A large work 'Two Rock Pools' 1967-8 (Lot 43 ) by Michael Smither from the late 1960s came to the sale with an ambitious pre-sale estimate of $500,000-$750,000. The highest price for a work by Smither until this week was $285,000 and the work was sold for $430,000, the highest price at auction this year for a NZ living artist.
On the night, the auction audience numbers were good with 50 in the room at the start of the sale. Despite strong numbers coming through on the online bidding app, the IAC audience does tend to like a night out with many of the audience sitting through the sale till near the end. Early lots in the sale were those guaranteed to garner attention including a small Ralph Hotere work on glass Lo Negro Sobre Lo Oro (The Black Over the Gold) (Lot 1 ) which sold for $1,000 over the low estimate to make $11,000 and a Michael Parekowhai photo Portrait of Elmer Keith #1 (Lot 5 ) in good, non-faded condition which sold for a record of $41,000 to a floor bidder. The previous highest price for this image was $27,500.
Three works by A. Lois White were watched with interest by those in the know as her work comes up infrequently at auction and she is the closest women artist New Zealand has to the popular modernist Australian artists such as Dorrit Black and Evelyn Syme. In the BNZ sale two months earlier, Te Papa Tongarewa paid a staggering $185,000 for a varnished watercolour which well exceeded any previous price for the artist including her oil paintings and with the definite interest in woman artists at auction currently, interest in these works was keen. The varnished watercolour Birds (Lot 8 ) retained very good colour and had been consigned with a sensible estimate of $30,000-$40,000 and the multiple bidders confirmed this was the right price for it when it sold for $$35,000 to the room. Two 1930s prints in a typical stylised design also sold with the beautiful work Bathers (Lot 6 ) making $4,250 against a $2,500 reserve and Untitled Bathing Study (Lot 7 ) going under estimate for $3,300.
Early works by Karl Maughan have always been desired by the collectors having a fresh, painterly quality that the later works have moved on from. Pink Azalea (Lot 20 ) from 1988 was well contested by three floor bidders who could see past its enormous thick gold frame (definitely framed in the 80s!) with active bidding and knockout bids taking it well past it’s $20,000-$30,000 estimate to $35,000. Another earlier work, a fantastic example by the artist and dating from 1998 titled Titoki (Lot 28 ) came to the sale carrying the highest presale estimate for a painting by Karl Maughan at $140,000-$180,000. With a start at $100,000, the bidding was slow but made it to $120,000 where it was hammered subject to a room bidder and later sold at that price, setting a record for the artist. By comparison, the later more typical work titled Lithgow (Lot 21 ) did not sell.
The late 1960s is a key period within the oeuvre of Michael Smither and a large work Two Rock Pools 1967-8(Lot 43 ) came to the sale with an generous pre-sale estimate of $500,000-$750,000. The highest price by a work by Smither until this week was $285,000 for a work from the same period (Seawall and Kingfisher 1967) which was smaller in scale but arguably a more desirable subject. IAC set the record for this work back in 2019, and have achieved most of the top prices for Smither of late. Interest in this particular work was more limited this time, but the painting was hammered subject to a couple in the room at $430,000 and sold post sale at that price, the highest price at auction this year for a NZ living artist.
The three works by C.F Goldie provided a good lesson in connoisseurship for any viewers who took the time to study the works in person in the viewing. The period between about 1908-1920 is considered Goldie’s best when he produced his most detailed and photographic like works. The later works are looser and less detailed partly due to his health problems but also a stylistic change which comes with age. The works consigned in this sale were an early and late portrait and also a pencil drawing. The smaller portrait The Calm Close of Valour’s Various Day (A Portrait of Chief Wharekauri Tahuna) 1918 (Lot 44 ) well demonstrated Goldie’s prowess in the earlier years, the treatment of the cloak, hei tiki and moko were particularly well done. A phone bidder had competition from an old fashioned absentee bidder who had left a bid of $905,000 on the sheets. In the end the work sold to the phone for $925,000 (the low estimate for the work was $600,000).
The later work with an unidentified sitter, titled Maori Chief with Hei Tiki 1939 (Lot 45 ) was far less detailed with looser more obvious brushstrokes. Although being considerably larger than the other painting, the work slid in under estimate at $765,000 also to the phone against a low estimate of $800,000. An accomplished drawing of Guide Sophia, one of the artist’s favourite subjects was back at IAC after setting a record for a drawing in 2017 when it sold for $100,000. Sophie (Lot 46 ) was previously in the collection of artist’s niece and carried a personal inscription from Goldie to his aunt. A good drawing is always a good drawing and its sale this time round set a new record of $130,000 for a work on paper.
A painting which may provide good arbitrage opportunities was South African artist George Pemba’s painting Assebleif (Lot 73 ). Coming from a very desirable period in the artists’s practice and held in the original owners family since the 1960s one imagines this would be a sought after painting if sold back in South Africa. The work was estimated at $25,000-$35,000 and sold midway between the estimate at $30,000.
As at Art + Object last week, the IAC auction had a few surprising passed ins – pieces that in the preceding two years would have been sold without any difficulty. A very nice Michael Smither domestic still life painting Egg cup (Lot 52 ) which was sold subject close to the estimate of $35,000 but is still sitting unsold on the IAC bidding app. One of the three Banksy prints, Have a Nice Day (Lot 40 ) also remains unsold a few days post sale, after having been sold at IAC last year when the market was at its peak for $60,000 NZD. Internationally the Banksy market has come off the boil somewhat (for some works) with recent sales of this particular image now making about half last year’s sale price.
At the end of the auction, with a few big post negotiations pending, it felt as if a bit of heat had come out the market after a busy year of sales across all the auction houses. However the sale of the Smither and the Maughan along added another $550,000 to the hammer price plus everything else that has been transacted in the last two days, taking the hammer price up to $4,288,050 and a clearance rate of 83% by number, easily matching the Important and Rare sale totals and clearance rates from last year which all made over $4,000,000. Squeezing in just one last online sale before the end of the year IAC will be pleased to finish up the year on a extremely successful note.
All prices are in $NZ and are hammer unless otherwise noted.
