So, while a few of the works in Sotheby’s upcoming sale of his personal collection include his paintings, most of the lots are pieces by other artists with which he surrounded himself. These include pieces such as a 19th century Persian carpet, a 16th century pilgrim flask, an 18th century Japanese plaque and as well as a painting by Hodgkin’s contemporary Patrick Caulfield.
“Howard liked the idea of a sale after his death. The objects have served their purpose to him. They were what he called his ‘must haves’ that, in some mysterious way, fed his work,” says his partner Antony Peattie.
Highlights will be exhibited in Mumbai, Dubai and London before going under the hammer in London on October 24.
A dedicated collector
Hodgkin defined his urge to collect as “an almost unquenchable thirst for acquiring other things to look at”. In the 1970s he traded in antiques as a means to supplement his painting career and by the time of his first retrospective in 1976 at the Museum of Modern Art he was better known as a collector than as a painter.
Over the course of 30 years he built up an extensive and varied collection in his London home in Bloomsbury. His taste ran particularly to ornamental objects and fragments and he also built up an assortment of individual tiles from different periods and cultures.
The collection reflects the friendships he enjoyed with artists including Caulfield, Robyn Denny, Peter Blake and Stephen Buckley. The two paintings of his own he kept both came from his ICA show in 1962, Bedroom and Travelling. These are included in the sale.
