A rare red coral group representing Guanyin with musicians finely sculpted, China, Qing Dynasty, beginning 20th century
A rare red coral group representing Guanyin with musicians finely sculpted, China, Qing Dynasty, beginning 20th century. Photo Cambi Casa d'Aste
1956gr., h 28cm. Estimation : 10 000 / 15 000 €
Cambi Casa d'Aste. Mercredi 22 mai 2013. Castello Mackenzie - Mura di San Bartolomeo 16. Contact: Emilie Volka 0039 (0) 108395029 -emilie@cambiaste.com
Ashmolean announces major acquisition of "John Ruskin" by John Everett Millais
John Everett Millais (1829–1896), John Ruskin, 1853–4. Oil on canvas, 78.7 x 68 cm, inscribed ‘JM (monogram) 1854’.
OXFORD.- The Ashmolean announced the acquisition of one of the most important Pre-Raphaelite paintings remaining in private ownership – the celebrated portrait of John Ruskin by John Everett Millais. The picture, which was recently exhibited in Tate’s major exhibition, Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde, has been on loan to the Ashmolean since January 2012. It has been allocated to the Ashmolean by the Arts Council England under the Acceptance in Lieu of Inheritance (AIL) scheme.
The portrait was started in the summer of 1853 while the artist, sitter, and Ruskin’s wife were staying in Glen Finglas, a remote area of the Trossachs north of Glasgow. It was during this holiday that Millais fell in love with Effie Ruskin, setting in motion the events which would break the Ruskins’ marriage, Millais’s friendship with Ruskin, and the artist’s engagement with the Pre-Raphaelite movement. Finishing the picture was to become, for Millais, “the most hateful task I have ever had to perform.”
The portrait was commissioned by John Ruskin on behalf of his father, John James. Ruskin hoped that in this work he would be able to oversee Millais’s artistic development. In accordance with the true principles of Pre-Raphaelitism, Ruskin insisted that the landscape should be painted on the spot, in spite of bad weather and swarms of midges. He told his father that ”Millais has fixed on this place, a lovely piece of worn rock, with foaming water and weeds, and moss, and a noble overhanging bank of dark crag, and I am to be standing looking quietly down the stream, just the sort of thing I used to do for hours together …. We shall have the two most wonderful torrents in the world, Turner’s St Gothard and Millais’s Glenfinlas.” Ruskin saw Millais as the heir in landscape painting to his great hero, J.M.W. Turner, who died in 1851. Earlier in that year, he had jumped to the defence of Millais and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in two famous letters to The Times. Two of the paintings he praised are now in the Ashmolean: Charles Allston Collins’s Convent Thoughts; and Millais’s own Return of the Dove to the Ark. Ruskin had high expectations for the portrait, which he declared “will make a revolution in landscape painting”.
The Ruskins’ marriage was annulled in July 1854 on the grounds that the marriage had not been consummated and a year later Millais married Effie. The portrait was not exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1854, as had no doubt been expected when it was begun, and Ruskin must always have had mixed feelings about it. In 1871, he gave it to his closest friend in Oxford, Henry Wentworth Acland, later Regius Professor of Medicine, who had been present in Scotland when the picture was begun. It hung in his house in Oxford, and remained in the family until sold by his descendants for a record price at Christie’s in 1965, where it was bought by the late owner.
Prof Christopher Brown CBE, Director, Ashmolean Museum, said: “We are hugely grateful to the Arts Council for their support in allocating this extraordinary picture to the Ashmolean. The portrait is of supreme importance for the study of 19th-century British art and it will be shown with the Museum’s world-renowned Pre-Raphaelite collection.”
Peter Bazalgette, Chair, Arts Council England, said: “It’s wonderful that such a celebrated portrait is now on permanent public display at the Ashmolean Museum. This was one of the finest pieces at the Tate’s sell-out exhibition on the Pre-Raphaelites, and can now be admired by even more people.
“Acceptance in Lieu is an important part of the Arts Council’s work. Thanks to this scheme, unique cultural objects which for years may have been glimpsed only in textbooks are once again being displayed for everyone to enjoy.”
Landmark exhibition returns Sir Horace Walpole's collection to its original setting
Pieter Paul Rubens, Friar’s Head. Oil on canvas. ©The State Hermitage Museum.
LONDON.- The magnificent art collection amassed by Great Britain’s first Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole, has been reassembled in its original home of Houghton Hall for the first time in over 200 years. The most celebrated British collection of the 18th century, it was acquired in 1779 by Catherine the Great in a landmark private sale negotiated by James Christie, founder of Christie’s. The core of the collection went on to adorn the Hermitage in St. Petersburg.
Christie’s is sponsoring Houghton Revisited which includes paintings from the English, French, Italian, Flemish and Spanish schools, with masterpieces by Van Dyck, Poussin, Albani, Rubens, Rembrandt, Velazquez and Murillo. The public exhibition sees all of the paintings hung in their original positions in the State Rooms, precisely recreating the collection’s splendour.
