Watercolours

A sketch attributed to John Constable (1776-1837) uncovered in a Holland Park home is to be offered at auction in Maidenhead – the latest in a string of Constable sketch discoveries.

Thousands of items are available to buy from dealers online. Here we pick out one that caught our eye this week.

Two previously unpublished watercolours painted by Lady Anne Barnard (1750-1825) during her momentous visit to the Cape of Good Hope emerged for sale at Stephan Welz & Co in South Africa earlier this month. They came for sale from the descendants of Lady Anne who had owned them since 1966.

Tentatively guided at £200-400, this watercolour of an unknown sitter below attributed to the painter and sculptor Glyn Philpot (1884-1937) attracted multiple bids in Cardiff.

An 1817 miniature of Napoleon by British painter Henry Bone (1755-1834) is among the highlights at Ellison Fine Art’s exhibition of portrait miniatures this month.

Andrew Newell Wyeth (1917-2009), one of America’s best-known artists of the mid-20th century, focused on provincial landscapes and the people in them.

Nicky Gould of Gould Antiques offers a range of small items including portrait miniatures, perfume bottles and various objects of vertu from the 16th-20th centuries. She next exhibits at Olympia.

A rare opportunity to own a watercolour by Prince Charles (b.1948) presented itself when items belonging to the former British Prime Minister Harold Wilson and his wife Mary were put up for sale at Hansons (20% buyer’s premium).

A watercolour of a thoroughbred racehorse auction appeared at Chorley’s (20% buyer’s premium) of Prinknash Abbey Park, Gloucestershire, on May 21 – 123 years to the day since it had itself last sold at auction.

The American artist John Singer Sargent (1856-1925) is best known for the high-society ‘swagger’ portraits that had earned him fame and fortune, but the watercolours he produced in greater number are more commonly available at auction.

A watercolour by John Nixon (1755-1818) showing St Paul’s Cathedral and the City of London from Regent’s Park in the early days of the land’s development is offered at Guy Peppiatt Fine Art for £6500.

At an uncertain time bidders are assertive when the best and not the rest comes up at auction.