Thursday, June 17, 2010




Alfred Stevens (1817-75)
Portrait of Mrs. Collman (National Gallery, London)
Edward Hopper (1882-1967)
House by the Railroad (1925, Museum of Modern Art, New York)

Max Beckmann
Self Portrait in a Tuxedo (1927, Busch-Reisinger Museum, Cambridge, USA)

Sir Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898)
The Beguiling of Merlin (1874, Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight, UK)

George Frederick Watts (1817-1904)
Portrait of Cardinal Manning (1881, National Portrait Gallery, London)

Ilya Repin (1844-1930)
Krestny Khod (Religious Procession) in Kursk Gubernia (1883, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow)

John Singer Sargent
Daughters of Edward Darley Boit (1882, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

Franz Marc
Tiger (1912, Stadtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich)
The Large Blue Horses (1911, Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis)

Thomas Gainsborough
Blue Boy (1770, Huntington Art Collections, San Marino)

Winslow Homer (1836-1910)
The Gulf Stream (1899, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)

Sol LeWitt (1928-2007)
Open Geometric Structure 3 (1990, Lisson Gallery London)

William Orpen
The Cafe Royale in London (1912, Musee d'Orsay)

Adraen Brouwer
The Bitter Draught (1635, Stadel Art Museum, Frankfurt)

Adriaen van Ostade
The Smoker (1655, Hermitage, St Petersburg)

Bernardo Bellotto (1720–1780)
View of the Ponte delle Navi, Verona (1745, private collection)

Jean Chardin (1699-1779)
The Meat Day Meal (c.1731, Louvre Museum)

David Teniers the Younger (1610-90)
Gambling Scene at an Inn (1649, Wallace Collection)

Gerard Terborch (1617-81)
Parental Admonition (1654-5) Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
Hendrik Terbrugghen (1588-1629)
Saint Sebastian Tended by the Holy Women (1625, Oberlin, Ohio)
Jan Steen (1629-79)
The Christening Feast (1664, Wallace Collection)
Jan Vermeer (1632-1675)
Girl With the Red Hat (1665-6, National Gallery Washington DC)
Pieter de Hooch (1629-83)
Courtyard of a House in Delft (1658, National Gallery, London)
Raphael
Sistine Madonna (1513-4) Gemaldegalerie Dresden
Jusepe Ribera
Saint Paul the Hermit (1640, Prado Museum, Madrid)
Georges Rouault
Crucifixion, quatint on paper (1936, Dallas Museum of Art, Texas)
Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627-78)
A View Down a Corridor (1662, Dyrham Park, Gloucestershire, UK)
Titian (c.1490–1576)
Venus of Urbino (1538, Uffizi Gallery)
Francisco Zurbaran
Saint Francis of Assisi (1650-60, Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, Barcelona)

Monday, June 14, 2010

Fritz Wotruba, austrian sculptor

A sculptor from Austria, Fritz Wotruba was trained classically at the Vienna School of Art. He was born in 1907 and died in 1975. He became a popular and much admired post-war sculptor and a prominent teacher. His works were made of wood, stone and other materials, he enjoyed creating reliefs and free standing figures. He was influenced by Abstract and Primitivism.

Thursday, June 10, 2010

World of Art

World of Art is a Russian association of artists that want to differentiate themselves from academic art and the colloquialness of the Wanderer's art style. Formed in 1892 , the main proponents were Aleksandr Benois , Valentin Serov and Mikhail Vrubel. On the non-fine arts side, the ballet producer Diaghilev was also a leading member. They organised exhibitions together and designed ballets and ballet sets. The journal of World of Art (1899-1904) was published which contained essays and illustrations on contemporary Russian art. It also included a section on Russian architecture and art history.

Tuesday, June 08, 2010

Robert Motherwell
Elegy to the Spanish Republic, 70, (1961, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)

Jan Davidszoon de Heem, considered one of the Old Masters.
Festoon of Fruit and Flowers (c.1660, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)

Willem Kalf
Still-Life with a Nautilus Cup (1662, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid)

Rachel Ruysch
Basket of Flowers (1711, Uffizi, Florence)

Samuel van Hoogstraten
A Peepshow with Views of the Interior of a Dutch House (c.1655-60, National Gallery, London)

Arnold Bocklin
Island of the Dead (1886, Museum der Bildenden Kunste, Leipzig)

William Holman Hunt
The Awakening Conscience (1853, Tate Gallery, London)

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones (1833-1898)
Fair Rosamund and Queen Eleanor (1862, Tate Gallery, London)

Also, listed are greatest sculptors, in the world and Europe.

