New Rembrandt in Oxford

Posted on September 18, 2020August 22, 2024 by David Dallas

There is great excitement at my local museum, the Ashmolean in Oxford, as some of you may have read in the Guardian on Sunday 30th August. An van Camp, curator of Northern Europe Art at the museum has made a great discovery in the museum’s basement. She was concerned that a small oak panel of the head of a melancholic old man, bequeathed to the museum in 1951 as a Rembrandt, but subsequently rejected by the Rembrandt Research Project, as an old fake merited re-examination. She was quite right! She said “It is what Rembrandt does. He does these tiny head studies of old men with forlorn, melancholic, pensive looks. It is very typical of what Rembrandt does in Leiden around 1630”.

In 1630 Rembrandt shared a studio in Leiden with his childhood friend Jan Lievens and visitors to the studio said their work was interchangeable it was so similar.

Head of a Bearded Man Rembrandt

The painting was examined by Peter Klein, a leading dendrochronologist and he established that it was painted on a panel of Baltic oak from the same tree as the panel used by Rembrandt for his ‘Andromeda chained to the Rocks’ in the Mauritshuis Museum in the Hague and the panel used by Lievens for his ‘Portrait of Rembrandt’s Mother’ in the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen in Dresden. Both paintings were executed around 1630, just as An van Camp had surmised about the Ashmolean panel. Rembrandt did not have pupils at this stage of his career, so it seems almost certain it is by him.

Dendrochronology has become a very exact science and works best on oak panels from Northern Europe. In Italy they painted on Poplar, Walnut and Lime and these soft woods are very hard to analyse. Dendrochronology works by taking a cross section of the growth rings of a tree. In wet years they are wide and in dry ones black and narrow. Each panel reads like a bar code and there are enough securely dated altarpieces and panel paintings that a huge database has arisen going back from the present day to almost the last ice age. This last bit did not involve altarpieces! I once had a painting by Hendrick Martensz. Sorgh, which had a remnant of bark attached. Usually panel makers cut off the soft green outer wood as it is so prone to woodworm or beetle attack. Dr Ian Tyres, who is an English Dendrochronologist could date the tree to within 6 months of its felling!

I saw the ‘Young Rembrandt’ exhibition at the Ashmolean before lockdown and it is a ‘must-see show’; it reveals so much about the prodigious talents of this young miller’s son.
It re-opened on August 10th and now runs until November 1st. I urge you to go and see it, but remember these days you have to book a timed ticket in advance, to conform with social distancing regulations.

Patrick Heron (1920-1999)

Posted on September 7, 2020October 21, 2024 by Jonathan Horwich

Patrick Heron was one of the leading painters of his generation and one of my artist heroes. Like me, Heron also had artist heroes. His were chosen from the great French Post-Impressionist painters; namely Pierre Bonnard, Paul Cezanne, Georges Braque and Henri Matisse and the influence of each artist can be seen in many, if not all, of Heron’s paintings.

Henri Matisse, L’Atelier Rouge, Oil on canvas, 181 x 220 cms, Painted in 1911. Collection MOMA New York
Heron first saw this picture during the war in a basement gallery in London, it was for sale at £600 and was bought on behalf of the American collector Mrs Simon Guggenheim who later bequeathed it to MOMA. Heron did not have the money to buy it, however it made such an impression on him that he visited the gallery every day until it was finally sold.

Matisse, as the master of colour, was the inspiration and guide for Heron’s use of colour throughout his professional career. Heron knew Braque and describes a visit to his studio where he saw something completely new to him – an artist working on multiple pictures all at the same time. He speaks of watching while Braque frugally uses up any left-over paint by flitting from picture to picture to find the best location for every tiny dot of colour. Heron considered Bonnard an under-appreciated, semi-abstract painter artist and his mastery of the figure and its importance to a composition was a great influence on Heron’s art throughout the 1940’s and 50’s. Cezanne’s landscapes, when transferred to the scenery of Cornwall, also provided constant inspiration.

