A pencil and pastel study depicting the youthful head of Apollo wearing his famous laurel wreath was made by the academic painter as a preparatory study for the commission at the Sorbonne in Paris.
Offered by Derbyshire saleroom Hansons (20% buyer’s premium) on October 9, this 21 x 18in (54 x 46cm) work, dated 1901, was consigned from a property a few miles from where the sale was held at Bishton Hall in Staffordshire.
Estimated at £1000-1200, it attracted interest from a room bidder and four phone lines before the gavel fell to one of the latter at £17,000.
Dagnan-Bouveret was a major influence on the development of naturalism at the Paris Salon and sought to modernise academic art in the 19th century. But his efforts were eclipsed by the Impressionists and their avant-garde followers and he remained in relative obscurity until 2002 when an exhibition at Dahesh Museum of Art in New York highlighted Dagnan-Bouveret’s achievements in the field of academic painting.
Dutch warship
Oil on panel showing Dutch vessels off a coastal town by Bonaventura Peeters – £19,000 at Hansons.
Elsewhere at Hansons, a 15 x 23in (38 x 59cm) oil on panel by the celebrated Flemish marine artist Bonaventura Peeters (1614-52) drew bids from three phone lines before it was knocked down at £19,000 against a £3000-5000 guide.
Discovered in a Staffordshire property, it showed a Dutch Man of War and other sailing vessels off a coastal town and was signed with the artist’s initials to the lower right.
Completing the picture results was a watercolour by St Ives artist Walter Langley (1852-1922) showing two women looking out to sea. Found on a home visit in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, it sold at the higher estimate of £10,500.