Hans Burgkmair, German painter

German painter and engraver, Hans Burgkmair designed woodcuts and lived just outside of Augsburg (1473-1531), around the same time as Durer was active in Nuremburg. The son of a painter, he may also have apprenticed under Schongauer in the 1490s. He spent a short time in Italy, studying the Renaissance Masters and on his return to Germany, married the sister of Hans Holbein the Elder. His later paintings show Venetian colours and monumental figures in the style of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. His most famous work is St John's Altarpiece, 1518 at the Alte Pinakothek, Munich.

Thursday, June 03, 2010

Margaret Preston female artist

Australian painter, write and printmaker, Margaret Preston was trained at the Adelaide School of Design and moved to Munich and Paris at the turn of the century. She moved from an academic style during this time and was influenced by Fauvism. In the 1920s her work was characterised by blocky simple shapes painted in oil, later developing to woodcut, lino-cut, masonite-cut and silk screen. Hugely versatile, a good example is her 1927 Implement Blue, at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. By the time she painted this, she was considered one of the leading female artists back in her own country. She tended to paint landscapes and flowers, and was driven by the desire to create a distinctive national style of art. She was one of the first Australian artists to appreciate and see the potential in Aboriginal art.

Monday, May 31, 2010

Asian Art

The Spring 2010 Christie's sale in Hong Kong, of Southeast Asian Modern and Contemporary Art went well. It showed a 33% increase in sales on the previus year. Over 10 records were set for established and emerging artists from both contemporary and modern sets. Italian painter, Romualdo Locatelli's painting 'Young Balinese Girl with Hibiscus' broke all records selling for $773,000. Also a rare painting by Fernando Cueto Amorsolo, sold for $434,000. 13 lots recorded sale prices over expection, indicating an appreciation of modern masterworks from the Asian art market.

Friday, May 28, 2010

Artist Studio

The artist's studio is always a source of interest for collectors and people who appreciate art alike. Ever since since the Spanish painter Velazquez painted himself painting Las Meninas, in his studio. Painters, and sometimes photographers have often depicted themselves slaving over a canvas, at their easel, studying a model, or even entertaining collectors and dealers. Props and costumes, brushes and easels: all the accoutrements of the artist's livelihood might find their way into the finished canvas.

Today's modern art museums are using the Internet to allow visitors to watch the artist live in their world. With one click, the artist's interior world is available. Even the nature of the studio visit has changed enormously in the online era. "Basically, you sit down with the artist, and out comes the laptop," notes Harry Philbrick, director of the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Ridgefield, Connecticut.

Thursday, May 27, 2010


Diego Rivera
Detail of Leon Trotsky in Controller of the Universe Mural (1934, Palacio de Bella Artes, Mexico City)

Friday, May 21, 2010

Georges Rouault
The Old King (1937)

Hugo van der Goes (1440–1483)
-Portinari Altarpiece, detail (c.1475, Uffizi, Florence)
-Death of the Virgin (1480, Groeninge Museum, Bruges)

Paul Signac
The Papal Palace, Avignon (1900, Musee d'Orsay, Paris)

Chaim Soutine
Portrait of a Man with Red Scarf (1921, private collection)

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Rona Pondick Sculptor

Female artist and sculptor Rona Pondick mixes animal body parts with her own to create hybrid sculptures which unite the emotional and the intellectual, the sublime and the grotesque. On first viewing, you find it disgusting, but then you can't get enough of it. Pondick has been unnerving audiences since the 1980s with her eccentric, unnerving sculpture. She explored figurative work when abstraction was de rigueur, she used dirt and found objects when minimalism was popular.

The New York born artist emerged, in 1977, from the Yale School of Art, where she studied sculpture with Richard Serra, among others. She distinguished herself early on with an unusual array of anatomical parts and body-related objects that had some of Louise Bourgeois's oddity and near-surrealism and Philip Guston's ambiguous symbolism.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Metropolitian painting may be a Michelangelo

The painting Saint John the Baptist Bearing Witness (c.1510, Metropolitan museum of Art) has long been attributed to the workshop of Italian artist Francesco Granacci. But Everett Fahy, former head of the museum's European paintings department, now believe the painting may have been created by Michelangelo. Fahy says he is aware the critics will throw 'brickbats' at him, but is adamant in his view stating 'I am confident that the only artist capable of making this splendid painting was Michelangelo.' Granacci and Michelangelo were good friends in their time. The Met bought the painting in the 1970s for $150,000.