Some early drawings and watercolours by the young Patrick Heron aged from 3-8 years old

Heron himself was somewhat of a child prodigy. At the age of three he was making very competent landscape and figure drawings. By five he was almost up to Art School standard. His artistic and enlightened parents eased the burden on Heron’s school teachers by telling them not to worry too much about teaching him anything – he was going to be an artist anyway so he should be left to focus on that. At his secondary school near Harpenden he was indeed left to his own devices. His art teachers could no longer teach him anything and so he painted all day and so was largely self-taught.

Bedroom Mousehole, Cornwall. Signed and dated 1946, Oil on canvas, 76 x 63 cms
Sold in 2018 for 120,000 Euro.
Exhibited at Heron’s first one man show at the Redfern in 1947,

Cornwall was a great influence on Heron. Having first visited there as a child, the family later moved to Hertfordshire where they founded Cresta – a firm of silk printers where Heron helped out by designing scarves aged just 14. He finally returned to Cornwall due to the Second World War. A conscientious objector like his parents, Heron was allowed to go down to Cornwall to work with the potter Bernard Leach; an extraordinary piece of good fortune as Heron was not only able to hone his artistic skills by making pots, he also thrived under the watchful tutelage of Leach. He continued to paint throughout the war and afterwards in 1947 he had his first one-man show at The Redfern Gallery in London.

Blue Table with Window, Signed and dated 1954,
Oil on canvas, 102 x 127 cms
Sold in 2011 for £ 1,049,250 , current auction record price.

Heron was by now spending every summer in Cornwall and a clear transition from figurative painting to pure abstract began through the late 1940’s and 1950’s, always edging nearer to pure colour. This culminated in 1956/57 when he bought ‘Eagles Nest’, a cliff top house near St Ives, which he first saw as a child. Here in Cornwall he paints, ‘Interior Garden Window’ – his final major narrative painting, and then begins a new chapter with the pure abstract ‘Camellia Garden’. Everything thereafter is abstract and all about colour, light and shapes.

Patrick Heron Interior with garden window

Interior with Garden Window , circa 1955/1956,
Oil canvas, 121 x 152 cms. Collection Tate Britain
Heron’s last narrative painting before becoming a totally abstract painter

Watching Heron’s work ethic on film is exhausting. He is either out walking miles every day or painting long hours in Ben Nicholson’s old studio in St. Ives. He can be seen working on a large canvas, almost the size of a bedroom wall. It takes 13 hours straight to fill in the spaces using paint straight from the tube and he works without stopping, explaining that should he take a break then the paint will dry and a mark or ridge will appear where he left off and spoil the picture.

Camellia Garden, March. Signed and dated 1956, oil on canvas, 182 x 91 cms
Sold 2008 for £668,450
Herons first solely abstract painting following directly on from ‘Interior with Garden Window’

From my selection of images, I hope you can see the transition from semi-narrative to pure abstract and the energy and the warmth that comes through from Heron’s exceptional art.

Atmospheric Strata, Feb 1958. Oil on canvas, 122 x 56 cms. Sold 2013 £626,000
One of a relative rare series of very attractive and commercially successful ‘stripe’ paintings

Heron was successful right from his first show in 1947 and in 1985 he was honoured with a retrospective exhibition at the Barbican, which is probably the largest assembly of his works. His prices remained constant for many years until in 2006 they spiked. Prices continued to rise until 2009, when they settled back down a little, but remained strong for Masterworks from both pre and post 1957 eras.

Patrick Heron would have been 100 this year and I am sure that if he were still alive and able to paint, he would be making art as energetically now as he was throughout his amazing career.

Bridget Riley, CH, CBE. Born 1931

Posted on August 25, 2020August 22, 2024 by Jonathan Horwich

Bridget Riley, Bassacs, ’94 (section), signed and dated 94, gouache on paper, 66 x 87 cms. Sold Nov 2019, £250,000

It is impossible not to be moved both spiritually and physically while standing in front of a major work by Bridget Riley. She belongs to a painting movement known as ‘Op Art’.

