Tag Archives: art

Helen Bradley (1900-1979)

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Many of us promise ourselves that we will take up painting in retirement, few of us ever do and even fewer stick at it and only a tiny few achieve commercial and critical success with their Art. Helen Bradley was one of these tiny few and in her own uniquely British way she created a whole new life for herself with her Art when at the age of 65 she began painting pictures each one recalling a memory of her Edwardian childhood. To begin with her paintings were a way for her to show her grandchildren just how different a place the world was for her as a child in the Edwardian Era.

Born in 1900 Helen Bradley was like the late Queen Mother, the same age as the century she lived in. She was born in Lees just outside Oldham in Lancashire and showed enough early artistic talent for her to study Art but only for one year from 1913, when as for so many others the Great War intervened stopping her art studies in their tracks , then marriage and children followed.

At first glance you might think that Helen Bradley’s paintings look a little like L S Lowry’s figure compositions, however she had her own unique style and technique just as Lowry has his. Indeed the two artists met early on in Bradley’s career, they got on well and Lowry continued to encourage Bradley in her work and the two developed a firm friendship. Neither artist followed or was influenced by the other and both held a strong admiration for each other’s work.

The majority of Bradley’s figure pictures depict specific remembered events and are often accompanied by a story handwritten in biro on a parcel label and usually attached to the back of the picture. These notes explain to some extent what the viewer is looking at in the composition and the characters, Bradley sets the scene for us to share her memories and individual characters the most famous of which is Miss Carter . This excerpt from her online biography explains a little about her characters.

She mixed a little pink colour, she painted the dress of a tiny figure. From that moment was created the enchanting land that was to delight millions. The figure she painted was that of Miss Carter (who wore pink) who features in most of Helen Bradley’s paintings. Other characters you will find are her mother, grandmother, her three maiden aunts, Mr Taylor (the bank manager) Helen herself with brother George and their dogs Gyp and Barney and many others.

These narrative paintings were first exhibited at The Saddleworth Art Society in 1965, followed by a London exhibition in 1966, and a sell out exhibition at the appropriately named Carter Gallery in Los Angeles in 1968.

In 1971 Jonathan Cape published the first of four books “And Miss Carter Wore Pink”. This was an instant success. German, French, Dutch and Japanese editions were published, and a special edition produced for the U.S.A.

Requests for illustrations of her work were satisfied by the publication of 30 Signed Limited Edition Prints, 3 Unsigned Limited Edition Prints and 11 Open Edition Prints.

Magazine features, appearances on television and radio endeared Bradley to the general public and led to her being awarded the M.B.E. for services to the arts, unfortunately she died on the 19th of July 1979 shortly before she was due to receive her M.B.E. from Her Majesty The Queen.

The market for Helen Bradley’s work is very well established and her work is regularly available at auction and in galleries and I hope that this little snapshot will whet your appetite for further investigation perhaps even a purchase. To start with you could consider buying one of her beautifully illustrated books of story pictures, all are out of print but are available online or in specialist galleries for around £15 to 30, the signed limited edition prints start at around £350.

The Queen’s Portraits

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Throughout history the Crown has used portraiture to define and promote its official image – the image which each successive monarch chooses to portray itself to the Nation. These images, whether they show the monarch as a great head of State, or as a triumphant military leader or even as the embodiment of middle-class values, have eventually come to define the visual culture of each passing generation.

On 9th September this year, Elizabeth II became the nation’s longest-reigning monarch, surpassing her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria. Throughout her long reign the Queen has overseen the greatest political and social changes this county has ever seen. She was born into a country which still sat at the centre of a global empire, and during her reign she oversaw the evolution of the Commonwealth of Nations.

The United Kingdom has emerged from a post Edwardian society to a vibrant, modern, multi-culture one. All this in one lifetime.

From Cecil Beaton to Pietro Annigoni, from Andy Warhol to Lucian Freud, and more recently Jamie Reid to Chris Levine – Britain’s longest reigning monarch has been painted by some of the greatest artists of her time, with each image recording the ever-evolving relationship between the Queen and her people. But what is unique about the Queen’s portraits in the history of royal portraiture, is that her face has been appropriated to become an icon of popular culture. She is both a Queen, a Pop icon and a defining symbol of punk subversiveness!

In celebration of the Queen’s Jubilee, we have put together a short survey of the Queen’s most famous portraits throughout her reign.

