Jack B Yeats and Gerard Dillon works in the picture in London

A feast of Irish art will be celebrated at Sotheby's this month at the modern British and Irish art sale

'The Fisherman's Cottage' by Gerard Dillon at Sotheby's.

A feast of Irish art will be celebrated at Sotheby's this month. Jack B Yeats and Gerard Dillon will headline the Irish side of the modern British and Irish art sale in London on November 23.

An online sale of Irish art at Sotheby's from next Wednesday will run until Tuesday, November 22, and a selection from these sales is on view at the RHA in Dublin this weekend.

The introduction of relatively unknown Irish artists to the world and important rediscoveries like The Fisherman's Cottage by Gerard Dillon combine to offer an important shot in the arm.

'Going to the Races' by Jack B. Yeats at Sotheby's.

The global reach of Sotheby's, the Irish diaspora, the fact that art lovers everywhere will find these sales relatively affordable compared to the stratospheric prices now achieved at the top of the international market, the presence in the catalogue of feted British artists like Barbara Hepworth, LS Lowry and William Nicholson and the support of an international marketing campaign make this November a very good month indeed for Irish art and artists.

There is much more than a sense of onwards and upwards at play. The two atmospheric early Yeats oils

Going to the Races,

1917, and

Sunday Morning,

 1921, and the fantastic rediscovery of

The Fisherman's Cottage,

a c1950, Dillon, from a private collection, have a combined value of £430,000-£670,000 (€495,000-€772,000). 

'The Settlers' by Rowan Gillespie at Sotheby's online sale.

Dillon's first encounter with Connemara in 1939 was a revelatory moment and this painting, set on Inishlacken looking across to Roundstone, ranks among the finest examples of his portrayals of the west of Ireland.

It is impossible not to be enthusiastic about the 74 diverse lots in an online sale with a range of paintings, drawings and sculpture from the 19th century to the present day. The combined estimate is €816,500-€1,231,600. There is a Gerard Dillon  ( Village on the Hill), a lively Paul Henry ( The Entrance to Killary Bay), John Lavery's last painting ( Gypsies in Ireland) and Last Bastion of the Old Theatre Royal by Harry Kernoff. This second Theatre Royal closed its doors in 1934 and was demolished soon after. 

There are 18 works from the collection of the late Irish American Brian P Burns, who amassed one of the greatest collections of Irish art in private hands.

'Glengarriff from the Kenmare Road, Evening', 1862 by William McEvoy from the Brian P Burns Collection at Sotheby's.

Contemporary artists and sculptors represented include Rowan Gillespie, Linda Brunker, John Behan, Patrick O'Reilly, Maser, Joy Gerrard, Diana Copperwhite, Richard Hearn, Blaise Smith and Melissa O'Flaherty and there are early works by Erskine Nicol and James Arthur O'Connor.

There will be artists' talks at the RHA at noon today by John Behan, Melissa O'Flaherty and Maser and at noon tomorrow by Diana Copperwhite, Richard Hearn and Blaise Smith.