Bridget Riley – Shift, 1963. Oil on canvas, 75 x 75 cms. Sold twice recently in London, June 2016, £1,426,500 and then February 2020, £2,715,000

Not to be confused with Pop Art, Op Art is short for Optical Art, a style of visual art that uses optical illusions and effects with the aim of destabilising the viewer. The viewer gets the impression of movement, hidden images, flashing and vibrating patterns or of swelling and warping. The movement emerges in the 1960’s and includes other major International artists such as Victor Vasarely and Jesus Rafael Soto.

Bridget Riley – Primitive Blaze, emulsion on board, 1963, 94 x 94 cms.
Sold June 2007 for £826,400

Just try standing directly in front of a Riley work, especially a large 60’s black and white piece. It truly is a unique experience. After a few seconds you begin to feel woozy, then you begin to feel like you are being pulled into the picture itself and so you begin to move involuntarily and to sway gently to gain access, and then your eyes go fuzzy. This effect all comes from the artist’s specific design and her precise aim is to make this happen to you.

Bridget Riley – Chant 2, 1967, Emulsion on canvas, 231 x 231 cms. Sold July 2008, £2,561,250

Bridget Riley uses a studio system to make her pieces; she makes the original design and then her super skilled team produce the finished pictures under her direct supervision throughout. Her distinctive way of working owes little to other artists and her skill, knowledge and experience now spans over 50 years as a working artist. By using a studio method with teams of people who will carry out her ideas and put them into practice means she is freed up to constantly have new ideas and to refresh her art and output.

Bridget Riley – Study fo Point Movement, signed, gouache on card, 68 x 73 cms. Sold Nov 2017, £162,000

I love the sheer precision of her work and also the variety, and I marvel at how she manages to always make it undoubtedly recognisable as the work of Bridget Riley. The most desirable and expensive pieces are the black-and-white works which span the early 60’s from 1961-1964. These culminate in the 1965 exhibition ‘ The Responsive Eye’ held at MOMA New York, when ‘Current’ 1964, by Riley was selected for the front cover of the catalogue.

Bridget Riley – October 5, Revision of August 11, signed and dated 98, gouache on paper, 85 x 56 cms. Sold March 2020, £125,000

Colour works begin to emerge from 1967 onwards and are inspired by places Riley knows or has visited. For example, the ‘Ka’ and ‘Ra’ series relate to her visits to Egypt and evoke the colours, shapes and light in Egypt. The series, ‘Les Bassacs’ is inspired and named after the village of the same name in Provence, near to where Riley has her studio.

Bridget Riley, Bassacs, ’94 (section), signed and dated 94, gouache on paper, 66 x 87 cms. Sold Nov 2019, £250,000

For collectors there is much to choose from; an easy and affordable starting point being the many limited-edition prints, followed by works on paper and then paintings. The big money has until recently been for the 60’s black and white works only which inevitably are now very rare, so in recent years large scale colour works from the 70’s and 80’s and later have increased in price significantly.

Bridget Riley – Serpentine Study, 1999, gouache on paper, 39 x 38 cms
Sold Oct 2019, £50,000

For me, the genius of Bridget Riley is that her work never dates and is always fresh and vibrant in its intensity and vision.

Bridget Riley – Six Circles, gouache, 1970, 79 x 45 cms. Sold June 2018, £125,000

Dame Laura Knight, RA, DBE, RWS (1877-1970)

Posted on August 25, 2020August 22, 2024 by Jonathan Horwich

Dame Laura Knight was an extraordinarily gifted painter, who despite being painfully shy in her early years, later developed a great sense of personal style and strength of character and honed her true genius for colour and composition.

