Orpheus (Marquette 1) by Dame Barbara Hepworth
On Wednesday, June 18th, Bonham’s hosted one of their sales of modern British and Irish art at their London location on New Bond Street. The auction consisted of seventy-four paintings, sculptures, and other artworks by a variety of artists, including Henry Moore, Laurence Stephen Lowry, and Lynn Chadwick.
Wednesday’s top lot ended up being a 1956 work by the British modernist sculptor Dame Barbara Hepworth. The artist created Orpheus (Marquette 1) during a particularly significant year, as this was when Hepworth decided to begin working with metals again. Previously, she had worked exclusively with stone and wood. However, the brass elements of Orpheus (Marquette 1) were not cast specially for the sculpture. Hepworth employed a technique called cold rolling, where wooden implements are run over the brass pieces, causing them to curl in the desired fashion. The work is also notable for its use of strings, which are tied to the edges of the metal and cross one another in a mesmerizing design. Hepworth would make great use of such techniques in her work throughout the mid- to late 1950s. The work offered at Bonham’s is numbered three of eight. The house specialists initially expected the sculpture to sell for no more than £600K. Orpheus (Maquette 1) would exceed this estimate, hammering at £750K / $1 million (or £952.9K / $1.28 million w/p).
E.O.W. Lying on her Bed I by Frank Auerbach
Following the Hepworth was Frank Auerbach’s 1958 oil painting E.O.W. Lying on her Bed I. The work has only been exhibited once, shortly after its creation, and has been in the same private collection since leaving Auerbach’s studio. The work is considered a study for his 1959 painting E.O.W. Nude on Bed, a painting once owned by Jean Chrysler and was later acquired by the Muscarelle Museum of Williamsburg, Virginia. The titular E.O.W. is Estella West, a model with whom Auerbach worked extensively throughout his career and featured in around seventy of his paintings. The panel Auerbach used is narrow and rough, almost like a floorboard blank. The paint is also heavily applied with a thick impasto, yet the shape of a nude woman with her knees tucked in is very clear. Bonhams expected the study to sell for no more than £180K. However, with the work’s rarity and the opportunity it offers to gain insight into Auerbach’s process, E.O.W. Lying on her Bed I sold far above this number, reaching not quite double the high estimate at £320K / $430.2K (or £406.8K / $546.9K w/p).
Roses & Knitting by Sir William Nicholson
And finally, in third place was a more traditional still-life painting by Sir William Nicholson. I’ve mentioned the artist’s work previously, namely when his painting The Lustre Bowl sold at Christie’s for £950K / $1.2 million hammer, over five times its high estimate. In doing so, it became the second most expensive painting by Nicholson to sell at auction. The painting offered at Bonhams, Roses & Knitting, was created around 1928 and was last offered at auction in 1983. The work’s first owner, Marie Tempest, purchased the painting during the artist’s 1929 solo show at the Beaux Arts Gallery. Tempest and Nicholson were friends, with Nicholson designing some of her costumes for the stage. It is the only painting of Nicholson’s that includes knitting needles, with Tempest being drawn to the work due to her love of embroidery during her leisure time. It is unknown if Nicholson created the painting, especially for Tempest, but the speculation is nonetheless an exciting detail. Roses & Knitting ended up becoming one of the sale’s surprises, selling for £200K / $268.9K (or £254.4K / $342K w/p) against a high estimate of £100K. The only other major surprise at the sale was Julian Trevelyan’s 1946 painting Dolphin Bay, Tresco. While often associated with the British surrealists, Trevelyan’s work usually displays influence from naive art, depicting scenes of daily life in twentieth-century Britain. The painting offered at Bonhams depicts a day on Tresco, part of the Isles of Scilly, located west of Cornwall. Bonhams predicted the painting to sell for between £7K and £10K. Dolphin Bay, Tresco ended up selling for more than double its high estimate, hammering at £22K / $29.6K (or £28.2K / $37.9K w/p).
Bonhams’ Modern British & Irish sale ended up doing moderately well. Of the seventy-four available lots, twenty-four sold within their estimates, giving Bonhams a 32% accuracy rate. An additional nineteen lots (26%) sold above their estimates, while only six lots (8%) sold below. The remaining twenty-five lots went unsold, resulting in a 66% sell-through rate for the sale. Despite this disappointing figure, the auction performed well in terms of the amount raised compared to the estimate ranges. The auction as a whole generated a total of £2.8 million (or $3.8 million) against a £2.4 million pre-sale total low estimate. Six of the nine lots estimated to sell in excess of £100K sold during the sale. Of those six, four sold above their high estimates, including all three of the top lots. This may account for the discrepancy between the low sell-through rate and the “normal” total.