'The second panel is so superior to the companion panel,' Fahy says. 'I believe Michelangelo painted it in 1506, two years before he started on the Sistine ceiling. It was already in my brain in 1971, the year after it was bought. When the Metropolitan showed it in 1971, I wrote for an exhibition called 'Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries' that the second panel recalled the figures in the Sistine Chapel. As years went by, it firmed up. I had long believed it to be by Michelangelo, but exactly when I don't know. There wasn't a moment when I suddenly said, 'This is absolutely by Michelangelo.' It was a gradual recognition.'

Monday, May 17, 2010

Olafur Eliasson: The Weather Project (2003)

The Weather Project, the 4th of the Unilever Series of commissions for the Turbine Hall, Tate Gallery. An installation by Olafur Eliasson which takes the subject of weather as the basis for exploring ideas about experience, mediation and representation. He installed a gigantic wintery sun at the far endof the hall, and visitors were able to bask in it's warm orange glow. "I was incredibly happy with people's reactions – they were so diverse," Eliasson said after the project.

Artist Career

The basic elements of the weather, water, temperature, light, pressure, are the materials that Eliasson has used throughout his career. His installations more often than not feature elements derived from nature – billowing steam, glistening rainbows or fog-filled rooms. By introducing ‘natural’ phenomena, such as water, mist or light, into an un-natural setting, be it a city street or an art gallery, the artist encourages the viewer to reflect upon their understanding and perception of the physical world that surrounds them.

Friday, May 14, 2010

Alexei Jawlensky

Head (1910, Museum of Modern Art, New York)

Russian painter and printmaker, who was active in Germany during the first part of the 20th century. He became interested in painting at the age of 16, when he visited the Moscow World Exposition, which had a profound influence on him. He subsequently spent all of his leisure time at the Tret’yakov State Gallery, Moscow.

Between 1908 and 1910 Jawlensky and the artist Werefkin spent summers in the Bavarian Alps with Kandinsky and his companion Gabriele Munter. Here, through painting landscapes of their mountainous surroundings (e.g. Jawlensky’s Summer Evening in Murnau, 1909, Munich, Lenbachhaus), they experimented with one another’s techniques and discussed the theoretical bases of their art. In 1909 they helped to found the Neue kuenstlervereinigung muenchen (NKVM). After a break-away group formed the Blue Rider in 1911, Jawlensky remained in the NKVM until 1912, when works by him were shown at the Blue Rider exhibitions. During this period he made a vital contribution to the development of Expressionism.
For a full list of Famous Painters, see the website underlined.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Mary Cassatt
Two Children at the Seashore (1884, The National Gallery of Art, Washington)

Pierre Bonnard
In the Washroom (1907, Gallery Daniel Malingue, Paris)

Max Ernst
Ube Imperator (1923, Pompidou Centre, Paris)

Carsten Holler: Installation 'Test Site' (2006) at the Tate Modern

Test Site is a large series of slides which are impressive sculptures by sculptor Carsten Holler. You don't need to slide down the sculpture to appreciate it, the visual of seeing people slide down the 'inner spectacle', puts the viewer into a state of simultaneous delight and anxiety. Of course many wonder whether it is really art. But art, Holler says is changing its character, like it or not. In the 1970s, projects such as Robert Smithson's Spiral Jetty were of minority interest. In London, Holler says, "every newspaper wrote about Test Site, and every taxi driver knew about the slides. British popular culture embraces something like this in a way other countries don't."

So the Turbine Hall has become a playground. In a more serious note, the artist says "I was also dealing with the space, all those grids and straight lines. Putting the slides there was an artistic, even poetic intervention. The spirals relate to natural growth and form. No one mentioned this. I wanted to make the people part of the work, but you didn't have to use the slides. Standing and watching could be like looking at a painting by Hieronymous Bosch."

