Prints

Dozens of London galleries are primed to open their doors to the public for the capital’s first physical mass art event in months.

The London Original Print Fair (LOPF) has modified its operations to suit the current restrictions and plans a Print Week in dealers’ galleries next month.

Famous for the sort of graffiti that morphs into street art and critical acclaim, Banksy is now bringing in big money in the form of screenprints

The live webcast auction of Urban and Contemporary art held by Tate Ward (25% buyer’s premium) on March 24 proved well timed, coming just a day after Christie’s sold Banksy’s 'Game Changer' for £14.4m.

Bonhams (27.5/25/20/14.5% buyer’s premium) has been offering works by Banksy for some time now in a number of different sale types including Contemporary art auctions and specialist print offerings.

Among the Banksy works sold outside London recently was a screenprint of Trolleys that made £40,000 at Tennants’ (20% buyer’s premium) of Leyburn in North Yorkshire.

This image of children swinging along a watch tower was part of Banksy’s ‘Walled Off’ project that relates to the West Bank barrier between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

A number of Banksy’s earlier prints from the early 2000s feature the subject of a rat.

A very early coloured litho view of Melbourne formed part of an Australiana sale held by dealer and auctioneer Peter Arnold (18% buyer’s premium).

Although catalogued as ‘a 19th century Japanese woodblock print’, the signature to a scene of a boat with Mount Fuji beyond gave a clue to its creator.

A print by street artist Banksy (b.1974) called Morons, depicting an art auction featuring the former Christie’s boss Charles Hindlip, has been sold by a member of his family.

Life model depicted by Freud, Auerbach and even Lennon amassed her own art collection

As with other sectors of the art and antiques market, Contemporary art can certainly produce dramatic bidding battles for under-valued material at auction.

Covent Garden dealership Grosvenor Prints planned to feature 100 items in its special Catalogue 100, but after delaying its release for nine months due to Covid-19 challenges, it now has an excess of items to offer.

For those in the southern hemisphere, Christmas means summer, sun, flowers and exotic wildlife. In this year’s Australian Antique and Art Dealers Association (AAADA) Christmas Catalogue, dealer Josef Lebovic offers a group of 11 Antipodean Christmas cards from c.1883.

As time goes by, an almost imperceptible process seems to take place in the art market where certain artists who were once considered avant garde begin to feel like established names.

Offered with moderate estimates, two Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) etchings from the Vollard Suite drew demand at the recent timed online sale of Modern & Contemporary art at Halls (20% buyer’s premium).

The term ‘works on paper’ encompasses a diverse range of media from artist’s prints to posters, ephemera and documents. Pictured here, along with an array of books, is a section of items available to buy from dealers or bid for at auction.