Day two continues with the record breaking impetus for the Francis collection.

By John Perry in Auckland, on 09-Sep-2016

Top prices for Part Two of the Tim and Sherrah Francis Collection in Auckland on 8 September continued with a similar impetus as Part One except for the fact that the tasty raft works on offer in Part Two were more affordable, being smaller works and works on paper.

Off the 98 works on offer, only two ''old fashioned'' 19th century ancestor portraits failed to sell with the vast majority of the other works attracting spirited bidding from another large crowd who had come along, thinking perhaps the sting might have gone out of the tail, but no such luck.

The top price of the evening was for a work from 1975, Drawing, (Lot 173 ) by Christchurch based artist Don Peebles selling for $13,000 followed closely by one of the few works in the collection by Maori artist Selwyn Muru entitled Hone Heke (Lot 163 ) an infamous Maori Chief from the far north, famous for his chopping down the Colonist flagpole in the early 19th century, with a hammer price of $12,750 against a pre sale estimate of $4,000-$6,000.

This was followed closely by Colin McCahon's cubist style lithograph, Kauri Tree (Lot 160 ), originally published by Peter Webb in a small edition of 50 way back in 1956. Normally (if there is such a thing) they usually sell for between $4,000-$6,000 but on the night selling for $12,250.

The small untitled abstract painting by Dennis Knight Turner (Lot 162 ) that started the newly-wed Francis couple on their life-long passion for collecting contemporary New Zealand Art attracted spirited bidding, and sold for $9,000 with a postal bidder prepared to go along way further according to Art + Object auctioneer Ben Plumbly.

A rather curious elaborately framed early work by Fiona Pardington, Great Expectation, (lot166) from 1988 sold well at $10,000 while a small collection of block prints near the end of the fine art section all sold well above the tail-end estimates with Hilda Wiseman's print of a tui (Lot 205 ) sold for $2,000 against a presale estimate of $100-$200

The tail section of the dispersal sale was sub-divided into four parts, three of ceramics and one of books.

Top prices for the New Zealand Historical and Contemporary ceramics section went to a small piece of pottery (lot 255) made in 1926 by the pioneer woman potter Elizabeth Lissaman decorated with dinosaurs amongst foliage. This 160 mm high little pot sold at the upper estimate for $4,000, while a timeless matt white hand potted vase by Ernest Shufflebotham (lot 229) sold for $2,750. A majolica glazed umbrella stand by the 19th century brick maker and potter George Boyd of Newton Potteries Auckland sold for $3700.

In the International Ceramic section, the top price went to an early Hans Coper vase (lot 347) selling for $4,250.

The final section of the sale comprised Asian Ceramics, assembled while Tim and Sherrah Francis were on a diplomatic posting in Singapore, and top price was for a small Chinese tea bowl (lot 377) from the Song Dynasty which sold for $1050

In all just over $6.6 million of mainly 20th & 21st century New Zealand material culture has changed hands in the two day record breaking sale establishing a whole raft of auction records and exceeding the older high water mark that Art & Object created back in September 2012 with the Les and Milly Paris sale of just over $4 million.

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About The Author

John Perry is known locally as a collector / consultant / curator/ educator and artist and is a former director of the Rotorua Museum of Art and History. For the last 20 years has worked as an antique dealer specializing in ''man made and natural curiosities'' from an old art deco cinema on the outskirts of Auckland. Over the last 16 years he has developed a multi million dollar collection of 19th and 20th century artworks for the Rotorua Energy Charitable Trust. He recently donated 120 artworks from his collection in various media to the East Southland Art Gallery in Gore. A committed ''art o holic'' he continues to develop collections of New Zealand and International fine art / folk art / ceramics and photography for future usage in a private/public ARTMUSEEUM of NEWSEELAND, not to be confused with Te Papa Museum of New Zealand.

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