Laura Knight – Artist’s Self Portrait, at her easel, public collection

Laura had a great lust for life and embraced everything it threw at her; from being a teaching assistant at Nottingham School of Art, aged 13, via the shores of North Yorkshire and Cornwall and following critical success becoming the first ever female Royal Academician. She was also the only female War artist in World War Two, covering the Nuremberg War Crime trials as the official British artist, with her career culminating in1963 with being the first female artist to have a full retrospective exhibition of her work at the Royal Academy.

Laura Knight – Nuremberg war crimes trials, collection of the Imperial War Museum

What a life! Laura really packed everything in. She had a very pale ‘English Rose’ complexion and blushed very easily, especially when confronted by ‘chaps’ other than her husband, the painter Harold Knight whom she married in 1903. For those of you who like movies featuring real artists, you can see Laura on Netflix in the flesh as it were in the 2013 movie ‘Summer in February’ starring Dominic Cooper as the painter Alfred Munnings, Laura is brilliantly played by Hattie Morihan and the movie is set in Lamorna, Cornwall.

Laura Knight – On the Cliffs, Cornwall. Signed, oil on canvas, 63 x 76 cms. Sold December 2009, £ 646,050 the current world record price

The action takes place in February of 1913. As Spring comes early down there, it was during what proved to be the last golden, warm, and peaceful Cornish Spring before the destruction and devastation of WW1 arrived in 1914. Laura is tongue-tied and red in the face whenever she is confronted by the roguish painter Alfred Munnings (Dominic Cooper is just playing himself I think!), who takes every opportunity to embarrass Laura with his advances whenever Laura’s husband Harold was nowhere to be seen.

Laura Knight, Ballet Girl and Dressmaker, signed, oil on canvas, 96 x 122 cms. Sold July 2018, £322,000

Laura learned painting from her mother who taught at Nottingham School of Art. When she was only13 her mother became terminally ill and Laura effectively took on her role. She married her childhood friend the painter Harold Knight (1874-1961) in 1903 and they moved to join the Staithes artists’ colony based on the North Yorkshire coast due north of Whitby, living and working in or near the village of Staithes .

Laura Knight – Packing Fish, Staithes, oil on canvas, 60 x 50 cms. Sold March 2013, £20,000

Her style is quite different in Staithes. As money was tight, she painted mostly in watercolour there. However, the work is very charming. She loved the local people and depicted their daily life in low-ceilinged, poorly lit interior with figures using muted and subtle colours.

Laura Knight – Marsh Mallows, Cornwall. Oil on canvas, 76 x 64 cms. Sold Dec 1999, £331,500

The Knights moved to Cornwall in 1907 and by 1908 Laura’s style had transformed under the influence of the warm, brilliant light, dazzling blue green seas and glorious sunny days. All this lifted her palette and her work to new heights. When this new work was first shown at the Royal Academy it caused a sensation and even today these truly remarkable Cornish pictures always command the highest prices.

Laura Knight – Munitions worker, collection of the Imperial War Museum

Laura Knight was a great painter in the British Impressionist tradition and a trailblazer for women artists of the 20th Century. Both Laura and Harold enjoyed critical and financial success, with Laura notably arriving in her Rolls-Royce to paint at the Epsom Derby. She was also amazingly productive, painting continuously for well over 50 years.

Laura Knight – A dull day Epsom, oil on canvas, 63 x 76 cms. Sold may 2014, £88,000

She was always on the hunt for new subjects, which in addition to Staithes and Cornwall include; the theatre, ballet, the circus – with all its players and characters – glamour girls and ladies, horse racing, fairgrounds, landscapes… She was a remarkably busy lady indeed, so luckily for the collector there are many buying opportunities, from fine black and white etchings for not much money, to drawings and sketches, and watercolours and oils.

Mary Fedden 1915-2012

Posted on August 18, 2020August 21, 2024 by Jonathan Horwich

They say you should never meet your heroes, however in my case meeting my heroine Mary Fedden back in 1989 went without a hitch and she was a pure delight throughout.

