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Sotheby's partners with Old Master galleries in London and New York for new online sales
The auction house has collaborated with 39 world-renowned Old Master dealers for two dedicated online sales, respectively entitled "The Dealer's Eye: London" and "The Dealer's Eye: New York".
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People pass by a Sotheby's auction house logo in the Russian History Museum in Moscow, 23 May 2007. (AFP/Maxim Marmur)
T
he auction house Sotheby's has collaborated with 39 world-renowned Old Master dealers for two dedicated online sales, respectively entitled "The Dealer's Eye: London" and "The Dealer's Eye: New York", which will run on June 18 to 25.
These concurrent auctions will offer exceptional examples of Old Master and 19th century paintings and drawings, which were curated by leading dealers such as Wildenstein, Richard Feigen, Derek Johns, Patrick Matthiesen and Sam Fogg.
"The Dealer's Eye: London" will present over 66 pieces by Old Masters such as Jacopo Bassano, Thomas Gainsborough and Anthony Van Dyck, which are collectively expected to bring in between £2.7 million and £4 million (around $3.4 million and $5.0 million).
Among the most coveted lots is "A View of the River Arno with the Ponte Alle Grazie, Florence" by British artist Thomas Patch, which is estimated to sell for between £200,000 and £300,000 (around $250,480 and $375,720).
This masterwork, selected by Robilant Fine Art, was last seen at auction in 2008 at Sotheby's New York, where it sold over ten times its pre-sale estimate and fetched $433,000.
Meanwhile, Benappi Fine Art consigned Pseudo-Tommaso Salini's enigmatic "Portrait of a Young Man as Bacchus", which is believed to achieve up to £60,000 (around $74,144).
The New York installment of "The Dealer's Eye" will offer 51 works by artists of the likes of Govert Flinck and Elisabeth-Louise Vigée Le Brun, with the sale expected to run at £2.3 million to £3.3 million (around $2.9 million and $4.1 million).
Read also: Sotheby's New York spring sales set for London, without an audience
Among them is an elegant bust-length portrait of a "Young Girl in Antique Costume" by Elisabeth-Louise Vigée Le Brun, which is estimated between $60,000 and $80,000, as well as a pair of flower still-lifes by 17th-century French painter Jean Michel Picart, expected to go under the hammer for up to $120,000.
"With The Dealer's Eye, we've created our own version of an art fair, where dealers can continue to promote the works that make their individual galleries so unique. It gives me great pleasure to be able to support our gallery peers with this online sales initiative, as well as offer our clients this opportunity to acquire works specially curated by some of the most internationally-renowned Old Master galleries," Otto Naumann, who is Sotheby's Client Development Director for Old Masters, said in a statement.
With galleries temporarily closed and art fairs postponed in light of the coronavirus pandemic, the Old Masters market is forced to adapt in order to attract a new generation of buyers.
In April, Sotheby's held an online-only auction presenting a collection of works from the gallery of Rafael Valls, which more than tripled its pre-sale estimate to achieve a total of £1.6 million (around $2.0 million).
The auction house achieved similar success in May with the online sale "Refining Taste: Works Selected by Danny Katz", during which over 60% of the lots sold above their high-estimates.
"Old Master dealers currently have limited access to their clients, and are bound to find particularly welcome the wide exposure provided by collaboration with Sotheby's," London-based dealer Charles Beddington said in a statement.
Beddington added that Sotheby's "The Dealer's Eye" series are "particularly welcome during a period when online auctions of Old Master paintings are doing particularly well, confounding those inclined to see this as a field not particularly suited to selling online."