Cecil Beaton

The fashion designer, Cecil Beaton, was unusually chosen to take the official coronation portrait of Queen Elizabeth on June 2, 1954. The image he created came to define the first decade of the Queen’s reign and symbolised the new Elizabethan age she heralded in. At its heart, the image is fundamentally rooted in the tradition of Royal portraiture, with the Queen shown in all the majesty of her Coronation robes – with the Imperial State Crown on her head and the orb and sceptre in her hands. Beaton manages to capture the Queen as both intensely royal but also yet somewhat vulnerable due to her youth.

Interestingly, whilst this is an intensely traditional image, the medium of photography with which it was created, together with Beaton’s visual trickery also makes it a surprisingly modern one. Although the image appears at first glance to be set in Westminster Abbey, the photographer actually employed a theatrical backdrop for the photo, which was taken in a drawing room at Buckingham Palace.

Pietro Annigoni

In 1954, two years after her coronation, the Italian artist Pietro Annigoni painted the first of his two famous portraits of the Queen. Commissioned by the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers in London, the painting is universally considered the most beautiful ever painted of her and is the queen’s known favourite. The artist shows the beautiful young queen in the magnificent robes of the ancient Order of the Garter and set within a beautiful Italianate landscape worthy of any Renaissance master. The resulting image is a supremely elegant and glamorous one, which has appeared on stamps and currency in British dependencies across the world.

 

In 1969, at the request of the Queen, the National Portrait Gallery in London, commissioned Annigoni to paint her portrait again. This time, however, the artists decided not to paint her as a glamorous young monarch, but rather as a much more remote Regal figure, silhouette starkly against an almost abstracted background. As the artist said himself, “I did not want to paint her as a film star, I saw her as a monarch, alone in the problems of her responsibility,” said the artist of the striking difference.

Jamie Reid

The 1970s saw Punk Rock explode onto the British scene. Anti-establishment and anarchic, Punk challenged everything the previous generation held dear, and its influence was truly global. How ironic then, that one of Punk’s greatest images is Jamie Reid’s famous Sex Pistol’s album cover showing the Queen superimposed across the Union Jack! The figure head of the Establishment being used to subvert itself. To this day, it is one of the most influential images of the Queen of all time.

Andy Warhol

In 1985, the king of Pop Art Andy Warhol, produced his Reigning Queen’s portfolio of prints – a set of 16 portraits of the world’s four reigning Queens – Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, Queen Beatrix of The Netherlands, Queen Ntombi Twala of Swaziland and of course, our Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom.

Warhol chose to depict these female monarchs, as powerful matriarchs – queens who ruled in their own right and were not queens through marriage. These portraits represent independent female authority, a different view on femininity in comparison to Warhol’s portraits of the likes of Marilyn Monroe and Billy Boy.

Lucien Freud

In 2001 one of Britain’s greatest living painters, Lucien Freud, painted his tiny but highly controversial portraits of the Queen. Originally meant to depict the Queen informally without a crown or tiara, Freud had to subsequently expand the canvas by 3.5cm when he decided to include the 1820 Diamond Diadem! Without doubt the most controversial
of all the Queen’s portraits, this tiny work has divided audiences since it was first exhibited. Whilst certainly not one of her Majesty’s most flattering portraits, the way that Freud has disregarded the entire tradition of Royal portraits is certainly unique.

Alison Jackson

Whatever next – the Queen taking selfies?! Well not quite! This faux royal family selfie is the work of Alison Jackson, a British photographer who has made her reputation creating convincing personal photos of intimate moments experienced by British celebrities using look alike actors. Alison Jackson’s genius lies in her ability to cast convincing doppelganger actors in the role of her famous sitters in entirely convincing, yet fake situations. One can only guess that Her Majesty must get a kick out of such fun…..the Queen as a social media savvy influencer monarch!

Chris Levine

In 2004, British artist Chris Levine created what can only be described as a modern classic when he produced his, Lightness of Being portrait of the Queen. The work which he produced in various formats, shows the Queen beautifully dressed in white fur and pearls, wearing the 1820 Diamond Diadem. However, what is disarming about the image is that the Queen is depicted with her eyes closed in contemplation.

The artist explained how the image came about, “I wanted the Queen to feel peaceful, so I asked her to rest between shots; this was a moment of stillness that just happened.” The resulting image is indeed peaceful and calm, yet it is also full of gravity and power – a monarch who has reigned over us for 70 years.

Constable at the V&A

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Last month I was given the most wonderful treat. I started my morning in the V&A picture rooms, looking at the Turners and Constables in the Sheepshank Bequest. How his descendants must hate his philanthropy; there are hundreds of millions of pounds worth of paintings hanging there.