Mary Fedden
The Blue table, oil on board, 76 x 91 cms.
Painted in 1959,
Sold in Feb 2007 for £49,200 ( estimate 15-20,000)

We were both council members of the artists’ charity the AGBI, founded by J M W Turner in 1814; 200+ years later we are still helping artists and going strong. The Committee would meet eight times a year with ten or more council members, mainly artists with some commercial art members such as myself in attendance also. I sat opposite or near Mary for the next ten years or more and if I close my eyes I can still hear her rich, gentle and mellow speaking voice, just the sort of voice that suits fairy tales read aloud. Mary had been on the council for years when I joined, and she was happily enjoying a well-deserved revival of fortunes. Back in 1989 the art market was enjoying a real high point. It was a ‘bonkers’ market for art which lasted until November 1990 when it finally ‘tanked’.

Mary Fedden Tuscan Terrace, signed and dated 1956, oil on canvas, 50 x 76 cms. Sold £27,500 July 2010 ( estimate £20-30,000)

Mary was showing her work in an exhibition in a gallery in Cork Street. On the opening day lines of people had begun forming up outside the gallery from the early morning, all trying to be first in to buy. Part of the reason for this was Mary’s insistence that her prices should be attractive, ie low so as to ensure success, so the pictures were all priced between £300 and £600, which for the commercially minded collector in the queue outside represented an immediate profit on the current auction prices; hence the feeding frenzy … I remember buyers were limited to no more than 3 pictures per person! On or around Mary’s 90^th birthday in 2005 I managed to get her in for a boardroom lunch I was hosting at Christie’s, at which she told me a little more about her life and career.

Mary Fedden My Things, signed, oil on canvas, 101x 162 cms. Sold twice, first in June 2006 for £30,000 and again in 2008 for £103,250 !!

She had married fellow artist Julian Trevelyan in 1951. It was his second marriage and her first, and as was the convention back then, Mary almost entirely parked her painting career and ambitions not long after they married. At the time it was not thought appropriate to compete with one’s husband in a marriage between painters.

Mary Fedden. Mary’s husband Julian Trevelyan by the Thames, signed, oil on board, painted in 1978, 78 x 68 cms sold for £19,200 in Nov 2007.

Julian became President of the RA and died in 1988 and so 1989 marked the first year Mary felt able to ‘go for it’ as it were. She had not stopped painting in the intervening years, she had just stopped selling. Her pricing was probably still stuck in the fifties also! Her accountant told her that in 1989 she earned as much in that one year as she had earned since getting married in 1951 and 1988!

Mary Fedden Julian in the Greenhouse, signed and dated 1986, oil on canvas, 50 x 40 cms. Sold £ 25,000 July 2015 ( estimate £8-12,000)

The appeal of Mary’s work is universal and immediate and private collectors loved and admired it back then and still do now. Also, for me Mary’s work is unique to her and she does not owe anything to or follow any school of painting, making her work recognisable and attractive.

Mary Fedden, The White Umbrella , signed, oil on canvas, 91 x 101 cms. Sold Nov 2007 for £48,000 ( estimte 30-50,000)

Mary’s prices rocketed, albeit from a low base in the late 80’s, so her confidence grew and grew, and her prices have remained strong continuing to gain ground today. Mary was a delight to know and she lived and loved to paint.

Mary Fedden. Tabby’s dinner, signed, oil on canvas, 40 x 50 cms. Sold June 2007 for £22,000 (estimate £6-8,000)

When she was no longer able to travel, she painted at home in Hammersmith using postcards of her old paintings as source material. I have unashamedly chosen some of my favourite pictures for this piece and you can buy her work at the Portland Gallery in London, who also take great care looking after her estate and artistic legacy.

Corona and the Art World

Posted on July 22, 2020August 19, 2024 by David Dallas

It was only when humans ceased to be hunter gatherers, began to domesticate animals and settled down to live in large communities that it became worth the while of viruses to jump from animals to humans. They have certainly got the hang of it now.

