Auction News Network

Teenaged Rembrandt Peale Painted Washington

Charles Wilson Peale, the famed painter of George Washington, took his 17-year old boy (named Rembrandt) along for a sitting with the Founding Father. The teenager painted to acclaim and went on to recreate portraits of Washington for decades. One of those, known as a “porthole” copy, will be offered by Heritage next month, with a high estimate of  $175,000.

World’s Best Selling Portrait Goes For $1.5m

No, it’s not something from Warhol or Picasso or Dali, the best selling reproduction in the world, according to the BBC, is a portrait called, “The Chinese Girl,” by Vladimir Tretchikoff’. This week Bonhams in London sold the original oil canvas for $1.5m, almost double the original high estimate. The portrait is also sometimes called, “The Green Lady.”

Painted Pugilist Didn’t Die In Vain

By his girth, it doesn’t appear George Stevenson spent a lot of time in the gym. Unfortunately, he died after a bare-knuckle fairground fight in 1741 with the British Champion who then felt compelled to write the first book of rules for pugilists.  The painting from the English School of portraits will be sold by Bonhams London at the end of the month. High estimate, $25,000.

Christie’s Luxury Week

Closing out its 2012 season, Christie’s will offer a Luxury Week series of sales, beginning today with an event in New York devoted to jewels, led by a 50.01 carat diamond ring by Graff, (est. $7m-$10m). In tomorrow’s sale, Christie’s will auction a collection of furniture, fine and decorative art from the estate of legendary director Billy Wilder, and in coming days, there will be sales, six in all, devoted to watches, wine, and 20^th century design.

Basquiat Painting Expected To Set $20m Record

In the early 80’s Jean-Michel Basquiat moved from street art into art galleries with his wildly neo-expressionist paintings such as an untitled, partial self-portrait that became—like all of his work–increasingly valuable after his death from a heroin overdose at 27. Christie’s will offer “Untitled, 1981,” at its Spring sale in London for what’s expected to be a record $20m.

Arthur Boyd Sells Down Under For Record $1.68m

The painting, of a bride fleeing a bearded, blue-faced groom in a rough seascape, isn’t much of an advertisement for marriage. Yesterday, however, it became the most expensive work ever sold at auction by renowned Australian painter Arthur Boyd. “Bride Running Away,” which Boyd produced in 1957, realized $1.68m at Sotheby’s in Melbourne.

Canaletto Painting & Olympic Beach Volleyball

Art patrons and volleyball fans will recognize il Canaletto’s 1853 rendering of the Horse Guard Parade at St. James Park, currently the venue for the 2012 Olympics’ bikini clad volleyball competitors. Vienna’s Dorotheum is selling the painting.

Rare Goya Painting Comes To Market

Goya paintings rarely come to market and Koller Swiss Auctions caused a stir when it announced that the Spaniard’s “Lot and his Daughters” will be auctioned in late September in Zurich. It had been hanging unrecognized in a private collection for the past 80 years, and may fetch $800,000 or more at the sale.

Over $1m Expected For Painting By Winston Churchill

It’s hard to imagine that Winston Churchill had much spare time. But when he wasn’t leading England through the dark days of World War II, or writing the 55 volumes for which he won the 1953 Nobel Prize for literature, he was painting, and doing it with the same zeal he showed in his other activities. One of Churchill’s works, a 1936 oil on canvas called “Still Life With Orchids,” is coming up for auction later this month in London, where it’s expected to sell for a statesmanlike $1.17m.

Dali to Test Surrealism Prices At Sotheby’s

Sotheby’s is staging a major modern and impressionist auction that will test the surging market in late 20^th Century artists such as surrealist Salvador Dali whose painting, “Printemps Necrophilique,” comes with a $12m estimate at the May 2 sale in New York.

Lost Lempicka Canvas To Sell For Millions

The painter Tamara de Lempicka came roaring out of the 1920’s with her Art Deco styled nudes to become lionized in Parisian art circles. One of her sensual paintings, “Nu adossé I,” was shown in a 1925 Milan exhibit, but then disappeared. The work has re-emerged and Sotheby’s will offer it in early May with a high estimate of $5m.

High Estimate For Rare Irma Stern Painting

Irma Stern was born in South Africa. In her 20’s she gained some recognition in Europe, but hometown reviewers called her work “ugliness as a cult.” Stern died in 1966 and has had the last word as her paintings now sell in the millions, and there’s a museum in Cape Town dedicated to her art. Bonham’s is selling “The Pink Sari,” never before on the market, at its South Africa sale later this month.

Hitler Seascape Sells For $53,000

Historians have speculated on the course of history had Hitler not been rejected as by a famous art academy, and instead found notoriety writing Mein Kampf . As a young Bohemian artist bumping around Vienna in his 20’s, Hitler turned out a number of oils, one of which is a moonlit seascape that just sold for $53,000 at an online Slovakian auction. The buyer was not revealed.

$40m Klimt Boosts Sotheby’s Tally

What a difference a day makes. Paced by a $40m sale of a rare Klimt painting, Sotheby’s Impressionist and Modern Art auction yesterday in New York was a notable success, and a major boost to the flagging Impressionist market. Unlike Christie’s tepid result at its parallel event the night before, Sotheby’s sold all but 13 lots for a total of almost $200m.

Malcolm Forbes’ Art & Queen Victoria’s Bloomers

What didn’t interest Malcolm Forbes? The late publisher collected art, hot air balloons, historical documents, yachts, real estate, motorcycles, maritime artifacts and toys—thousands of them. Now, yet another of his remarkable collections will be sold. That would be the contents—500 lots strong– of Old Battersea House, the 17^th century London home, which he restored in 1970. Among the featured lots at the Lyon & Turnbull sale is “For the Squire,” an oil by Sir John Everett Millais, estimated at $800,000-$1.28m.

Update: The Millais painting sold above its low estimate for $886,412, and the Queen’s bloomers swelled to $15,000, more than three times the high estimate.