Then I moved on to the Isabel Constable Bequest. Isabel was the last surviving child of John Constable and in September 1888 gifted the residual contents of her father’s studio to the Museum. There are 395 oil paintings, sketches, drawings, watercolours and sketchbooks in the bequest, of which a mere twenty odd were on view.

However, I had the good fortune to be taken behind the scenes to the secure lock-up, where the others are stored, by Emily Knight, daughter of my old friend Richard Knight (ex-head of Old Masters at Christie’s, London), who curates these treasures for the Museum.

I am particularly interested in Constable’s oil sketches, most of which were painted out of doors and many inscribed with a specific date and time of day, revealing much about his working practices. Here I was, backstage, taking them off the racks and holding them in my hands for a closer look. I have done this sort of thing before, so they were perfectly safe! Nevertheless, to be holding such precious objects in my hands was a great privilege. Sketches by constable can make seven figure sums these days.

Oil sketches were not always so precious, well not in commercial terms anyway. Constable never sold any, but he had been sketching in oil from around 1802, for example “Dedham Vale: Evening” when he was 27 and was particularly active from 1808 onwards. In his lifetime they were not considered independent works of art, by John Constable or any of his contemporaries, but formed a database of scenes he felt worthy of recording, which might be used as inspiration for large easel pictures in the future. He was an inveterate recorder of things around him and travelled with a large and small sketchbook and pencil everywhere he went, even on honeymoon! He is famous for saying that he never saw an ugly thing in nature and no man has ever devoted his life to portraying the landscape of his childhood with as much passion and brilliance as John Constable did. Indeed, it is the brilliance of these vivacious and spontaneous oil sketches dashed off on card, paper, strips of canvas, wood, or whatever came to hand, that chimes so well with modern taste. When trying to catch the play of light, as a rainstorm passes over the sea, as in “Weymouth Bay” of 1816, Constable does not have time to conform to the painting style of his own age, as a result of which, his oil sketches are timeless.

A selection of these dynamic little paintings is about to leave for an exhibition in Romania and then on to further venues in Eastern Europe. I was glad to have the chance to see them before they go and wish them bon voyage.

Marilyn Monroe – Shot Sage Blue Marilyn

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She was THE film star of her day, and at the auction on 9th May 2022 at Christie’s New York, she proved that her star power was as strong as ever!

In under four minutes of bidding, Andy Warhol’s 1964 painting of Marilyn Monroe, Shot Sage Blue Marilyn, sold for $195,000,000 to an unknown buyer, making it the highest price achieved for any American work of art at auction – comfortably beating the world record of $110,500,000 that Basquiat’s Untitled, 1982 made at a Sotheby’s auction in New York in 2017.

Described as ‘the most significant 20th-century painting to come to auction in a generation’, Shot Sage Blue Marilyn is one of only 5 works Warhol produced in this series – each in different colour variations.

The paintings were stored at The Factory, his studio on East 47th Street, Manhattan. It was here that the artist, Dorothy Podber, stopped by and asked Warhol if she could “shoot” them. Presuming she meant with a camera, he said yes, but instead she pulled out a revolver and shot all but the turquoise print in the forehead! Warhol had the four paintings restored and they became known as the “Shot Marilyns.”

The work was the undoubted and much-anticipated star lot of the Christie’s Monday sale, which itself kicked off New York’s spring season of mega auctions. As such, it was always going to attract huge interest, eventually selling to Larry Gagosian for an undisclosed client.

The sale itself was made up of 36 lots consigned from the estate of the legendary Swiss dealers Thomas and Doris Ammann, with all of the proceeds going toward their foundation, which supports health care and educational programs for children. Interestingly and very old school in approach, none of the works were backed by financial guarantees, which is a system whereby the auction houses provide sellers with a minimum price at which a third party or the auction house has committed to purchase the work even if it fails to sell on the day.

Perhaps a risky approach one might think, however, after 2 years of pent-up demand from collectors, and with huge amounts of money sloshing around, and with such star works on offer, it was a risk well worth taking, with the overall sale achieving $318,000,000 for the Ammann charitable foundation. Lucky them!

It all goes to show that quality will always win out, and the best works will always achieve the strongest prices. That said, having Marilyn on your side can’t hurt either!

Drama of Light and Land: The Martyn Gregory Collection of British Art

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For the second time in two years, a good friend of mine has offered a portion of his stock for sale at one of the major London Auction Houses.

Last time around it was Rafael Valls at Sotheby’s, consigning Old Master oil paintings. I need not have fretted, all but 2 sold, but this time, it was Martyn Gregory offering British watercolours at Christie’s, a far more challenging proposition.

