Join Head of Sale Chantal de Prez as she discusses several pieces from our October 2022 sale that should appeal to the keen collector ...
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James Morrison is recognised as one of the most important Scottish artists of the latter-twentieth century, and his work would make an astute addition to any collection. While the delicate painterly quality of his later works cannot be denied, I find the moody, earthier tone of his 1960s paintings irresistible. In Lot 109 Morrison essentialises certain passages of the St. Cyrus landscape to near abstraction, as if to emphasise the strangeness and unknowability of the natural world, an inclination that would later draw him to make painting expeditions to Botswana and the Arctic Circle. Morrison’s Arctic voyages were recently commemorated in the 2021 BBC film ‘Eye of the Storm’, which can be rented by clicking here.
A later work by Morrison also features in the auction, Lot 52.
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Alan Davie is an internationally-acclaimed artist whose distinctive visual language comprises symbols and pattern influenced by jazz music, spirituality, and global traditional art. Lots 4 and 5 both come with Gimpel Fils provenance, and present an exciting opportunity to acquire work by a key name in modern Scottish painting. An interesting review of Davie’s career titled ‘Beginning of a Far-Off World’ is currently on view at the Dovecot Gallery until 24th September 2022, featuring rarely-seen artworks from across the artist’s career.
To view a further gouache by Davie, please click here.
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As interest grows in modern Scottish woman artists, Millie Frood’s work has started to enjoy the attention it deserves. Frood was born in Motherwell in 1900 and trained at the Glasgow School of Art. She was a founding member of the New Scottish Group which coalesced in postwar Glasgow following J.D. Fergusson and Margaret Morris’ arrival from France. Of the two works by Frood that feature in this auction, I’m particularly drawn to Lot 2, the powerful 1960 oil ‘Approaching Night’, in which blocky, conceivably-architectural forms are scrambled by a blitz of frenetic pigment.
Don’t miss Frood’s other oil ‘Escape’, Lot 10, as well as a line-drawing by line-drawn portrait by fellow New Scottish Group member Jankel Adler, Lot 49.
Jersey-born Blampied is best-remembered as an etcher, but from the late 1920s he also began to produce oils to acclaim, particularly from American collectors. Lot 45 ‘Two Dancers’ brims with personality and dynamism, a quality likely indebted to Blampied’s work as a caricaturist and illustrator in the inter-war years. This work appears to have been produced post-war, when after being made R.B.A. Blampied returned to Jersey, where he worked predominantly in oil and watercolour for the remainder of his life.
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Alberto Morrocco is best-known for his evocative portrayals of Italian life. This stylish landscape drawing of Barga in Tuscany, lot 51, will be of interest to Morrocco collectors as it exemplifies the artist’s deft and assured markmaking. A still life of fruit rendered with Morrocco’s distinctive vibrant palette is also offered in the auction as Lot 3 – click here to find out more.
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Prints & multiples are an ever-developing market, and present the opportunity to acquire works by significant artists at a more accessible price-point. Procktor shot to fame in the early 1960s, due in part to his inclusion in the Whitechapel Gallery’s New Generation exhibition, which also featured work by David Hockney, Bridget Riley and John Hoyland. Lot 30, the aquatint ‘Mirrors’, dates to 1969-70, and depicts Prockter’s friends Gervase Griffiths and Eric Emerson in a New York apartment. It comes from the ‘Invitation to a Voyage’ series based on drawings Prockter made in 1968.
A selection of prints & multiples are offered in Paintings & Works on Paper. To browse, click here.
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Peter Howson’s work is instantly-recognisable and highly collectable. His dark forays into masculinity, physicality and urban living often play out on the streets of Glasgow . Several Howson drawings feature in the auction, but my favourite has to be lot 21, ‘Rabbie on the Prowl’, on account of its wicked humour.
To view further works by Howson in the auction, click here.
CHANTAL DE PREZ | HEAD OF SALE
chantal.deprez@lyonandturnbull.com