“Silvery Moonlight” by John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836-1893), one of Yorkshire’s most significant 19th century artists, is coming up for sale in Tennants Auctioneers’ British, European and Sporting Art Sale on 12th November with an estimate of £80,000-120,000 plus buyer’s premium. The painting is from the estate of Denton Hall in Ilkley, Yorkshire which was part of the NG Bailey group of companies for over 40 years until its recent sale. NG Bailey is the UK’s leading independent engineering and services business and is owned by the Bailey family.
John Atkinson Grimshaw was born in Leeds in 1836 and was famous for his paintings of urban, moonlit nocturnal scenes, which he painted from the late 1860s onwards. Inspired by photography which flourished in the Victorian era, he found a passion for realism and would use a camera obscura to project scenes onto canvas. This made for extremely realistic urban scenes. Coupled with Grimshaw’s virtuoso handling of colour, lighting, and shadows for which his friend James McNeill Whistler’s commended, his urban pictures boast gritty and stunning emotion and strong narratives.
An impressive example of the work of Richard Ansdell (1815-1885), “Going to the Lodge – Scotch Shootings”, will be offered with an estimate of £40,000-60,000. Richard Ansdell RA was born in Liverpool, the son of a dock worker, but became one of the most prominent painters of sporting and genre scenes in Victorian Britain. It is rumoured that despite Ansdell’s illustrious clientele, he never quite attained royal patronage like fellow animal painter Landseer because after Queen Victoria asked Ansdell to paint her favourite dogs, he stubbornly refused demanding that the dogs be brought to his studio, rather than him going the Royal Palaces. This charming picture was painted at a time when Richard Ansdell was embarking on a life-long love affair with the Scottish Highlands. For four months every year he would visit the Highlands to stay with family and friends in the lodge he built, mixing with the local people, and sensitively recording their daily lives with a backdrop of the dramatic Scottish landscape.
On the same theme is ‘Highland Gamekeeper’ by John Frederick Herring Snr. (1795-1865) (estimate: £30,000-50,000). John Frederick Herring Snr. was a celebrated sporting and animal painter in Victorian England. Prior to devoting his life to painting, he was a night coachman and painted insignia for coaches and inn signs. Herring first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1818. For an animal painter this was an incredible honour since sporting and animal pictures were not deemed “high art”.
A luminous 'breakfast' still life from the Dutch Golden Age deemed to have come from the Studio of Jan Davidzoon de Heem (1606-1683/4) will be sold with an estimate of £15,000-20,000. Recent further evaluation of the painting by Dr Fred G. Meijer, the leading scholar on de Heem, judges that this work was most likely painted in the artist's studio circa 1645-8, probably based on a composition prepared by de Heem and within his close vicinity. Jan Davidz. de Heem was born in Utrecht and remains one of the greatest Dutch still-life painters of the 17th century.
The sale will also offer a strong selection of Sporting Art, with notable lots including ‘A Study of two Setters at rest after a day in the field’ and ‘Spaniel and Grouse amongst the Heather’, both by William Woodhouse (1857-1939) (estimates £3,000-5,000 and £5,000-7,000 respectively). Paintings from the Contents of Ballachrink, Isle of Man, from the Estate of Nancy Sutton will also be included in the sale (the rest of the collection being sold in the Autumn Fine Sale on the same day), with highlights such as “Forfeits” by George Bernard O’Neill (1828-1917) on offer with an estimate of £6,000-9,000.
The sale will be on view to the public at Tennants Auctioneers’ Leyburn salerooms from 6th – 11th November.
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