With the latest virus (Covid 19) now attacking all continents bar Antartica, governments in Switzerland and France have banned gatherings of more than 1,000 people for the former and 5,000 for the latter. Many other countries will doubtless follow suit.

This is going to have an enormous impact on all businesses and life in general. The Art World has already felt the first effects. Art Basel Hong Kong has been cancelled, as has the Art Fair in Parma and Beijing’s Jingart Fair. The Design Fair in Milan, Salon de Mobile, has been pushed back from April to June and Baselworld Watch Fair, scheduled to take place in January, is now chalked in for April. Sotheby’s have switched sales from Hong Kong to New York and Bonhams have cancelled their March sales in Hong Kong altogether.

All Museums in Hong Kong and mainland China are shut, as they are in Northern Italy. With people in China being encouraged to work from home, supply chains have been severely disrupted and this will soon affect the whole world.

The major problem with Covid 19 is that for many people the symptoms are so mild they are undetectable, so these infectious people are on the loose unknowingly spreading the disease. It cannot be contained now, with one epidemiologist suggesting that between 40% and 70% of the world will have the virus by the end of the year. Who can tell what this will mean to the world economy? Nothing good, that’s for sure.

Stay well and I hope to be able to write about the Art World again soon. If you don’t hear from me, you know why…

Rembrandt to Richter

Posted on July 22, 2020August 19, 2024 by Ben Hanly

Ben Hanly on the Unusual Format of Sotheby’s Forthcoming ‘Rembrandt to Richter’ Sale

No doubt influenced by their hugely successful gamble in 2017 to sell Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi in their Post War and Contemporary sale rather than in its traditional Old Masters setting, Sotheby’s has decided to take a similar approach this month with its much lauded summer auction – From Rembrandt to Richter.

On 28th July Sotheby’s breaks with auction tradition and showcases the finest quality works from all periods within a single sale – their rational being that quality transcends chronological period, and that the traditional auction categories are now unnecessary at the top end of the market. Behind this laudable aesthetic judgement lies solid business acumen – Sotheby’s, along with all the major auctions houses, are very keen to expand audiences for the less hyped markets they represent, and to entice cash rich, young contemporary collectors to consider purchases in more traditional areas. What better way of doing this than putting a major Gerard Richter Triptych (Wolken) along side one of the last Rembrandt Self Portraits remaining in private hands – the idea being that if they looks great at Sotheby’s, why wouldn’t they look great in a collector’s home.

Only time will tell whether this gamble pays off, but it’s hard to see how it can fail with so many beautiful works on offer. One thing is for sure, the sale’s key lot – Rembrandt’s Self Portrait, estimated at £12-16m, is expected to achieve a very strong price, solidly in the £20m region. Bearing in mind the iconic nature of this work, even the expected bullish price in the £20s clearly illustrates the relative value of buying in alternative areas of the market in comparison to the staggering prices achieved at the top end of the Contemporary market.
Download the From Rembrandt to Richter article here

Investing in Warhol Is Investing in Art History

Posted on July 10, 2020August 5, 2024 by Doerr Dallas Valuations

By Ben Hanly, Modern and Contemporary Art Specialist

Download the article here

“Investing in Warhol Is Investing in Art History” (Eric Shiner, Andy Warhol Museum)
The appeal of Andy Warhol’s work is universal and enduring, and it has been the bedrock of the Post War/Contemporary art market for decades, fuelled by his global fame and the rich supply of work. Not surprisingly, his images which were drawn so strongly from popular culture, have come to define our understanding of contemporary art and culture since the 1970s. The art of Warhol is now so mainstream and so inextricably linked to our visual vocabulary that it is impossible not to be familiar with it.