There are several reasons why watercolours do not chime with modern taste. The first is their fragility. We now know that light comes in particles and waves. We have always known that it generates heat and it fades watercolour pigments, if it hits them directly. This can take just a matter of a few years. They are also susceptible to attack from silverfish, if they are coated in Gum Arabic, the substance which made Osama Bin Laden’s family fortune, you may remember, and which was much used in the 19th Century by watercolourists to give depth to the colours. Silverfish love to eat Gum Arabic and when they do, it takes the pigment with it, leaving blank squiggles across the paper!

Watercolours are often painted on acidic paper and this can discolour and damage the pigments too. Furthermore, the big exhibition ‘machines’, the enormous watercolours ‘finished’ to a high degree, which the O.W.S. (Old Watercolour Society) and others produced in the early 19th Century, with a view to them holding their own, visually, when hung in exhibitions next to oil paintings, are totally out of fashion.

This is the background against which Martyn Gregory’s British Landscapes were offered. Christie’s were confident the sale would succeed and to sell 149 out of 194 lots proves them to be right. However, a closer analysis of what happened is revealing. The sale total was £559,864 including buyers’ premium, which adds nearly 34% to the hammer price. The lots averaged out at just over £3,700 each. When I was at Bonhams 10 years ago, we calculated that any lot selling for under £10,000 lost us money. (In this sale only 14 lots hit this threshold and that is including premiums) It must be the same for Christie’s. We can only speculate that they hope to get the rest of his stock in due course!

The landscapes that appealed most were wild places with dramatic stormy skies or lowering cloudy sunsets or both. The first 5 to exceed £10,000 were all Scottish scenes. Lot 5, the Turner of Oxford of Loch Torridon under a moody dawn sky was a very impressive example of this genre, as was his Sunset over Loch Coruisk on the Isle of Skye.

There was a classic harvesting scene by de Wint, painted on a warm late summer day at £15,000 and a fascinating and rare whaling scene in the Arctic by John Cleveley which made £20,000. However, despite these watercolours being well-chosen examples, in good condition, selected by an expert with a very good eye and promoted by the Christie’s International publicity machine, one came away with the feeling that British Watercolours, which were so sought after by collectors in previous decades, are somewhat passé.

In real terms most are worth a tenth of what they were 50 years ago. When will it be time for their re-assessment?

London Art Business Conference Report

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Jonathan Horwich at the London Art Business Conference

Jonathan Horwich, Modern & Contemporary specialist reports on the London Art Business Conference, 25 March 2002.

The scene was set as I entered the Gothic gateway into Deans Yard, behind me was Westminster Abbey and opening out in front of me was Westminster School to my left and in the air Westminster Abbey choir practising for the Duke of Edinburgh’s Memorial service for the following week. It felt and sounded a bit like a scene from a Harry Potter film as I walked up to the Church House were, after two years, finally we’re all back together again enjoying some proper face to face communication, which is so important in the Art world.

On arrival I bumped into Melanie Gerlis, the conference chair who is a powerhouse presenter and well able to hold the attention of a room full of noisy Art professionals. Melanie gave the opening address which was followed by a panel discussion on Sustainability and the Art World. The panel included Chris Bentley from AXA, speaking about sustainably insuring art in transit; Tom Woolston from Christie’s spoke about his firm’s 10 years to net zero programme. Imogen Prus from shippers Convelio spoke about new materials and methods of shipping and their plans to reduce the use of air transport. Lastly Cliodhna Murphy the Director of sustainability at International Contemporary Art dealers.

Hauser and Wirth spoke about their plans to reduce the galleries carbon footprint.

Louisa Buck from the Art Newspaper was moderating the discussions which focussed on reducing air travel which is the most significant and heavy polluter. The aim is to try and reduce movement of art by air, the majority of which is for auctions and travelling exhibitions, while at the same time not depressing the market. It’s a hard trick to pull off, there were discussions about moving art by sea container which comes with its own difficulties. The captain of the ship has the right to move or worse remove any container on board even if it is full of valuable pictures. However, I think we can look forward confidently to significant changes in sustainability for shipping in the art world going forward.

This was followed by an inspiring all-female discussion panel outlining just how extraordinarily quickly the African Contemporary Art market has moved up in value in very recent years, up 44% since 2020! particularly at Sotheby’s who only began selling in this category in 2016 following the arrival of the extraordinarily hard working and dedicated specialist, Hannah O’Leary. Not only is she running Sotheby’s very successful auctions in this category but she is also traveling the world, leading fundraising initiatives across Africa & Europe to enable artists to have access to safe living and studio accommodation, so they can just focus on making art.

