Irish art market marched on in 2020 despite postponements

Stalwarts like Paul Henry, Yeats, le Brocquy, Lavery,  O'Neill and Scott have performed very well, as have contemporary artists

'A Sunny Day, Connemara' sold for a world record hammer price of €420,000 at Whyte's.

Postponements, deferrals, re-scheduling and last-minute cancellations failed to stop the onward march of the Irish art market in 2020.

It has not been a bad year at all and the omens on the home front are good for major upcoming sales of Irish art by Morgan O'Driscoll, Whyte's, de Veres and James Adam.

Stalwarts like Yeats, le Brocquy, Lavery, Dan O'Neill and William Scott have performed very well and so have the more contemporary range of Irish artists like Sean Scully, John Shinnors, Donald Teskey, Rowan Gillespie and John Behan, to name but a few.

Many difficulties presented themselves and were mostly overcome. After Dublin went into lockdown, Whyte's was forced at short notice to defer a sale of Important Irish art scheduled to take place at the RDS at the end of September. 

Cancellations like this are distressing because catalogues have been printed and everything is set up. 

When it went ahead at first opportunity three weeks later it turned out that the postponement did not affect the outcome in the slightest.

The sale brought in a total of €1.6 million and a new world record for Paul Henry. A Sunny Day, Connemara, estimated at €150,000-200,000 made a hammer price of €420,000. 

Even though this 1940 work is relatively small it was particularly loved by the artist, who selected it to be reproduced on the dust jacket of his autobiography An Irish Portrait published in 1951 with an introduction by Sean O Faolain. 

A stained-glass panel from the Harry Clarke studio sold for €36,000 on the hammer over an estimate of €3,000-€5,000 at the same auction.

There was a similar story for Deep Blues by William Scott which sold for £837,800 at Sotheby's earlier this month. 

It was a highlight of the Patrick Kelly - 44 Fitzwilliam Square collection which was to have been sold on March 18, just as Covid-19 really began to bite in this part of the globe. 

The sale, which had been heavily promoted, was cancelled. The fact that it eventually took place in the midst of some pretty severe London restrictions did not adversely affect the outcome in the least. 

The top estimate on the Scott was £500,000 and the Kelly Collection, which included four works by Yeats as well as Georgian and Regency furniture, brought in £3.36 million over a reserve of just over £2 million.

Meantime Morgan O'Driscoll had a €2 million online sale of Irish and International art at the end of October. 

An Irish collector snapped up Andy Warhol's portraits of Mohammed Ali for €210,000 at Morgan O'Driscoll's major autumn sale.

The top lot, Andy Warhol's portraits of Mohammed Ali, went to an Irish collector who paid €210,000 at hammer. Summer by Dan O'Neill sold for €125,000 at hammer.

At James Adam in September Paul Henry's Hay Stooks with Cottages made €100,000 and an Aubusson Tapestry called Ucello by Louis le Brocquy was sold for €65,000 at hammer. 

Both these prices were considerably higher than the upper estimates.

Irish art buyers have proved themselves as adaptable to online only sales as have people anywhere else. Online sales have also delivered new buyers from the UK, the US and Europe in a market that seems ripe for expansion.

Morgan O'Driscoll's Irish art online auction runs until next Monday evening. There is plenty here to whet the appetite of an avid collector. 

The most expensively estimated lot is a 1979 oil on canvas by William Scott. Jug is estimated at €80,000-120,000. 

The sale offers a selection of highly collectible works by artists like Jack B. Yeats, Paul Henry, Donald Teskey, Dan O'Neill, John Shinnors, Gerard Dillon, Robert Ballagh and many more.

The selection at Whyte's on December 7 includes work by artists Walter Osborne, William Orpen, Jack Yeats, George Russell, William Conor, Maurice McGonigal, Tony O'Malley, Gerard Dillon, Louis le Brocquy, Kenneth Webb and Mark Francis.

Untitled by Sean Scully comes up at de Veres in December with an estimate of €80,000-€120,000.

Also in Dublin de Veres say that their art auction on the following evening is a sale of major quality which includes important works by William Scott, Roderic O'Conor, Paul Henry, Jack Yeats, Sean Scully, Louis le Broquy and Hughie O'Donoghue. 

The 1946 Scott Still Life in this sale is estimated at €200,000-€300,000.

The Important Irish Art sale at James Adam on December 9 will offer 150 lots of painting and sculpture. 

Adam's promise that there is something for every taste and most pockets. 

The catalogue cover lot is Walter Osborne's Loiterers, painted in 1888 and comes with an estimate of around €40,000. 

Sleep by Falling Water by Jack Yeats is a large and colourful work which dates to 1948. 

It is estimated at around €150,000 and the National Gallery of Ireland hopes to include it in their major Yeats exhibition next year to honour the 150th anniversary of the birth of the artist.