Art Market

A raft of Modern and Contemporary art auctions were held in Paris in the second half of October coinciding with the Paris + par Art Basel fair held at the Grand Palais Ephemère.

On September 21 Bonhams Cornette de Saint Cyr (28/27/21/14.5% buyer’s premium) held a sale in Paris celebrating the decade of the 1980s.

An example from Frederick Edward McWilliam’s (1909-92) 'Women of Belfast' series is being offered at Halls’ auction in Shrewsbury on December 6.

Scenes of parks were a favourite topic of artist Doris Clare Zinkeisen (1897-1991) although most of those produced show figures or horses and carriages.

Konrad Klapheck, who died at the end of July aged 88, was a pioneer of German pop art and is credited with the invention of so-called Machine Paintings.

Jane Bond (b.1939), a costume designer for stage, television and films, started painting portraits especially from the early 1980s onward.

Many 20th century works are selling very healthily at mid-range price points

Between December 13 and 19 Sotheby’s Paris rooms will offer a series of live and online auctions of works from the collection of Hubert Guerrand-Hermès (1940-2016), a descendant of the founder of the famous firm Hermès.

It was in the early 1950s that Prunella Clough (1919-99) ‘found’ her subject matter after touring London’s industrial wastelands and factories.

The career of the French artist Pierre Soulages spanned over 80 years. He died in 2022 at the age of 102.

Highlights of the sale of Modern and Contemporary Art on November 16 at Clars in Oakland, California, will include works by Andy Warhol, the Latvian/American artist Raimonds Staprans, the American artist Gordon Onslow Ford and this monumental work by the Austrian artist Goetz Valien (b.1960).

A high price for a Winifred Nicholson (1893-1981) picture sold outside the main London rooms came recently in Cumbria.

Two of the highest prices at auction in the last 20 years for Dame Ethel Walker (1861-1951) came at Roseberys’ (26% buyer’s premium) latest Modern British & 20th Century Art sale.

Pictures were a prominent part of the Robert Kime (1946-2022) aesthetic.

Large urban or coastal scenes in the manner of LS Lowry were the stock-in-trade of Brian ‘Braaq’ Shields (1951-97).

The highest prices at auction for the Camden Town Group artist Charles Ginner (1878-1952) have all come for oil paintings but his precise, lucid style very much leant itself to the medium of watercolour.

Two watercolours by Frank Algernon Stewart (1877-1945) were among the best performers in a collection of works amassed by two former gallery owners.

Following the record £64,000 for a Helen Allingham (1848-1926) watercolour at Philip Serrell (20% buyer’s premium) back in July, another group of works by the artist was offered at the Malvern saleroom.

Dutch artist used a technique that was much admired in his homeland as well as Britain

The early English Surrealist Tristram Hillier (1905-83) was a regular visitor to Spain and Portugal.