting images. Based on the interioir of a luxury goods store, the work is a triumphal examination of consumer culture and the nature of global trade. Its strong architectural lines, muted, meditative lighting and row of sports shoes displayed like sparkling religious icons produces an almost sacred experience... The cool, crisp lines punctuated only by the brightly coloured footwear, are testimony to the enduring influence and Minimalism and to the work of Donald Judd in particular, whose transformation of what Peter Galassi has called 'the solemn majesty of infinite progression (...) into the aesthetic repetitions of the assembly line and the display case' has a particular significance here.
Much more in the catalogue here.
The Holy Grail of Modern British?
January 13 2011
A Francis Bacon triptych of Lucien Freud will be offered by Sotheby’s in London on 10th February. Painted in 1964, it should eclipse the £5.4m realised by Freud’s reciprocal portrait of Bacon, sold in October 2008 at Christie’s London. The Freud of Bacon had an estimate of £4m-7m. The Bacon of Freud has an estimate of £7m-9m.
Not William Gladstone...
January 12 2011
Picture: Bonhams
...as catalogued, but John Bright. Still worth buying though.
Bright wasn't Prime Minister, but he was one of the most important statesman of the Victorian age. He said the famous phrase during the Crimean War; "The Angel of Death has been abroad throughout the land. You may almost hear the beating of his wings."
Update 19.1.11; it made £1,440.
How much will it make?
January 11 2011
Picture: Christie's
A previously unknown self-portrait by Andy Warhol will be auctioned by Christie's London on 16th February with an estimate of £3-5m. It is the eleventh version on a 6ft large canvas, and newly authenticated. Previously there were thought to be only ten.
There are more than forty on the smaller 22 inch scale.
Update 20.1.11; full Christie's catalogue entry here.
Brueghel bought
January 7 2011
Picture: National Trust
Splendid news; ‘The Procession to Calvary’ by Pieter Brueghel the Younger at Nostell Priory has been bought for the nation after a campaign to raise £2.7m. The National Heritage Memorial Fund contributed £1m, and the Art Fund £500,000.
Public donations amounted to an impressive £680,000. The picture is a religious scene, by the younger Brueghel, and can in no way be described as specifically British. But that it still generated such a strong public response is testament to the appetite for good acquisitions.
Given the strong prices for anything Brueghel these days, I think £2.7m was a bit of a bargain. Well done to everybody involved.
The world's most coveted painting?
December 29 2010
A new book makes the case for van Eyck's Ghent Altarpiece.
More baffling Contemporaryartspeak
December 28 2010
From artdaily.com, describing a new exhibition (featuring Turner Prize Winner Simon Starling) at the Camden Arts Centre:
"It aims to create a temporal cacaphony by orchestrating a series of collissions between spatially and historically remote works, that themselves push and pull at an understanding of linear time."
The Future of Art History?
December 23 2010
Picture: David Hockney
David Hockney paints on his iPad.
Velasquez Upgraded
December 22 2010
Picture: New York Times/Metropolitan Museum
After a long campaign of conservation, curators at the Met in New York believe that their ‘workshop’ portrait of Philip IV is in fact an autograph work by Velasquez. It had been downgraded in 1973. The New York Times has a fascinating article, where you can see the picture before and after conservation.
Philip’s left eye had been totally obliterated, and has had to be recreated (very well I think) from other versions of the portrait. Despite appearances, the picture is actually in a relatively good state. The story is yet another example of how a picture’s condition can throw people off the scent – ‘dirty’ paintings, obscured by old varnish and over-paint, are often hard to read.
The Met’s attribution of Philip IV follows on from their earlier upgrading of Portrait of a Man from workshop to autograph.
Courtauld defeats Jewish heirs to keep Rubens
December 20 2010
In a strange ruling, the UK’s Spoliation Advisory Panel has concluded that the heirs of a Jewish banker cannot claim ownership of a Rubens sketch sold under the Nazis. Herbert Gutmann sold the picture at Graupe auction house in 1934, a year after Hitler assumed full control of Germany. Austrian authorities, on the other hand, have previously decided that Gutmann’s paintings sold at Graupe should be returned to his heirs.
The case revolved around whether Gutmann sold the Rubens at its market value because of debts he was obliged to repay legitimately, or whether he was forced to sell the picture because of anti-semitism.
The basic facts of the case are these:
Louvre secures Cranach
December 17 2010
Picture: Louvre
The Louvre has raised a million euros towards the EUR4M it needs to buy Cranach’s Three Graces. Amazingly, in these straitened times, the million boost came from 5,000 individual donors via the Louvre’s appeal website. "It's a magnificent Christmas present," the museum's director Loyrette said.
Looks like a bargain too. The picture was listed as a French National Treasure, meaning it could never be sold outside France. I fancy that if the picture was to appear in a Christie’s catalogue in London or New York, it would have a far higher estimate.
