Auction Preview: Bonham's 19th Century Paintings London

John William Waterhouse
The Courtship (Sweet Offerings)
oil on canvas
24 x 12.5 in.

On July 10th, Great Britain's Bonhams Auction House, will be hosting a sale of 19th Century Paintings, Drawings , and Watercolours at their London salesroom.  Among the 134 lots up for bid are several by well-known European artists, among them Alfred de Bréanski Sr., Benjamin Williams Leader, Frederick Morgan, John Simmons, John Atkinson Grimshaw, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Eugène Delacroix, Jean-François Millet, Ignacio Zuloaga, John William Godward, Henry Herbert La Thangue, Sir Frank Brangwyn, Stanhope Forbes, Henry Tonks, Henry Scott Tuke, and Sir William Russell Flint.  But the most intriguing pieces in the auction are by two English contemporaries, John William Waterhouse and Sir Edward John Poynter.  The works by both artists were only recently re-discovered - Waterhouse's Sweet Offerings was known by name only; and Poynter's celebrated Ionian Dance was documented through engraved reproductions, but was feared lost forever.  It will be interesting to see how the works are received on the auction block.

Prior to the sale on July 10th, Bonham's auction of 19th Century Paintings will be available for viewing  at the auction house's salesroom on New Bond Street.  The preview times are as follows:

July 7     11:00 - 15:00

July 8     09:00 - 16:30

July 9     09:00 - 16:30

July 10    09:00 - 12:00

Bonham's will also be holding a special American viewing of Sir Edward John Poynter's The Ionian Dance at their New York City salesroom from June 21st through the 26th.  Please contact the New York City facility for times.

The full catalog is also available for online viewing by visiting Bonham's website.

Sir Edward John Poynter
The Ionian Dance - Motus doceri gaudet Ionicos, Matura virgo, et fingitur artibus (1895)
oil on canvas
15.25 x 20 in.

John William Godward
A Beauty
oil on canvas
20 x 16 in.

Franz Xavier Kosler
Nada, jeune Beduin, Sinai
oil on panel
14.25 x 8.25 in.

Rubens Santoro
In the Gondola, Venice
oil on canvas
20 x 15 in.

Vittorio Emanuele Bressanin
Breaking the News (1886)
oil on canvas
27.25 x 43 in.

William Teulon Blandford Fletcher
Feeding Time
oil on canvas
20 x 16.125 in.

Terrick John Williams
The Market Under the Trees (1900)
oil on canvas
20 x 30.125 in.

Henry Tonks
After the Bath (1911)
oil on canvas
42 x 38 in.

Stanhope Alexander Forbes
Out Into the Dark and Silence (1900)
oil on canvas
31.5 x 38.25 in.

George Cole
Early Morning on the Tamar, Devon (1872)
oil on canvas
34.25 x 48 in.

Auction Preview: Christie's Important Victorian & British Impressionist Art

Edmund Blair Leighton
The Dedication (1908)
oil on canvas
55 X 43 in.

With its upcoming auction of Important Victorian & British Impressionist Art, Christie's Auction House in London has indicated that they expect good sales due to the recent global success of the exhibit, Pre-Raphaelites:  Avant Garde (now in Moscow, after stops in London and Washington, D.C.).  Though there are several nice pieces in the auction done by members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood - in particular, Love Among the Ruins by Sir Edward Burne-Jones - the sale appears to be much stronger in other areas of 19th century British art.  The impressionist canvases of the Newlyn School are among those very well represented with pieces by Sir George Clausen and his followers, but, to me, the stand-out artwork in the auction is that of Edmund Blair Leighton, whose painting The Dedication is a recent re-discovery of a piece which had not been seen on the open market for over seventy-five years.

Christie's sale of Important Victorian & British Impressionist Art will take place on July 11th, at 2:30 PM at the auction house's King Street location.  For those able to visit, previews of all lots in the show will accessible to the public from the afternoon of July 7th through the morning of July 11th (dates and times are listed below).  The full catalog is also available for online viewing by visiting Christie's website.

VIEWING TIMES

July 7,     12PM - 5PM

July 8,     9AM - 4:30PM

July 9,     9AM - 8PM

July 10,     9AM - 4:30PM

July 11,     9AM - 12PM

John William Waterhouse
Day Dreams
pencil and watercolor, heightened with body color, on paper
17.75 X 10.375 in.

John William Waterhouse
Sketch for 'A Mermaid'
oil on canvas
27.75 X 17.75 in.

Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema
The Poet Gallus Dreaming
oil on panel
9.5 X 6.5 in.

Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema
Una Carita
oil on board
4.25 X 3.25 in.

Henry Scott Tuke
The Orange Jersey (1913)
oil on canvas
17.25 X 24.75 in.

Edward Seago
Fishing Boats - Honfleur
oil on board
20 X 25.875 in.

John William North
The Grass of the Field (1880)
oil on canvas
52.5 X 74.5 in.

Sir Alfred James Munnings
Western Hunt, Zennor Hill (1912)
oil on canvas
19.75 X 23.75 in.

Sir Alfred James Munnings
December Morning, Cornwall
oil on canvas
20 X 24 in.

Arthur Wardle
A Fairy Tale - "All seemed to sleep, the timid hare on form." – Scott
oil on canvas
45 X 65.25 in.

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones
Love Among the Ruins
watercolor and bodycolor on paper
38 X 60 in.