Bonhams Modern British & Irish Art
Orpheus (Marquette 1) by Dame Barbara Hepworth
On Wednesday, June 18th, Bonham’s hosted one of their sales of modern British and Irish art at their London location on New Bond Street. The auction consisted of seventy-four paintings, sculptures, and other artworks by a variety of artists, including Henry Moore, Laurence Stephen Lowry, and Lynn Chadwick.
Wednesday’s top lot ended up being a 1956 work by the British modernist sculptor Dame Barbara Hepworth. The artist created Orpheus (Marquette 1) during a particularly significant year, as this was when Hepworth decided to begin working with metals again. Previously, she had worked exclusively with stone and wood. However, the brass elements of Orpheus (Marquette 1) were not cast specially for the sculpture. Hepworth employed a technique called cold rolling, where wooden implements are run over the brass pieces, causing them to curl in the desired fashion. The work is also notable for its use of strings, which are tied to the edges of the metal and cross one another in a mesmerizing design. Hepworth would make great use of such techniques in her work throughout the mid- to late 1950s. The work offered at Bonham’s is numbered three of eight. The house specialists initially expected the sculpture to sell for no more than £600K. Orpheus (Maquette 1) would exceed this estimate, hammering at £750K / $1 million (or £952.9K / $1.28 million w/p).
E.O.W. Lying on her Bed I by Frank Auerbach
Following the Hepworth was Frank Auerbach’s 1958 oil painting E.O.W. Lying on her Bed I. The work has only been exhibited once, shortly after its creation, and has been in the same private collection since leaving Auerbach’s studio. The work is considered a study for his 1959 painting E.O.W. Nude on Bed, a painting once owned by Jean Chrysler and was later acquired by the Muscarelle Museum of Williamsburg, Virginia. The titular E.O.W. is Estella West, a model with whom Auerbach worked extensively throughout his career and featured in around seventy of his paintings. The panel Auerbach used is narrow and rough, almost like a floorboard blank. The paint is also heavily applied with a thick impasto, yet the shape of a nude woman with her knees tucked in is very clear. Bonhams expected the study to sell for no more than £180K. However, with the work’s rarity and the opportunity it offers to gain insight into Auerbach’s process, E.O.W. Lying on her Bed I sold far above this number, reaching not quite double the high estimate at £320K / $430.2K (or £406.8K / $546.9K w/p).
Roses & Knitting by Sir William Nicholson
And finally, in third place was a more traditional still-life painting by Sir William Nicholson. I’ve mentioned the artist’s work previously, namely when his painting The Lustre Bowl sold at Christie’s for £950K / $1.2 million hammer, over five times its high estimate. In doing so, it became the second most expensive painting by Nicholson to sell at auction. The painting offered at Bonhams, Roses & Knitting, was created around 1928 and was last offered at auction in 1983. The work’s first owner, Marie Tempest, purchased the painting during the artist’s 1929 solo show at the Beaux Arts Gallery. Tempest and Nicholson were friends, with Nicholson designing some of her costumes for the stage. It is the only painting of Nicholson’s that includes knitting needles, with Tempest being drawn to the work due to her love of embroidery during her leisure time. It is unknown if Nicholson created the painting, especially for Tempest, but the speculation is nonetheless an exciting detail. Roses & Knitting ended up becoming one of the sale’s surprises, selling for £200K / $268.9K (or £254.4K / $342K w/p) against a high estimate of £100K. The only other major surprise at the sale was Julian Trevelyan’s 1946 painting Dolphin Bay, Tresco. While often associated with the British surrealists, Trevelyan’s work usually displays influence from naive art, depicting scenes of daily life in twentieth-century Britain. The painting offered at Bonhams depicts a day on Tresco, part of the Isles of Scilly, located west of Cornwall. Bonhams predicted the painting to sell for between £7K and £10K. Dolphin Bay, Tresco ended up selling for more than double its high estimate, hammering at £22K / $29.6K (or £28.2K / $37.9K w/p).
Bonhams’ Modern British & Irish sale ended up doing moderately well. Of the seventy-four available lots, twenty-four sold within their estimates, giving Bonhams a 32% accuracy rate. An additional nineteen lots (26%) sold above their estimates, while only six lots (8%) sold below. The remaining twenty-five lots went unsold, resulting in a 66% sell-through rate for the sale. Despite this disappointing figure, the auction performed well in terms of the amount raised compared to the estimate ranges. The auction as a whole generated a total of £2.8 million (or $3.8 million) against a £2.4 million pre-sale total low estimate. Six of the nine lots estimated to sell in excess of £100K sold during the sale. Of those six, four sold above their high estimates, including all three of the top lots. This may account for the discrepancy between the low sell-through rate and the “normal” total.