Our next panel was also an all-female panel discussion on ‘women innovating in art’ with new tech. and finance. Stacie McCormack talked about her App, FairartFair, which enables you to buy art direct online via virtual exhibitions and studios tours all at very reasonable prices with no commission, it’s an amazing App. which is continuously evolving.

Anna Lowe of Smartify was a very inspiring speaker, she set up the app Smartify from scratch, the app allows you to take a photograph of any work of art in any museum and it will instantly identify the piece and give you the artists name and work details whatever and wherever it is in the world you’re looking at… the app was developed hand in hand with all the museums cooperation so they have embraced the idea and are moving away from earphone headset guides that you have to hand in at the end of your tour.

Smartify enables you to know what you are looking at and retains the art you saw on every trip so when you get home you can share the images and details in all the usual ways from any trip. The museum can use the App to see how popular their museum is in real time and also which are their exhibits are the most popular. I spoke to Anna later and she told me she is looking for new investment for the expansion of Smartify.

Rebecca Fine told us about her business, Athena Finance, they loan against owned art in order to allow owners to have liquidity on demand.

The final panel discussion on NFT’s was another fascinating session, with a strong cross-section of panel members including Xin Li-Cohen (founder of TR Lab, an NFT portal)

Alex Estorick (founder, right-click-save) who for some inexplicable reason had shaved his head and was wearing a bright green freebee tennis sweat band) Joe Kennedy (Unit London) and Brendan Dawes (NFT artist).

Alex’s presentation was an extraordinary tour de force, his app ‘right click save’ really led us through the pluses and minuses of NFT’s and his depth of knowledge and grasp of the details was quite extraordinary.

Joe Kennedy of unit London similarly is involved in NFT’s and was a contrast to Alex in his description and very engaging. Brendan Dawes the NFT artist was a revelation, he told us that as an artist, NFT’s have absolutely transformed his life, he was no longer thinking how to pay his bills, he was now very comfortably off, making art and engaging with his collectors, often one-to-one through the website ‘discord’ that enables collectors to communicate directly with Brendan and other NFT artist. He did say that it sometimes can be quite exhausting but stimulating, after an hour with 1000 voices asking you questions you really need a lie down!

Xin Li-Cohen (TR Lab) was personally involved in advising Chinese clients on the record breaking $69 million sale of Beeple’s NFT ‘5,000 days’ sold at Christie’s New York in 2021. She founded TR lab after the auction to sell NFT’s. Brendan Dawes is one of TR Lab’s top artists.

The NFT and Contemporary African art panels were highlights for me, however the whole event was wonderfully run and gave out very positive vibes confirming that the Art World is busy getting back to normal…

What is an NFT?

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Will they stand the test of time? Non-fungible tokens explained.

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) seem to have come out of nowhere, however the technology has been around since at least 2014 if not before. The catalyst seems to have been Lockdown, if you can’t go to the saleroom then let the saleroom come to you, albeit virtually. Auctioneers, Galleries and Artists transformed their web presence almost overnight in order to offer NFTs that take the form of art and music and everything in between and are selling like hotcakes, some for a few £ and others for millions and millions of £, sometimes it feels like ‘Tulip Fever’ has re-visited us from the 17th-century…

What is an NFT?
An NFT is a digital asset recorded on the ‘Blockchain’ that represents actual objects such as art, music, in-game items and videos. An NFT is created, or “minted” from digital objects that represent both tangible and intangible items. They are bought and sold online, mainly using cryptocurrencies and are generally encoded with the same or similar software to that used by many crypto currencies. I think it’s best to assume that to be involved with buying NFTs you will have to embrace crypto currencies, the most common one used in NFTs is Ethereum. The value of Crypto currencies changes minute to minute day to day, before Christmas one Etheruem was worth around £3,000 to 1 Ethereum today its down to nearer to £2,200 to E1. Ethereum’s value is not only affected by the usual world events and demand but also by the sale of significant numbers of NFTs. Just like the Stock market, a collector offloading significant numbers of NFT’s creates downward price pressure on both crypto currency and the value of NFTs.

New NFTs are announced as ‘Drops’ and are either unique one off pieces or part of a limited edition exactly like limited edition prints, which interestingly were all the rage exactly 100 years ago back in 1922!
NFT ‘editions’ can be one off unique works or one from of a very limited run, large or small and each will have a unique identifying codes or features. Similar to Banksy print editions that are produced in total numbers of either 150 or 500, each print is individually numbered and carries formal certification and the ownerships changes are recorded, the smaller edition of 150 is also signed, typically numbered by hand in pencil, 7/150 the larger 150/500 etc.

