The offerings at auction for works by A. Lois White have been decidedly thin, as her best paintings are housed in public galleries and tightly held private collections. The market responds with enthusiasm when a good example comes along, and so it was with Collapse (Lot 53 ). Despite its sobering subject matter (a commentary on the death toll of World War II), the estimate of $100,000-$150,000 was easily surpassed by the five phone bidders who actively engaged to see the work soar to $240,000 and a new record for the artist.
Works are still coming in for auction though. International Art Centre consigned 122 lots for their July Important and Rare sale, with a low-end estimate of $4,200,000 and the usual mix of historical, modern and contemporary works on offer.
In a slower market, buyers are more selective and the two Ralph Hotere works on paper lotted early on in the sale were a case in point. Both were from 1991, oil stick on card, same subject ‘Winter Solstice, Carey’s Bay’ (Lot 6 ) although was larger than lot 7 (Lot 7 ). Lot 6 was well presented and well-priced but elicited scant interest, being passed in at $22,000 against a $25,000 low end estimate. By comparison, lot 7 was extremely well contested by multiple bidders on the floor and internet who had no hesitation in taking it well past the low-end estimate of $12,000 to realise $21,000.
Just five years ago, the highest price for painter Teuane Tibbo was $4,300 but recent renewed interest in the artist has seen her average price rapidly increase. Tibbo’s story is fascinating, she didn’t start painting until she was 71 in the 1960s and she was exhibited by Auckland dealer Barry Lett who was also showing McCahon at the same time. Her naïve but intuitive style captured the interest of fellow artists Pat Hanly and Tony Fomison and she produced hundreds of paintings in a very short time span before she passed away in 1984. A recent touring exhibition may have bought renewed enthusiasm for her paintings from collectors judging by their recent prices.
IAC included four in their sale, and the first of these, Untitled (Lot 9 ) carried a higher estimate than the others and was sold subject at $15,000 against a $20,000 reserve. The other three lots from a different vendor were really lovely examples, with Blue Lagoon (Lot 16 ) well exceeding its low estimate of $10,000 to realise $22,500 as did Rangitoto (Lot 17 ), depicting a rare view of Auckland which sold for $14,000.
A female artist who stayed in New Zealand her whole life but whose best work has a decidedly international feel is A. Lois White who is the latest female artist to feel the scrutiny and focus of collectors. Her most desirable paintings have an Art Deco feel to them with a strong rhythm and stylisation. The offerings at auction for works by A. Lois White have been decidedly thin, as her best paintings are housed in public galleries and tightly held private collections. The market responds with enthusiasm when a good example comes along, and so it was with Collapse (Lot 53 ). Despite its sobering subject matter (a commentary on the death toll of World War II), the estimate of $100,000-$150,000 was easily surpassed by the five phone bidders who actively engaged to see the work soar to $240,000 and a new record for the artist.
Another new auction record was set on the night for Sydney Lough Thompson, whose extremely convivial painting The Artist’s Children, Grasse c. 1930 (Lot 58 ) literally transported the viewer away to the warmer climes of the South of France, with his hazy, dappled light and charming subject matter. Paintings like this are out of fashion in New Zealand so it was a pleasant surprise to see it so well contested by three phone bidders. It realised $62,500 against a low estimate of $40,000.
Max Gimblett, a perennial favourite of the IAC crowd had no less than four examples in the sale, the most impressive being a full gold leaf quatrefoil measuring 127 x 127 cm titled Kingdom (Lot 55 ). This work was extremely popular with prospective buyers before the sale and the $60,000 low estimate was quicky and easily surpassed, selling for $90,000 hammer, well above current retail levels.
A small Bill Hammond painting gracing the cover of the catalogue, had good interest from the internet bidders. A few of these later works have come for sale recently at various auction houses and have done well, as they provide an attractive price point to buy an oil painting by the artist which feature his anthropomorphic bird figures. The detail and quality of the late works generally isn’t as good as those from a few decades earlier which now cost many hundreds of thousands of dollars. But even so, I’m sure that the internet bidder would have been happy to secure Untitled 2013 (Lot 46 ) which had an estimate of $40,000-$60,000 and sold for $62,000.
It wouldn’t be an IAC sale, without a painting by C.F Goldie taking out the top price and this sale certainly delivered in that respect. The painting on offer, Memories Tearara, A Chieftainess of the Arawa Tribe, Rotorua 1933 (lot 51) had last been offered at Dunbar Sloane in Wellington in 2015 and at the time had sold for $450,000. This painting is larger than most, measuring 46 x 41cm which is double the size of most of the Goldie works which come for sale. It carried a presale estimate of $1,000,000 - $1,500,000 and two phone bidders worked away from an $800,000 start, all the way to $1,010,000, sliding in $10,000 over the low estimate proving the Goldie market is still on form at IAC, and providing an exceptional return for the vendor.
A highly anticipated lot which didn’t reach presale expectations was a late period painting by expatriate New Zealand artist Frances Hodgkins. Very few of these oil paintings from her late modernist period in the 1930s come to market – there have been three in the past 10 years in New Zealand. This painting had a solid provenance having been in the collection of Hodgkins patron Lucy Wertheim, so it was surprising that just one bidder offered $350,000 against a low estimate of $450,000 despite the Hodgkins market growing significantly in the past two years. I expect there will be post sale negotiation going on and will await the after-sale results with interest.
It was a similar story with a small oil painting by William Hodges which had been the subject of a New Zealand Herald article prior to the sale due to its interesting back story. Hodges was the artist on Captain Cook’s second voyage to New Zealand in 1772-1775. IAC had consigned A Maori Before a Waterfall in Dusky Bay 1777 (lot 54) from a vendor in New Zealand who had purchased the painting in 2013 from an auction in Germany, where it was believed to be a copy of a larger work held in the Maritime Museum in Greenwich. After years of research, the painting has been confirmed as by Hodges hand, greatly increasing the value from the 14,000 euros paid in Hamburg.
Hodges’ recordings of New Zealand are some of the earliest images by a European and therefore are significant and important historical items. However, it is mainly institutional buyers seeking these types of works, which it must be said are never really available anyway, most having been sold in the decades predating the 1980s. The painting carried an estimate of $800,000 - $1,200,000 which really was a guesstimate of value as without any benchmarks, it’s very difficult to know. AASD records no sales of Hodges paintings of New Zealand since 1975 apart from this particular work which was offered at Christie’s in London in a Topographical sale in 2015 and was unsold at 70,000 pounds.
Now offered back in New Zealand with the full academic scholarship supporting its entry, the vendor must have been hoping for a figure closer to a Goldie price, but without any bids in the room on the night the work was passed in at $400,000 and remains unsold at this time.
Including post auction sales, the sale total was $2,646,450 (hammer), two nights after the sale which represents 63% by value and 68% by lot. As previous sales during the year across all the auction houses have demonstrated, the market is returning to pre-covid levels, where results like this were perfectly normal. This auction shows that the bright spots in the market will continue for those works of exceptional quality and rarity.
