As reported here, Art + Object recently held a ''big ticket Item'' sale breaking a whole lot of auction records with the two day dispersal of the Tim and Sherrah Francis Collection. So it was logical that any kind of follow-up sale would be of a slightly smaller size and scale.
The 577 lot New Collectors Art and Decorative Arts sale held by Art + Object in Auckland on 4 and 5 October was indeed just that, precipitating lots of action, lots of new faces, and lots of happy punters.
Of the 264 lots offered in the art section of the catalogue on the first day, a number were from established collections, but on a more humble scale than the Francis Collection, and often on a smaller scale.
Top price on the night was a large Hemisphere painting of Gretchen Albrecht, Plume Red, (Lot 63 ) which sold subject to vendor confirmation at $20,000, while a strong and powerful untitled work by the late Chinese / Maori artist Buck Nin from his Rongopai Series (Lot 72 ) sold well at $16,000, just below the upper estimate of $18,000.
A classic Gavin Hurley oil on canvas entitled Maman ll (Lot 12 ) sold for $11,000 while a Dick Frizzell painting entitled White House (Lot 21 ) from 2002 sold for $10,000, right on the upper estimate.
Serious excitement was generated when a modest untitled nude study from 1977 (Lot 172 ) by Doris Lusk, the subject of a long overdue retrospective exhibition was offered. Expected to realise between $800 to $1,500 the bidding reached $5,400, while the next lot another untitled nude study by Terry Stringer (Lot 173 ) from 1978 only realised $300
A small but diverse photographic section of 20 works had few spectacular results. The haunting back and front catalogue cover illustrations, a limited edition work of Yvonne Todd entitled Female Study (gold) (Lot 79 ) was passed in, which is most unusual for this artist.
Another important work that failed to find a new home was a colour linocut from 1932, Joseph & Nicodemus, (Lot 44 ) by Sybil Andrews from the Prior collection, which was passed in at $4,000, well below the low estimate of $9,000
In the small sculpture section of 10 works, plenty of interest was generated when a bronze entitled Vivian Dog, (Lot 136 ) estimated at $5,000 – 8,000 by artist and ex art dealer Barry Lett went under the hammer. Clearly a number of collectors wanted to take this medium sized canine sculpture home with them and one lucky punter did, with a hammer price of $10,000 being achieved.
Day 2 of the sale featured collections of Pop Art, Tribal Art, Ceramics, Glass and Modern Design and was headlined by another figure of a dog, this time by the recently deceased Coromandel potter, conservationist and engineer Barry Brickell.
Having seen one from the same Coromandel ''kennel'' sold at Cordy's Auction less than three months ago for a record $17,500 I was expecting some real action when this wonderful amalgam of dog and boiler went under the hammer.
Dogomotive 2 failed to set the room alight realising only $3,600, and for a dog with that pedigree it was the bargain of the night. A good early salt glazed ribbed vase by Len Castle sold well over the top estimate of $2,000 on the night selling for $5,000
The two day sale sold around $500,000 worth of art and objects which is not too bad considering the recent series of three major art sales by Auckland's auction houses has generated over $10,000,000 worth of revenue for vendors and collectors.
Not bad eh, considering our human population over here is around 4.5 million while our population of sheep is estimated at to be around 30 million and declining, and the dairy and beef cattle population is around 10 million and rising...
All prices shown are in $NZ.
