Although I don’t have a copy of the original 1971 IAC first catalogue, I can hazard a guess of what featured – lots of 19th century colonial painting, Hoyte, Blomfield, W.G Baker and probably van der Velden. There could have been a McCahon and some Francis Hodgkins and maybe a Goldie or two. These were the staples of the auction business in the 1970s and 1980s – a time when colonial painting ruled the roost and a painting of a waterfall by a second tier colonial artist would sell for more than a McCahon. The International Art Centre still has the most success of all the auction businesses with traditional painting and their auction catalogue featured some of these old favourites and well as some great examples of later modernism.
One such work was Michael Illingworth’s Mr and Mrs Thomas Piss-Quick (Lot 22 ), a large scale and important painting by the British born New Zealand artist, which held a long-standing auction record after it was sold in 2006 for $160,000 at Webb’s. Illingworth developed specific characters for his figurative paintings and the Piss-Quicks are one of the most well known couples represented in other paintings and drawings, signifying money and wealth without a discerning eye. Although Michael Illingworth is a very important painter, his work doesn’t have the wide appeal of his more sought-after contemporaries, and really good examples are hard to come by. Therefore it was heartening to see multiple bidders compete for the work well over estimate – the bidding started at $250,000 and new bidders entered at $335,000 and $350,000 but in the end a room buyer set a new record when they bid $390,000 for the painting.
The star of the night was a repatriated and previously unrecorded painting by Frances Hodgkins The Rialto, Venice (Lot 49 ), which was painted in 1906 and had spent it’s entire life with the Italian family of the original owner. Unknown to scholars in New Zealand including Frances Hodgkins expert Mary Kisler who compiles the Hodgkins Catalogue Raisonne, the discovery was extremely exciting. The watercolour had fresh colour and would have come up nicely with some minor conservation and a reframe. The composition was amongst Hodgkins most modern at the time, the pose of the solitary female figure in the foreground referencing courtesans in Japanese ukiyo-e prints which had been influential amongst Parisian artists in the late 19th century. The media had been highly excited by the discovery and the work had been well covered in the newspapers in New Zealand and perhaps that contributed to the multiple bidders who turned out to compete for the work including 3 phones, online and a couple of bidders in the room. Bidding opened on the low estimate of $70,000 and a total of 35 bids were placed across all the channels before the work sold to a New Zealand collector at $260,000 to set a new record for a watercolour by the artist, and the third highest price overall for her work.
It has been reported that some of the interest in the Hodgkins came from abroad and such is the power of the internet and the global market we operate in, that clients from all around the world can compete just as easily as being in the room. Vendors of the eight Banksy’s in the sale would have been counting on this global audience, especially as many the examples in this sale weren’t quite as well known as the previous offerings. In past sales it appears there have been just as many local buyers for these works as international ones but in this sale almost all the activity came from the phones and online. Although five of the eight screenprints were sold, some were sold subject and negotiated later or were sold with just one bid. The highest price was for Love is in the Air (Lot 30 ), sold to an online bidder for a swift and efficient click of the mouse at $200,000. Another unsigned edition had been sold in November 2020 by IAC for $255,000 against a flurry of bidding so this result was a noticeable difference. It will be interesting to see whether this trend continues and future Banksy sales bring a similar, more cautious result. By comparison, local buyers fought strongly for a giclee print by another British artist Damien Hirst, Honesty (Lot 38 ). Two room buyers on opposite sides of the room provided a ping-pong match for auctioneer Richard Thomson as they quickly bid from $15,000 straight up to $35,000 without any hesitation. As this print has most recently sold for £5,500 in July 2021, this was a staggering result. The underbidder for this lot was successful in purchasing the second Hirst work Loyalty (Lot 39 ) for $18,000 so they didn’t go home empty-handed.
A quick mention must go to the painting that achieved the highest price in the sale, C. F Goldie’s The Widow (Ngaheke) (Lot 45 ), a beautifully rendered female portrait. In excellent condition, it was well contested by an absentee bidder who left a bid of $550,000 on the sheets, well over the top estimate. The phone bidder stuck with it all the way and was finally rewarded for their patience to secure the work at $555,000.
And what about those works that would have been right at home in the 1971 inaugural catalogue? Well there weren’t as many of them this time round but the J.C.B Hoyte of Queen Charlotte Sound (Lot 108 ) which retained beautiful fresh colour sold for $10,500 and Sydney Lough Thompson’s Fisherman, Concarneau (Lot 68 ) went for $36,000 and I think if you looked back to one of those early catalogues the prices would have been about the same!
In all, the International Art Centre had another phenomenally successful evening clocking up $3,485,000 at the end of the night and with post sales the day after the total is now just shy of $4,000,000. With results like this, the team at IAC will be looking forward to the next 50 years in business.
All prices quoted are hammer price in $NZ and do not include the buyers premium of 17.5% plus GST.