Thursday, May 06, 2010

Top 10 most expensive artworks to ever go under the hammer

1. Nude, Green Leaves and Bust by Pablo Picasso (£68m) - sold in May, 2010
2. L'Homme Qui Marche (Walking Man 1) by Alberto Giacometti (£65.7m)
3. Gar(TM)on la pipe by Pablo Picasso (£65.6m)
4. Dora Maar au Chat by Pablo Picasso (£60m)
5. Adele Bloch-Bauer II by Gustav Klimt (£55.3m)
6. New York Triptych (in 3 parts) by Francis Bacon (£55m)
7. Portrait du Dr. Gachet by Vincent Van Gogh (£52m)
8. Le Bassin Aux Nymphmas by Claude Monet (£50m)
9. Bal au Moulin de la Galette by Pierre-Auguste Renoir (£49m)
10. The Massacre of the Innocents by Sir Peter Paul Rubens (£47m)

Wednesday, May 05, 2010

2000 Louise Bourgeois: Maman

The Tate Modern is celebrating it's 10th birthday. On show, as part of it's permanent celebration is Louise Bourgeois' spider sculpture Maman. Bourgeois, who is 99 years old, no longer gives interviews. But for the Tate's birthday, she came out of retirement to talk about her commission in the Turbine Hall. The Spider gave the Tate Modern an instant identifable signature and made the artist a household name. Did this sudden fame surprise her: 'No,' she says modestly. 'The space is so beautiful – anything placed inside it would cause a strong reaction.'
As an artist, Bourgeois focuses on remembered interiors of her childhood. Maman turned the surrealist obsession with men upside down, creating a haunting image of motherhood insted - of a spider carrying her eggs.

Before this, Bourgeois says, 'I made a series of small sculptures with mirrors and chairs. They were about looking and being looked at. To continue these concepts on a large scale was an opportunity I could not pass up." What mattered to her most about this installation was the audience's engagement with it. Her towers were designed to be ascended, paving the way for subsequent participatory installations. "The towers were meant to be an experience. If you did not experience all three towers in sequence, then you did not get the piece.'

Tuesday, May 04, 2010

Artists Pablo Picasso and Andre Derain

A collection of paintings by the famous Parisian art dealer Ambroise Vollard will be put to auction at Sotheby's in June. When Vollard died in 1939, 141 of his paintings were put in a vault, and forgotten about for 40 years. When they were rediscovered in 1979, a legal battle lasting 3 decades began. Vollard was a key player in 20th century art, without him the likes of Gaugin, Cezanne and Modigliani may never had sold a painting. One of the most exciting paintings in the auction is Andre Derain's Harbour at Collioure. It was was part of the 1905 Paris exhibition that included works by Matisse, and led to the critics dubbing their works Les Fauves, or Wild Beasts.

Monday, May 03, 2010

Irish Artist Sean Hillen at Art Chicago

The artist Sean Hillen will be represented at Art Chicago by the BlueLeaf Gallery, Dublin. This is the first time he will be represented in America. His humourous photo assemblages were taken during the time of conflict in Northern Ireland. Hillen's reputation is well established, and was confirmed by the recent aquisition of 24 pieces by the Imperial War Museum in London recently for thier permanent exhibition. His topical ‘Troubles’ series (1983-1993) piece together imagery such as the Virgin Mary appearing above a British Army patrol, watchtowers in Piccadilly Circus, masked militants of the Irish National Liberation Army parading alongside the Queen's mounted guard and London Buses.

The BlueLeaf Gallery will also be exhibiting works by Cork based artist Tom Climent and Marty Kelly.

Friday, April 30, 2010

Sir John Lavery, Irish Artist

A famous painting by Sir John Lavery, The Golden Turban is to go on sale next month at Sothebys, and is expected to reach half a million Euros.

Head of PR at Sotheby's, said the international art market had seen massive demand since the end of last year. "What has happened in the last six months we have seen a kind of unprecedented demand back in the art market," he said.

A study, the Spanish Shawl, by Louis Le Broquy is also to go under the hammer, with estimates of 440,000 to 650,000 Euros.

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

National Crafts Competition, Call for Entries

RDS National Crafts Competition

In conjuction with the Crafts Council of Ireland has announced their annual competition. Founded in 1968, with a prize fund in excess of €28,000 spread over 20 categories, the competition is one of Europe’s leading independently adjudicated craft competitions.

The categories for entry are glass, furniture, ceramics and textiles. The craft workers and designers have their work appraised by an independent jury of experts and to compete for prestigious awards and prizes which total €28,000. Previous entrants have included the Strule Arts Centre, Omagh; the Sirius Arts Centre, Cobh and the Regional Cultural Centre, Letterkenny.