Harold C. Harvey
Fishing by a Woodland Stream (1906)
oil on canvas
24 X 20 in.

Sir George Clausen
The Barn Door
oil on canvas
30 X 25 in.

Frank Bramley
Fireside Tales (1896)
oil on canvas
23 X 23.25 in.

Glyn Warren Philpot
Portrait of Ellen Borden Stevenson
oil on canvas
32 X 24 in.

Augustus Leopold Egg
Contemplation
oil on board
13.75 X 11.125 in.

Sir John Everett Millais
Sisters (1868)
oil on canvas
42.5 X 42.5 in.

Anna Lea Merritt
Eve (1885)
oil on canvas
30 X 43 in.

Workshop: Ryan Brown in Vancouver

Ryan Brown will be teaching back-to-back, 5-day workshops next month, and there are only a few spots available for interested students.  The first workshop, running from July 8th through the 12th, will concentrate on landscape painting, while the second, from the 15th through the 19th, will focus on the portrait.  Both workshops are being held at the Northwest Fine Art Studio in Vancouver, British Columbia.

While studying illustration at Brigham Young University, Brown found that his interests in 19th century Academic and Naturalist working methods were not being satisfied.  So in his senior year, he entered into a private study with William Whitaker, a figure painter renowned for his immaculate technique.  But when Brown received his degree in 2002, he felt he had only just scratched the surface of his assimilation of traditional methods, and he decided to move to Europe to finish his training.  Over several more years of intensive study, he eventually completed the rigorous drawing and painting program offered by the Florence Academy of Art in Italy.

Since returning to the Untied States, it has been Brown's goal to pass on the training he received in Academic art to a new generation of artists.  He has taught many classes and conducted many workshops throughout at the country, including teaching regular courses at his alma mater, BYU.  Several years ago, he opened his own school in Utah, the Center for Academic Study and Naturalist Painting (CAS), which offers a 5 year, full-time program.

In a recent interview, Brown had this to say about taking workshops:

Workshops can be great fun and a great resource for information for students. It’s a great opportunity to expand your thinking and experience other working methods. But for all the good workshops offer, they do have their limits.

I think there are a couple of things students can do to prepare for and take advantage of workshops. 

First, if possible, have a home base for your training. If you have a program or respected artist close to home that can provide you with a stable curriculum to follow that will help you build a solid foundation, this will help tremendously when branching out to experience different approaches. It grounds your learning and gives you a context by which to compare and understand other methods. 

Secondly, spend as much time as you need learning to draw. Perhaps the most important and the most common critiques I give to workshop attendees have to do with the correction of drawing errors. Nothing will make your time in any workshop more valuable than having developed strong drawing skills. Drawing is the fundamental first step towards being a good painter. Having said this, I don’t believe you have to be a master draftsman before you take a workshop;  it’s just a good idea to always be working on your drawing skills, and the more you do so, the more I believe you will be open to learning in any given workshop. 

Lastly, have realistic goals when attending a workshop. Don’t put undue pressure on yourself to create something amazing. Disconnect your desire to create from your desire to learn. Remember that the real prize you’ll bring home from a workshop is new information and knowledge. 

One of the most important pieces of advice I can share with any student is to be fair with themselves. Learning cannot be rushed. It takes as long as it takes. Don’t allow your impatience to overcome your determination to improve. Develop the discipline and patience that you need to succeed. 

And don’t be afraid to communicate your hopes with the instructor. A good instructor should want to know what you hope to learn and help you towards it.

The Northwest Fine Art Studio is located at 8091 Williams Road, Unit 14, in Richmond, B.C., just 15 minutes south of the Vancouver Airport.  For more information on their workshops, please visit their website.

Brown will also be offering a condensed 3-day portrait painting workshop in Miami this September. For more information on that workshop, please contact the Old Masters Atelier. 

See the earlier Underpaintings post on the making of Ryan Brown's painting,

The Loneliness of Waiting, by clicking here.

Out and About with Munnings

This is a busy summer for British painter Sir Alfred J. Munnings (1878-1959).  Not only is he one of the main characters in the film Summer in February - opening tomorrow in Great Britain - he is also the subject of a retrospective exhibition currently on view at the National Sporting Library & Museum in Middleburg, Virginia.  The show, Munnings:  Out in the Open, features 68 of the artist's outdoor compositions, including paintings of gypsy life, livestock, the English countryside, and, of course, equestrian life.  And one section of the exhibition is specifically dedicated to works created by Munnings between 1912 and 1914, the time period which coincides with the storyline of Summer in February.  The works in the show which are not part of the museum's permanent collection, are on loan from private collectors; the Pebble Hill Plantation in Thomasville, Georgia; the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in Saratoga, New York; The Yale Center for British Arts in New Haven, Connecticut; and the Sir Alfred Munnings Art Museum in Dedham, England. It is the largest exhibition of Munnings' work in the United States in the past thirty years, and many of the paintings on display have never before been seen in this country.

Munnings:  Out in the Open is on view until September 15th, 2013 (admission is free).  A 136 page color catalog accompanies the show, and is available at the National Sporting Library & Museum store for $30 plus shipping.  For more details, please visit the museum's website.

Dan Stevens (Gilbert Evans), Emily Browning (Florence "Blote" Carter-Wood),
and Dominic Cooper (A.J. Munnings) in a still from Summer in February.

Thank you to Suzanne Lago Arthur and Jill Banks.

Read more about Munnings:  Out in the Open on Armand Cabrera's blog, Art and Influence.