What does fungible mean?
Physical money and cryptocurrencies are “fungible,” meaning they can be traded or exchanged for one another. For example I give you a fiver you give me one back and we are quits, i.e. they are fungible and equal in value – one dollar is always worth another dollar; one Bitcoin is always equal to another Bitcoin. Crypto’s fungibility makes it a trusted means of conducting transactions on the Blockchain.

What is Blockchain?
NFTs exist on a blockchain, which is a public ledger that records transactions and ownership. If you are already familiar with Crypto currency then blockchain is the same underlying process that makes cryptocurrencies possible.

Specifically, NFTs are typically held on the Ethereum blockchain, although there are other blockchains that support them as well.

Each individual unique NFT is different. Each one has a digital signature that makes it impossible for NFTs to be exchanged for or equal to one another (hence, non-fungible).
NFTs can have only ever have one owner at a time their unique data verifies their ownership and transfers ownership to new owners and artists can sign their artwork by including their signature in an NFT’s metadata.

Are NFTs here to stay?
I think yes, and they offer new opportunities and life enhancements. For example artists can now cut out the gallery and sell direct to the public and also engage with them face to face and online. Owners form communities who join together to discuss the artists they collect and follow. The discussions are not just about money, the NFT is very inclusive and no longer the exclusive domain of the mega wealthy collector and in buying NFT’s you support artists and get the inside track on the latest news and drops.
Also its all virtual you don’t have to worry about where to hang your piece, it lives in the secure ‘wallet’ on your phone and you can look at it anytime you like.

Who are the big names in NFT’s and why do collectors spend such huge sums of money on them?
The most famous and valuable digital artist is Mike Winklemann, better known as “Beeple” he made a composite of 5,000 daily drawings he made over five years to create perhaps the most famous NFT of the moment, “EVERYDAYS: The First 5000 Days,” which sold at Christies New York in March 2021 for £69 million. However you don’t have to own the Beeple NFT to see it, anyone can view the individual images—or even the entire collage of images online for free. So why are people willing to spend millions on something they could easily screenshot or download?
Owning the NFT allows the buyer to own the original item. Blockchain offers authentication and provenance which offers proof of ownership.
Artists can also program in future royalties so they can receive a percentage of sales whenever their art is sold to a new owner. This is an attractive feature for artists as generally they don’t always receive future proceeds after their art is first sold.

How do I Buy NFTs
First, you’ll need to get a digital wallet that allows you to store your new NFTs and cryptocurrencies. You’ll need to purchase some cryptocurrency like Ethereum, which you can buy using a credit card on platforms such as Coinbase, Kraken, eToro and PayPal. There will be fees so watch out for these, most exchanges charge a percentage of your transaction when you buy crypto.
Once you’ve got your wallet set up and funded, you are good to go. Currently, the largest NFT marketplaces are:

  •  OpenSea.io
  •  Rarible
  •  Foundation

These platforms are host to thousands of NFT creators and collectors, equally you can also go to auction as all the main International auction houses now have fully staffed departments dealing only with NFT’s with private and regular auctions and ‘Drops’. Also the bigger galleries such as Pace now have a separate NFT department.

Should I buy NFTs?
NFTs are risky because there is no discernible secondary market as yet and so there are no comparable secondary sale prices that you might be looking at if collecting mainstream art. It’s all just so new, so maybe it’s worth just dipping your toe in the water and go for individual artists selling direct like ‘Waxbones’ via the site knownorigin.io. I was very impressed when I heard him on Radio 4 recently, as he says himself ‘I design information and wayfinding for cities by day and expel my creative juices under the alias ‘Waxbones’. by night.. his prices start at around £300 for his limited editions.

Buying NFTs must be a personal decision and only if you have money to spare and remember that the value is based entirely on what someone else is willing to pay for it. An NFT when it comes to resale may go for less than you paid for it, or you might not be able to sell it at all if nobody wants it.

I heard a collector speaking on the radio recently, he owns 15 NFT’s which he has bought as part of his broader investment portfolio, he has valued them all at £O! This way as he says ‘the only way is up’!

There lots to study and see out there on NFTs so take a good look around and enjoy!



Love is in the

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Nothing says I Love You more on Valentine’s Day than a big red heart – so if you’re the romantic type with deep pockets and a love of Urban art, why don’t you pop down to Sotheby’s on 2nd March and buy a belated Valentine’s gift for your better half?

Robbie Williams, the former Take That singer and one of the UK’s most successful pop star of the past 30 years, has decided to sell three major works by Banksy from his personal collection at Sotheby’s London contemporary sale. No doubt hoping to capitalise on the strong prices original works by Banksy have achieved in the last couple of years, Williams is offering a strong selection of iconic works for sale.