First round of entrants by May 17th.

Art Fair, 2010

The 2010 RDS Art Fair will take place from 5-7 November.

After a bit of market research and discussions with the arts sector, it has been decided that new aspects to the Fair will include a curatorial approach with an emphasis on displays and presentations, favouring galleries and professional artists.

Given the current economic climate, it will be interesting to see which artists exhibit, and their prices. I was recently at the London Art Fair, and was blown away by the quality of English art, and the extremely affordable prices. Irish art has always held a premium in the celtic boom - and I suspect more realistic prices will be on show at the RDS in November. Best of luck to the artists involved.

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Mark Rothko

Mark Rothko was never quite an American painter – not in the same way that Pollock or de Kooning ever were. He never quite left the old world, Nietzsche and Aeschylus were his best friends. A major retrospective exhibition: Into an Unknown World, takes place at the Garage Centre for Contemporary Culture, Moscow, until August 14, 2010. Finally, the country he left but never returned to has recognised the genuis of his colour field paintings.

Two superb artists. My pick of the day

Georgia O'Keeffe
Blue Flower (1930, Whitney Museum, Boston)
Elsheimer
Flight into Egypt (1609, Alte Pinakothek, Munich)

Monday, April 26, 2010

George Stubbs
Whistlejacket (1762, National Gallery, London)

Anselm Adams
The Tetons and the Snake River (1942)

Frida Kahlo
Henry Ford Hospital (1932, Collection Dolores Olmedo Foundation, Mexico City)

Francesco Guardi
View of the Molo towards the Santa Maria della Salute (1775)

Sir Thomas Lawrence
Pinkie (1794, Huntington Institute, San Marino, California)

George Grosz
Pillars of Society (1926, Staatliche Museum, Berlin)

Georgia O'Keeffe
Cow's Skull: Red, White, and Blue, (1931, Metropolitian Museum of Art, New York)

Norman Rockwell
Save The Freedom of Speech (1942, Curtis Publishing Company)

Jack Vettriano
The Singing Butler (1992, Private Collection)

Ivan Nikolayevich Kramskoy
Portrait of an Unknown Woman (1883, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow)

Antonello da Messina
Christ Crowned with Thorns (also known as Ecce Homo: 1470, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Still no response from the Crawford Art Gallery - I don't think they like suggestions from the general public!!

Just had a look at the Hugh Lane Gallery website, really cool. They have a list of educational lectures, including artist talks, public lectures, film screenings, as well as workshops (sketching classes, National Gallery Drawing Day, Summer camps). As well as as list of upcoming exhibitions, and information on collections including Sean Scully and the Stained Glass room.

One day...Cork might move into the 21st century......

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

From Impressionism to Modernism: The Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery, Washington, DC

Two shy Welsh sisters, with immaculate taste in Art created one of the most beautiful and relevant collections of Art in the 20th century. From a wealthy background the sisters bought their first French painting in 1925, Henri Matisse’s Plumed Hat , for $2,000 in New York. Matisse’s reputation was not yet fully established, and it was a daring, avant-garde purchase. Maud Dale had a liking for the recently deceased Modigliani, and began buying his works in 1927. The Dales went on to own 21 of Modigliani’s works, probably the finest selection in the world

Some described the sisters as 'cripplingly shy'. Over the decades of their lives they assembled a fine collection from the Barbizon, Impressionist and post-Impressionist schools. 53 works ranging from Turner to Cézanne have been loaned by the National Museum of Wales to the Corcoran Gallery, near the White House in Washington.

Other Painting in their Collection:

Claude Monet, Palazzo da Mula, Venice (1908); Amedeo Modigliani, Gypsy Woman with Baby (1919); Fernand Léger, Maud Dale (1935); Salvador Dalí, Chester Dale (1958); Pablo Picasso, The Lovers (1923), all from the Chester Dale collection; Pierre-Auguste Renoir, La Parisienne (1874); Paul Cezanne, The François Zola Dam (1877-78), both from the National Museum of Wales; Miss Gwendoline E Davies Bequest, 1931. Courtesy American Federation of Arts

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

LA Musuem of Contemporary Art

The actor Dennis Hopper to get art retrospective exhibition at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, curated by film-maker Julian Schnabel. It opens on May 11th, 2010 and is called Art is Life. It includes various style paintings including abstract, expressionist, pop art, collage, oils, graffiti style, and portrait photographs.