Contemporary art without Warhol is unthinkable, and this influence and popularity is reflected in the strength of his commercial market which has continued to rise on an upward trajectory since his death in 1987.
In many ways the Warhol market defies traditional market rules where perceived wisdom suggests that market strength is linked to the tension between supply and demand – where a limited supply exists, strong prices usually follow. Paradoxically, the opposite is true with Warhol who was a hugely prolific artist. In 1963, Gerald Malanga introduced Warhol to the hitherto commercial technique of silk-screening which he went on to use throughout his career to produce large numbers of canvases produced in various series, as well as extensive numbers of limited-edition prints.

Normally this would be a recipe for commercial disaster. However, with Warhol it turned out to be a strength. Warhol’s notoriety brought him global fame and this coupled with the easy accessibility of his images which have become icons of our time, has meant that there has always been a strong demand for Warhol’s work. The fact that the large supply of works on offer at any one time to collectors has encouraged a very buoyant and vigorous trading market for the artist. Similarly, the fact that collectors can enter his market at varying price points has been very helpful in developing Warhol’s market.

Even today, it is possible to buy a good Warhol limited edition print for as little as £25,000. Whilst this figure might not be exactly small change, it does represent extremely good value and a very attractive entry point level for new collectors entering the market of such an iconic artist. It is hard to believe that a Warhol Campbell’s Soup Can print can be bought at auction for a little as $35,000. The word ‘iconic’ is often used too freely these days, but in this case the use of the word is fully deserved. Warhol’s soup can imagery is truly iconic and for many people it represents what modern art is, so to be able to acquire such an important piece of art history for a relatively accessible price is remarkable.

At the other end of his market, Warhol’s major canvases can make staggering sums of money – such as his 1963 Silver Car Crash which made $105m at Sotheby’s in 2013; or his Triple Elvis, also from 1963, which made $82m the following year in 2014. It is not surprising that Warhol’s highest prices have been for his seminal early paintings – here rarity and uniqueness come into play as far fewer works were produced in the early 1960s than in later years, and all of them created with much more hands-on involvement from the Artist himself. It was only in the late 1960s/1970s that Warhol’s studio, his now famous Factory, came into full swing and started to produce large numbers of works with an ever-increasing supply of assistants and helpers. The early works from the 1960s are, therefore, pure Warhol and they are the truly iconic images which were to make Warhol’s reputation – his Soup Cans, Marilyn, Elvis, Jackie Kennedy etc.

A market as diverse and large as Warhol’s performs differently at its different price levels; prints perform differently to canvases, which in turn perform differently depending on date and quality. Clearly the masterworks will always be avidly sought after by major clients and achieve huge prices. However, it is the overall stability and buoyancy that is astonishing with the Warhol market across all sectors.
It is true to say that the value of Andy Warhol’s artwork—despite a brief dip in the 1990s—has been on an endless upward trajectory, and they continue to offer a secure investment opportunity to all levels of collectors. It should be noted that in 2014 alone the value of the international Warhol market sold at auction accounted for $570m – this figure accounted for more than a sixth of the global art market!
Warhol may have famously said that everyone has their 5 minutes of fame, but it appears that thirty-three years after his own death, Warhol’s artwork has a much longer lasting appeal to collectors!

Rafael Valls at Sotheby’s

Posted on July 3, 2020August 19, 2024 by David Dallas

You may have read that Rafael Valls, the well-respected St James’s stalwart, is to offer 100 paintings form his eclectic stock at Sotheby’s in London, online, between the 1st – 8th of April. The viewing is terrestrial, but the auction is not.

This is not the first time a sole trader’s stock has come up for auction and single owner sales date back centuries. Sotheby’s has an enviable record in this regard. In October 1991 they had their first sale of the works of a living artist, when David Oxtoby consigned 100 works on paper of musicians of the 1950s to be sold in aid of Nordoff Robbins Music therapy. Next up, in September 2008, was the Damien Hirst sale, which grossed over $200m. Subsequently, most of the top London Antique Furniture dealers consigned their stock to auction, notably Hotspur, Mallet, Phillips and Harris and Pelham Galleries, but this was because their market had almost evaporated.

