Old Masters

Three years after Christie’s sold an earlier version for £20m, a second version of John Constable’s (1776-1837) The Lock is being offered at Sotheby’s Old Master & British Paintings Sale on December 9.

In the 1984 book ‘The Late Paintings and Drawings of John Constable’ by Graham Reynolds, a pencil drawing of the back and shoulders of the artist’s wife Mrs Maria Constable (nee Bicknell) is described as ‘whereabouts unknown’.

A High Court judge has dismissed a claim made against Sotheby’s surrounding the sale of a disputed version of Caravaggio’s ‘The Card Sharps’.

The outstanding lot of the latest Old Master auction series in London, ‘Rome, from Mount Aventine’ by J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851), was knocked down at £27m at Sotheby’s evening sale, setting a record price for the artist.

The opening salvos have been fired in the court case centred on the version of Caravaggio’s ‘The Card Sharps’ which sold at Sotheby’s in 2006.

While two of the top prices of the London auctions last week came for ancient sculptures – the £14m Old Kingdom Egyptian limestone statue at Christie’s and the £8.3m for the Roman marble of Aphrodite (c.41-54AD) at Sotheby’s – there was also a bumper run of Old Master and British picture sales.

The earliest dated picture by the 17th century Dutch master Johannes Vermeer (1632-75), one of only two works by the artist left in private hands, will be a highlight of Christie’s Old Masters auction in London next month.

A rare painting of two big cats by George Stubbs will be offered for sale at Sotheby’s Old Master sale in London on July 9.

An appeal to buy Van Dyck’s final self-portrait for the nation, painted in England in 1640-41, has been given a boost by the news that a lower price is expected.

A rare early work by the Dutch Old Master painter Dirck Van Delen (c.1605-1671) will be offered at Halls of Shrewsbury on April 16.

Christie’s has announced a major consignment of Old Master drawings which will be offered over the next two years in a series of sales in London, Amsterdam and Paris.

The fundraising campaign to buy Van Dyck’s final self-portrait for the National Portrait Gallery will continue into the summer.

This pencil drawing by John Constable inscribed ‘Binfiled Decr. 6th 1816’ is believed to have made when the artist was staying in Binfield in Berkshire whilst returning from his honeymoon in Dorset with his wife Maria.

A lost portrait of Robert Burns by Alexander Nasmyth – thought to be the only one taken from life left in private hands – is to go on loan for display in the poet’s final home in Dumfries.

The vast collection of the late Dr Gustav Rau provided the top lot of London’s latest series of Old Master auctions as a portrait by Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806) took a record £15.2m at Bonhams.

A small painting bought as part of a £30 “job lot” at auction has turned out to be an original by the 19th century British artist John Constable and valued at £250,000.

The J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles has purchased the self-portrait by Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606-69) which is now known as Rembrandt Laughing.

Sotheby’s have issued a defence in response to a High Court claim made over a work sold at auction which was attributed to a ‘follower’ of Caravaggio.

An Old Master by the 17th century French painter Charles le Brun has been discovered hanging unattributed in the Hôtel Ritz in Paris.

Nestled among a 173-lot ‘time capsule’ collection from a Staffordshire estate offered at Hanson’s on January 12, the Old Master picture shown here proved to be the star performer of the sale by some considerable margin.