Bringing no new names, the revelations suggest there could be openings for new collectors in the market as Mr. Kennedy is in the process of selling his collection and Mr. Schwarzenbach's purchase is among 200 which have filled the bush gallery he bought to house them.
The Garangulah collection, as it might be now known, has an air of completion about it.
The tiny head and shoulders portrait, of White by Dumfries (Scotland) born Thomas Watling hit the market completely out of the blue when it sold in December 2007 for £105,750 against an initial estimate of £500 (upped to £3000 to £4000 just before the auction).
A miniature oil on ivory in untouched condition, the lot made its price despite very limited awareness of its offering by Australian punters which includes the normally alert antiquarian book trade.
It sold at an auction held by Gorringe's of Lewes in East Sussex. The buyer's identity appears to have remained unknown until the current present apparition.
The State Library of NSW learned of it only on the day of the sale, and, restrained in its ability to research the work, put in only a modest bid. Dealer Anne McCormick of Hordern House did not know of its existence until after the sale.
The miniature is now catalogued as had been speculated, as the work of convict artist Thomas Watling, whose signature it bears, and John White, as the sitter. White died in the Lewes area.
A likeness of White otherwise only appears in a drawing in London's Natural History Museum.
After transport to Sydney for forging a one guinea note Watling was assigned to White and made no bones about the fact that he did not like the doctor. This almost shows in the portrait which does not flatter him.
A handsome book revealing Mr. Shwarzenbach's find was published several years ago but does not appear to have gone into general distribution.
However, knowledge of its existence - including public library holdings - and the find which it illuminates – one of many – has gained currency from a party late last year to launch the collection at the rural gallery where it is housed.
Garangula: a bush gallery by John McPhee, Michael Reid, and Joanna Mendelssohn was issued in a limited edition of 200.
This difficult to track down book should prove an important document on taste in Australia over forty years, and a guide to buying by of one of the men who has helped shape its economics.
The rarest works in the Garangulah collection is probably Animaux de la Nouvelle Hollande. It is a watercolour painted by Charles - Alexandre Lesueur and was painted in 1807.
With its echoes of the American artist John Hicks Peacable Kingdom, the small 21 x 26 work last came up at Christie's art sale in August 1997 when it made $211,500.'
Most of Charles-Alexandre Lesueur's drawings and watercolours of Australian subjects are in the Musee d'Histoire Naturelle du Havre, France.
This attractive, as well as historically important work, was executed in France soon after the artist's return from one of the most significant scientific expeditions ever mounted by the French, under the command of Nicholas Baudin.
The image is seen as reflecting the belief the eighteenth century philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau had in a calm and ordered world in which man could learn to live in harmony with nature.
It was painted at a time when most of the population could still remember the terror of the French Revolution.
Hopefully in time the collection in which it stars will be on view to the general public as those housing the collections of merchants Thomas Mort and Thomas Smart in Darling Point were a century and a half ago.
It joins the more widely publicised book by Mr. John Symond on his collection.
Showing the importance of the overseas association in moulding the market, the “launch” of the John Symond collection coincided with a reported offer by an unidentified Singapore buyer for the Trevor Kennedy collection of Australiana.
Two decades ago antique dealer Mr. John Hawkins, who is handling the Kennedy collection, signalled that a Singapore buyer was in the market for another work considered to be by Watling, an early oil painting of Sydney Town.
That work, however, stayed in Australia.
The Schwarzenbach collection contains many of the finest specimens of colonial Australian art to appear on the market over four decades together with outstanding pieces of Australian Impressionist art and one or two choice moderns.
The collector's interest in international contemporary art has been very well exposed to many visitors to the Grand Dolder Hote, Zurich where examples have hung on loan. That collection contains works by Barry Flanagan, Andy Warhol, Scott Campbell, Gerard Richter and a whole suite devoted to the seasons by Camille Pissarro.
Mr. Symond, who founded Aussie Home Loans, late last year added his very glamorous production to works in this genre.
Several of the collection's stunners were purchased at the sale of Alan Bond's Dallhold collection in 1993.
Towering over them was Eugene von Guerard's Sydney Heads which, estimated at $450,000 to $600,000, sold for $715,000.
Another painting to make an impact in the saleroom is Gathering Mistletoe by Frederick McCubbin showing a little girl in a thicket.
Mr. Schwarzenbach's enthusiasm for this work drove it to $605,000 at Christie's in 1993 against an estimate of $150,000 to $200,000.
The theme of children lost in the bush also followed an established literary and artistic tradition in Australia and during the 1880s there were frequent newspaper references to the experiences.
