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.

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.

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)

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)

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......

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

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.

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.

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.