‘These works unite the cultural legacies of two of Britain’s biggest stars: Robbie Williams and Banksy,’ said Hugo Cobb of Sotheby’s. ‘Like their creator and like their owner, they are acerbic, iconic, irreverent and unique.’

The earliest work of the group is a 2002 unique version of Banksy’s famous Girl with Balloon, painted on a metal sheeting. This work is earlier than the infamous 2006 version which was shredded live during a Sotheby’s auction in 2018, and which subsequently sold again last year at Sotheby’s under the new titled of Love is in the Bin, making £18,500,000 – a world record for the artist. The Williams version might not have the notoriety of the shredded work, but its strong rock ‘n roll provenance, and the fact that it is the only version painted on metal to come to auction, will no doubt ensure a strong result. The work is estimated at £2m-3m.

Also up for sale is a 2005 version of Kissing Coppers, which depicts two male British police officers in a passionate embrace.

This image first appeared on the outside wall of the Prince Albert pub in Brighton in 2004 and was a very public demonstration for Banksy’s support for acceptance of homosexuality. The original mural was removed in 2014 after being repeatedly vandalised, but you can buy the Williams version at Sotheby’s, which is estimated at £2.5m-3.5m.

The third and final work being offered is a strong example of Banksy’s Vandalised Oil series, in which Banksy has superimposed a stencil of two military helicopters flying over and disrupting a serene pastoral landscape. It is part of a series of works the artist made in which he superimposes graffiti and stencilled images on top of traditional paintings. Flying Chopper, carries a pre-sale estimate of £2.5m-3.5m, but it will no doubt attract strong interest from buyers.

The three works were available for viewing at Sotheby’s New York between January 22nd-27th, Hong Kong between February 8th-9th, and are now heading back to London for the final public viewing from February 22nd before being sold on 2nd March.

Of course, if your Valentine’s Day budget is a little too modest to allow you to buy the famous big red heart for your loved one, I’m sure a box of chocolates will do just fine!

 

Sir John Lavery and the image of tennis

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2022 is not a year that anyone except the most reclusive could possibly claim not to have heard of the Australian Tennis Open – the high profile legal wranglings between the Australian Government and Novak Djokovic over his entry visa, covid vaccinations and his deportation, have made the already famous sports tournament front page news worldwide. Founded in 1905, the Australian Open, or the ‘happy slam’ as it is affectionately known, is the first of the 4 grand slam tournaments worldwide, which takes place in Melbourne every year. Although it is not the highest paid tournament (the prize money is only A$75m!), the Australian Open is by far the most popular in terms of attendance numbers, with 812,000 spectators attending the 2020 tournament.

Notwithstanding our current fascination with the dramas playing out in Oz, we, the public, have always had a fondness and affection for the game of tennis, one which is totally different to that of other sports, and one which goes back centuries to its origins. The racket sport we now call tennis, is the direct descendant of ‘real’ tennis or ‘royal‘ tennis, which continues to be played today as a separate sport with more complex rules. Most historians believe that tennis originated in the monastic cloisters in northern France in the 12th century, but the ball was then struck with the palm of the hand; hence, the name jeu de paume (game of the palm). It was not until the 16th century when rackets came into use, and the game as we know it emerged. The roots of the game are firmly linked to the royal courts of France and England, with Henry VIII of England being one of the most avid players of his day – his luxurious tennis courts still remain to this day at Hampton Court Palace. In France the sport was so firmly associated with the Court and Nobility that during the Revolution many of the tennis courts we deliberately destroyed as a sign of a new era emerging.

Subliminally these Aristocratic links and associations have remained with us into modern times. Tennis still has the perception of being a genteel sport, one which is played out on immaculate lawns on sunny summer afternoons, with players dressed in immaculate tennis whites. One only has to look at Wimbledon to confirm this – the tournament is so much more than simply a sporting occasion, it has become a firm part of London’s social season, with its Royal Box, champagne, strawberries and cream! Without doubt this image belies the seriousness of the sport, and the huge financials at stake in modern tennis, however, it is also this je ne sais quoi that also adds to its modern success.

Depictions of tennis in western art very much follow the image of tennis as a jolly, social pastime played by the leisured classes and gilded youth. The summer is always eternal, and the player are carefree without a worry in the world! One of the most brilliant and prolific painters of this subject is the Victorian artist Sir John Lavery, who is more usually associated with the glamorous and elegant society portraits he produced throughout his life. Tennis, however, fascinated him and he returned to paint the theme on a number of occasions, producing both informal studies and highly complicated compositions.