Houghton Hall, now the family seat of Sir Robert Walpole’s direct descendant, the 7th Marquess of Cholmondeley, is considered one of the country’s finest Palladian houses. The Hall was designed to house Walpole’s prized collection of Old Master paintings, and the magnificent interiors and furnishings designed by William Kent are also still intact.
Steven P. Murphy, CEO of Christie’s: “We are proud and honoured to be sponsoring this exhibition and applaud the efforts of everyone who has been involved in this hugely ambitious and exciting project.
"The Walpole Collection is legendary and one of the greatest endeavours of art collecting. It is also part of Christie’s history having been sold to Catherine the Great by our founder, James Christie, in 1779 in what remains one of the most significant private sales of all time. As we see a significant cultural shift with more and more people globally engaging with art, at all levels, this exhibition acts as inspiration to all those who admire art and who curate these wonderful objects. Christie’s in proud to be a part of the history of the Walpole Collection once again.”
In 1778 James Christie was hired by George, 3rd Earl of Orford, nephew of Horace Walpole, who was looking to sell his uncle’s celebrated art collection. A number of options were explored, including a proposal by John Wilkes, the Member of Parliament for Middlesex, that the collection be acquired by the nation and housed in the British Museum (the National Gallery was not founded until 1824). In a letter to Walpole’s lawyer, James Christie wrote: "If the Minister had a mind to immortalize himself I could put him in the way to do it effectually by causing this collection to be purchas'd at the expense of the publick and Building a Room at the British Museum for their reception. I would undertake that it would be the means of bringing all the Foreigners of Taste from different Parts of the World to see them and it would most undoubtedly correct the Taste and qualify the Judgements of our Modern Artists."
In 1779, with no public funds forthcoming and Catherine the Great eager to acquire the collection, James Christie negotiated its sale for a total of £40,550. The collection of approximately 200 paintings sailed to Russia on the frigate Natalia and, despite rumours of shipwreck amidst heavy seas it arrived safely in St. Petersburg.
The sale represented arguably the most significant art transaction since Oliver Cromwell instructed an auction of the Royal Collection following the execution of Charles I in 1649. It secured the international reputation of James Christie who had founded Christie’s 13 years before in London, a city booming both culturally and commercially, and who had already earned great prominence having sold Property of H.R.H. The Princess of Wales, mother of George III, six years earlier. His success was to continue as he built the foundations for the company which is known today, and which has since overseen the transfer of many of the world’s most celebrated art collections and works of art.
Christie’s has worked closely with museums and public art institutions throughout its history and continues to support initiatives which increase public access to works of art. Other major initiatives in the United Kingdom in 2013 include sponsorship of the National Gallery’s ‘Masterpiece Tour’; 'The Arts Council Collection Partnerships' supported by Christie’s; and ongoing work as national sponsor of The Public Catalogue Foundation.
David Teniers, Kitchen. Oil on canvas. ©The State Hermitage Museum.
Quartz included with Plancheite and some other unknown mineral (possibly Conichalcite)
Quartz included with Plancheite and some other unknown mineral (possibly Conichalcite)
A small turquoise vase decorated with flowers, China, Qing Dynasty, 19th century
A small turquoise vase decorated with flowers, China, Qing Dynasty, 19th century. Photo Cambi Casa d'Aste
h cm 10 - Estimation : 1 500 / 2 000 €
Cambi Casa d'Aste. Jeudi 23 mai 2013. Castello Mackenzie - Mura di San Bartolomeo 16. Contact: Emilie Volka 0039 (0) 108395029 -emilie@cambiaste.com
A turquoise capped vase finely sculpted with floral motives, China, Qing Dynasty, Qianlong Period (1736-1795)
A turquoise capped vase finely sculpted with floral motives, China, Qing Dynasty, Qianlong Period (1736-1795). Photo Cambi Casa d'Aste
h cm 23,5 - Estimation : 6 000 / 8 000 €
Cambi Casa d'Aste. Jeudi 23 mai 2013. Castello Mackenzie - Mura di San Bartolomeo 16. Contact: Emilie Volka 0039 (0) 108395029 -emilie@cambiaste.com
Smoky Quartz and Amazonite with a small patch of clear & purple Fluorite
Smoky Quartz and Amazonite with a small patch of clear & purple Fluorite
A rock crystal group representing Pho dogs with puppet, China, Qing Dynasty, 19th century
A rock crystal group representing Pho dogs with puppet, China, Qing Dynasty, 19th century. Photo Cambi Casa d'Aste
h cm 16 - Estimation : 1 000 / 1 500 €
Cambi Casa d'Aste. Jeudi 23 mai 2013. Castello Mackenzie - Mura di San Bartolomeo 16. Contact: Emilie Volka 0039 (0) 108395029 -emilie@cambiaste.com