There's also some film content, including a sculptural installation that involves the projection of Easy Rider and two of Hopper's other movies.

Monday, April 19, 2010

Crawford Gallery

Oh why oh why do the Crawford Gallery in Cork refuse to listen to the public? I've emailed, I've written letters, and never once did I receive the courtesy of a reply.

The Gallery, funded by the Arts Council have recently extended the size of their gallery to a really beautiful functional exhibition space. However, their website lags way behind - there is very little detail about future exhibitions, no community activities, gallery of permanent exhibitions or talks on painting and painting technique. You only need to look at the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin to see what benefits this sort of promotion achieves, they really know how to interact with the public.

The Crawford doesn't even open on Sunday.
And what day of the week do people most prefer to visit a gallery?
Sunday.

I can't help but wonder - who is behind the Crawford Gallery? Who are the people who are running it, and do they ever ask the public what THEY want? It's a terribly old fashioned approach, and one which leaves art in the reserves of the dying few.

Crawford - come on - for the sake of Cork - modernise. Open your doors and start offering events and talks to encourage the people of Cork to take an interest in you again.

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Courtauld Institute

Recently visited this hidden treasure in London - The Courtauld Institute contains some of the most famous paintings in the world, in a really beautiful setting. I had travelled over to the visit the Van Gogh exhibition at the Royal Academy, which incidently turned out really boring. Tickets for the exhibition sold out weeks previously, and when I arrived at the gallery there were a queue of people, waiting patiently on the off chance they may still get a glimpse of the expressionist artist.

I'm all for museums holding populist exhibitions, unfortunately the Irish galleries don't always do this enough. Anyway, this particular exhibition at the Royal Academy put 65 paintings, 30 drawings and 35 original letters by Van Gogh on display. The letters were mainly Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo and friend of sorts, Paul Gauguin.

Unfortunately the exhibition was rather disappointing- where were the Sunflowers? Although carrying a large number of works, the Academy failed to provide a glimpse of some of his most famous paintings. Where were the cafe scenes? Or where was the famous painting of the artist without his ear?

Let me tell you where.....

At the Courtauld Institute. I promise you, this is a well kept secret.

The Courtauld Institute can be located at Somerset House, 150 Strand, Charing Cross. I was buying an art book about Van Gogh, when the very helpful cashier told me about the Institute. Having left the Academy sooner than I thought, I decided to catch a taxi over and to try my luck.

It did not disappoint. I have never been so close to so many famous paintings in my life. Firstly there is a Michelangelo exhibition being held, with numerous delicate drawings by the Renaissance Master. I moved towards the Impressionism and Post-Impressionism room (permanent exhibition), to discover a sight to heal any poor soul.

Manet's 'A Bar at the Folies Bergere', Gauguin's 'Nevermore' (1897); Seurat's Woman Powdering Herself (1888) and of course La Loge by Renoir (reproduced below). Along with works by Degas, Manet, Monet and Cezanne.

Coming back to Van Gogh

I guess you know what painting I discovered next...... Self Portrait with Bandaged Ear (1889).

Louis Le Brocquy in Auction

With the recession, it seems that the price of un-established artists has completely bottomed out, and there's a return to safety on the side of art investors. The good ol' names like Louise Le Brocquy, John Shinnors, Sean Scully - along with the dead guys, John Lavery, Charles Lamb, Cecil Maguire - are fetching healthy prices again. As a result, we are seeing artworks by more established artists being dusted off and sent to auction.

Morgan O Driscoll auctioneers have an oil painting by Le Brocquy, entitled Orange (1972) in their forthcoming auction. It has an estimate price of €50,000 to €70,000.

For Le Brocquy collectors who perhaps are feeling the pinch, there are lithographs by the artist, entitled Playboy of the Western World, estimated at between €800 to €1200. Phew! And I thought I was priced out of the art market.

Just in case you do have any spare cash under the matress, there's also a small oil panel by Shinnors called Morning South, which is going for between €20,000 and €30,000.

The auction, for all you art buffs out there is on April 26th, 2010 at the Radison Hotel in Cork.

Monday, February 15, 2010

LA, February 2010.
Mel Gibson kindly became a supporter of my art.