One of the earliest depictions is Lavery’s 1885 painting, Played!! which captures the movement and drama of an exciting new sport, as a young woman lunges to return serve. In the early 1880s, Lavery had returned from Paris, where he was studying at the prestigious Academie Julian, and was quickly taken by the game. In the summer of 1885, he visited the home of a friend in the suburbs of Glasgow, where a tennis court had been set up. The painting was inspired by this visit, and marked a new direction for the artist, away from his more usual society portraits towards depictions of ‘modern’ life – no doubt influenced by the Impressionist works he would have seen during his stay in Paris. His choice of the subject and naturalistic portrayal was considered extremely avant-garde at the time. Lawn tennis was then at an interesting stage in its development as a modern sport. It had emerged in the 1870s and had been inaugurated at Wimbledon as recently as 1877, when the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club introduced men’s singles championships. Ladies’ singles and men’s doubles had not been incorporated until 1884. The process by which women arrived on court was a gradual one, then, and mixed doubles matches were yet to come.

Played!! turned out to be a mere prelude to Lavery’s undoubted masterpiece on the subject which painted the same year. The Tennis Party, which is in the collection of the Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museums, is an absolute tour de force of a painting, showing huge sophistication of composition, movement and bravura brushwork. In spite of its apparent spontaneity the picture is not merely an arbitrary slice of life, rather it is highly constructed work aimed at giving the illusion of spontaneity. The depiction of both male and female players in the same game, which seems uneventful to a modern viewer, would have been the height of modernism at the time, where casual, real-time depictions of the opposite sexes cavorting together was very rare at the time.

Throughout his career Lavery, returned often to the subject of tennis, which more than any other sport held his fascination. Although Lavery’s first depictions of tennis might have been painted in Scotland, his later works were increasingly international showing the growing popularity of the sport. The paintings Lavery produced in the first quarter of the 20th century whilst on the French Riviera and in America are some of the most spontaneous and evocative depictions ever produced on the subject. Whether they were painted at the famous courts at the Hôtel Beau Site in Cannes – then ‘the’ place to go for well healed British holiday makers, or at the courts of the Breakers Hotel in Florida or in the private residences of Palm Beach, these paintings have a freshness and sense of movement which still have the power mesmerise to this day.

Lavery’s 1885 The Tennis Party remains, however, his most accomplished and monumental depiction of the sport, an image which, more than any other artwork has influenced our vision of what we feel tennis ‘should’ be, and it remains to this day the quintessential image of the sport.

 

 

Reflections on The Old Master Sales

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“There are too many auctions and not enough collectors”, that is how Scott Reyburn’s article in the Art Newspaper in December 2021 began. It makes rather gloomy reading for any fan of Old Masters, but it is, sadly, the truth. Sotheby’s and Christie’s sales were down 20% on the year before the pandemic (2019). If a good Old Master in excellent state comes on to the market after an absence of several decades, it will make a strong price but there are simply not enough of them.

For those of you lucky enough to have come to our champagne private view at Bonhams, you might be interested to hear what happened to the paintings we examined there. The beautiful unlined, unrestored Lawrence of Jane Allnutt with her spaniel made £150,000 hammer, which I think is less than it deserved. The early Turner watercolour of North Wales, painted in rather muted tones made £40,000 which was twice the bottom estimate. The famous racehorse, Flying Childers, however, did not fly and is still under starter’s orders.

Rather than dwell on what were basically mediocre paintings making mediocre prices, I’d like to draw your attention to a couple of surprises. There was a very fine portrait of a man attributed to Frans Hals by Sotheby’s, which they offered with a very cagey estimate of £80,000-£120,000. The reason for their caution was that the two main experts on Frans Hals disagreed about its authenticity and the more recent of the scholars suggested it was by his son.

Not knowing what his son’s work looks like, I thought it looked like Frans himself. I was not alone in this as it made £1.95 million!

Sotheby’s also had, like Bonhams, an early Turner, theirs too was also Welsh, but this one was in oil and South Walian. It was a view of Cilgerran Castle dated 1799 and made £1 million against an estimate of £300,000-£500,000 proving once again the magic of the Turner name. The Constables on offer had a more varied outcome mostly due to the erratic estimating.
I am into my 6th decade of looking at Old Masters professionally and I am feeling the icy blast of change. The storm of interest in NFTs is going to have a detrimental effect on the way all collectors perceive art. The young are tech-savvy and non-materialistic, so is there a subtler way of collecting than virtually? Will the virtual supersede the real?