There are two things that set this sale apart from the above and from the Moretti Mannerlist sale of 2015 and the Otto Naumann retirement sale of 2018. The first is that this is just a small, perhaps toe-in-the-water, tranche of what Rafael Valls holds and the second is that it is online. This must appeal to a younger audience unfamiliar with Old Masters. Furthermore, as we find ourselves in a climate where gatherings are banned, viewing and auctioning a sale in cyber-space helps in maintaining motion within the art world.

Nordoff Robbins Music therapy: www.nordoff-robbins.org.uk

David Hockney

Posted on July 3, 2020August 19, 2024 by Jonathan Horwich

Who would have guessed that at the Sotheby’s Art auction in 2006, provided you had a spare £2.9 million, you could buy a truly iconic 60’s Splash painting by David Hockney, sell it 14 years later via the same auction house and achieve over a 600% net return on your investment!

Gaugin’s Chair (1988) sold in New York in 2017 for £6.1 million

This is the story behind Hockney’s painting ‘The Splash’, which comes up for auction again in London next month on Feb 11th. This time it has a £20-£30m estimate – ten times it’s 2006 price tag. The canny vendor has also secured an auction guarantee from a third party, meaning no worries about it selling and no nail biting on auction night. The owner can just sit back, relax and enjoy the show, as whatever happens it’s going to sell. The price achieved back at auction in 2006 was a new world record for Hockney and the Contemporary Art market was steaming ahead. Since then Hockney’s prices have rocketed, and in 2018 Hockney briefly became the most expensive living artist at auction, pushing Jeff Koons out of the top spot with ‘Portrait of an Artist, Pool with Two Figures’ (1972) which sold in NY for £61m.

Portrait of an Artist , Pool with with Two Figures (1972) sold in NY for £61 million

This got me thinking about other Hockney works that had made more than one appearance on the auction block over the last 10-20 years and how they fared.
Gaugin’s Chair from 1988 first appeared at a 1988 Christie’s Lighthouse charity sale and made £160k, it pops up again in 1998 and makes £23.k, then again in in New York in 2017 where it makes a staggering £6.1m!

Picture of a Hollywood Swimming Pool (1964) made £5.5 miliion in New York in 2019

Swimming Pool (1965) sold for £1.2 milllion in 2007. In June 2012 it made £2.5 million

‘Picture of a Hollywood Swimming Pool’, from 1964 was first offered from the Stanley Seeger Collection in 2001 when it made £465k. At its next appearance in 2019 in New York it sold for £5.5m.
‘Swimming Pool’ from 1965 first appeared in 2007, when it made £1.2m then it pops up again in June 2012 when it sold for £2.5m.

Different Kinds of Water pouring into a Swimming Pool (1965) sold for £506,000 in New York in 1989. In 2019 it made just over £2.7 million

Another example that shows things don’t always go to plan is that of the other Pool themed picture from 1965 called ‘Different Kinds of Water pouring into a Swimming Pool’. It first comes up in NY in 1989 when it makes £506k; then pops up again in 2018 with a speculative estimate of £6-8m. It fails to sell and then comes up again the following year in 2019, but now with a much more realistic £2.5-3.5m estimate. This time it sells comfortably within the estimate range at just over £2.7m

The Splash (1966) expects to sell for £20-£30 million in London in February 2020

The David Hockney exhibition at Tate Britain in 2017 was a Blockbuster and a total triumph. For me, it acted as a catalyst for the surge in interest in Hockney and his work. ‘Hockney is Tate Britain’s most visited exhibition ever’ was the Tate’s headline after the exhibition ended in 2017. This all-encompassing, totally absorbing, stunningly colourful and magnificent exhibition must surely have stirred everyone who saw it, including me, and no doubt led many major collectors to get in quick before the market runs away from them.