However, though the trade might not have thought much of the content at Knightsbridge, the sale notched up a total of £491,200 – some £50,000 up on the equivalent sale last year – and of the 260-odd lots on offer, 76 per cent found buyers, most of them private invididuals.
In the absence of major Montague Dawsons or James Wilson Carmichaels, Bonhams & Brooks, like other London auctioneers, have become increasingly reliant on contemporary marine painters to generate turnover.
John Steven Dews (b.1949) is generally regarded as the most talented of these artists, an assessment borne out by the day’s top price of £60,000, right on the lower estimate, paid for this ‘modern’ painting, pictured, of the J-class yachts Endeavour racing Velsheda in the Solent
in 1934.
Sailing against the trade winds
“One of their less distinguished sales. There were one or two decent things, but there was no heavyweight stuff...an example of too many auctions of marine things with not enough stock to go round.” Such was the assessment of one leading West End specialist dealer of Bonhams & Brooks (15/10% buyer’s premium) September 5 sale of Marine Works of Art.
