Sorry for all the typos - source is Sotheby's preess Spanning Renaissance Italy, the Great Painters of the Baroque, Through to 18th-Century Aristocratic England and Leading 19th-Century Names:
- A Magnificent “Spanish Pointer” by George Stubbs *The Earliest of All of His Depictions of Dogs*
- Returning to Sotheby’s After Half a Century Rediscovered Paintings by Botticelli, Artemisia Gentileschi & Rubens
- A Unique Painting Reworked & Repainted by Gustav Klimt After His Artist Brother’s Untimely Death
Artemisia GenHleschi, Mary Magdalen in medita.on (esHmate: £2,000,000 – 3,000,000) An incisive storyteller, Artemisia Gen2leschi is known for her powerful depic2ons of women from history, and indeed her images of biblical heroines are among her most compelling crea2ons. Throughout her career she was drawn to paint Mary Magdalen, whose life of sin and repentance offered rich narra2ve poten2al. Never-before-seen at auc2on, this newly-iden2fied 1620s work depicts the Magdalen in a rugged coastal seGng that evokes the wilderness where she lived in solitude – referencing the saint’s sea voyage to the southern coast of France, where, according to legend, she sought refuge. With starkly contras2ng areas of light and dark and showing a bold approach to the arrangement of its female subject, the pain2ng blurs the boundaries between the sacred and the profane.
The auc2on also offers a recently rediscovered early work by her father, Orazio GenHleschi, The Holy Family with the young Saint John the Bap.st (esHmate: £300,000 – 400,000). It had remained unknown un2l its reappearance in 2023, when it was recognised as an important addi2on to the small body of the ar2st’s work on copper.
Sandro BoTcelli, The Virgin and Child enthroned (esHmate: £2,000,000 – 3,000,000) Acquired by Lady Wantage in 1904, this Floren2ne Renaissance pain2ng of the Virgin and Child by the young BoGcelli has remained in the same family collec2on for over a century. LiWle studied and largely known only from black and white photographs, the pain2ng was lost from view, its loca2on often listed incorrectly, and largely overlooked in more recent monographs and exhibi2ons. The composi2on of the work bears strong similari2es to BoGcelli’s Sant’Ambrogio altarpiece of circa 1470, which is now in the Uffizi – considered not only the ar2st’s first large-scale pain2ng but also one of his first altarpieces. Carried out on a smaller scale, this pain2ng was likely intended for a patron seeking an in2mate altarpiece for private devo2on. In the early 19th century, it was housed in the Convent of San Giuliano in Florence, and from there it went to a small chapel aWached to a group of farmhouses in a village near Florence, where it was venerated at a convalescent home for the sick. It then passed into the family of Giovanni Magherini Graziani. The pain2ng was sold by the celebrated Italian dealer, Elia Volpi, to Harriet Sarah Jones Loyd, Lady Wantage in May 1904 – and has been in her family since
George Stubbs, The Spanish Pointer (esHmate: £1,500,000 – 2,000,000) This seminal pain2ng is the earliest and one of the most recognisable of all Stubbs’ depic2ons of dogs. Painted circa 1766-68, at the height of the ar2st’s career, it dates to the decade when Stubbs produced many of the pain2ngs for which he is most famous, including
the National Gallery’s beloved Whistlejacket. The Spanish Pointer has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted and has only rarely appeared at auc2on. It is one of two versions of the subject by the ar2st – virtually iden2cal except for minor differences in the detail of the landscapes (the other is in the Neue Pinakothek, Munich, having passed into the collec2on of the Elector of Bavaria). This version was purchased from the ar2st, or perhaps commissioned, by the publisher, Thomas Bradford and served as the basis for the famous print, engraved by William WoolleW, published in 1768. Highly prized by sportsmen for their ability to locate and indicate the presence of game, par2cularly the partridge, pointers were first imported to England from the Con2nent at the beginning of the eighteenth-century. Stubbs faithfully captures the physiognomy of this now ex2nct ancestor of the breed which, through selec2ve crossing with na2ve types of dogs, would gradually evolve into the lighter, more broken coated pointer known today. It first appeared at auc2on in London in 1802, when it sold for £11. Not seen on the market for over half a century, its last appearance at sale was at Sotheby’s in 1972.
Gustav Klimt and Ernst Klimt, Hanswurst Delivering an Impromptu Performance in Rothenburg (esHmate: £300,000 – 500,000) An itera2on of Ernst Klimt’s, monumental decora2ve panel made for and adorning the grand staircase of the Burgtheater in Vienna, this easel version was started in 1892. In December of that year, Ernst – a talented and ambi2ous ar2st two years Gustav Klimt’s junior – died unexpectedly aged twenty-nine. This large-scale and highly detailed pain2ng was completed by his grief-stricken brother (the Klimt family had also lost their father in July). During this 2me of emo2onal upheaval Gustav produced fewer works and this example is therefore a rare pain2ng executed at the height of his successful Ringstrasse period. In the finished oil, some of the faces in the original ceiling composi2on have been replaced with new portraits of family members, including Klimt’s mother, sisters and his surviving brother Georg. The pain2ng reveals Gustav’s commitment to his brother’s legacy, and his kindness in suppor2ng his widowed sister-in-law and fivemonth-old niece. Signed Ernst Klimt by Gustav, it was exhibited under Ernst’s name in 1895 and sold to a private Viennese collector for 8400 guilders. It last appeared at auc2on at Sotheby’s in London in November 1984, and has remained in the same private collec2on since.
Rosso FiorenHno, The Virgin and Child with the Infant Saint John the Bap.st (esHmate: £2,000,000 – 3,000,000) A rediscovered masterpiece of Floren2ne Mannerism, this refined, vibrant, and characteris2cally eccentric Madonna and Child marks an important addi2on to the small corpus of surviving works by Rosso Fioren2no (1494–1540). Known only from black and white photographs un2l very recently, the picture was recognised by a key Floren2ne scholar and art historian, who in 2013 published it, though its whereabouts were s2ll untraced. Its reemergence now, and da2ng to between 1514 and 1517, allows for a greater apprecia2on of the ar2st's produc2on at a rela2vely early stage in his career.
Francisco Goya, Los Caprichos (esHmate: £300,000 – 500,000) Goya’s Los Caprichos, published in 1799, stands as his graphic masterpiece, displaying astonishing pictorial and technical inven2on across 80 plates. Created in the context of reac2onary Spain and the ‘terrors’ of Revolu2onary France, Goya feared that these sa2rical depic2ons would lead to trouble with poli2cal and clerical powers. However, when Los Caprichos came to the aWen2on of the Inquisi2on, Goya was saved by his admirer King Charles IV, who in 1803 demanded the remaining sets and the plates from Goya, which he claimed ‘he had expressly asked him to make’, providing a pension for Goya’s son in return. This complete first edi2on set is par2cularly fine and early, prin2ng with atmospheric tones and drama2c chiaroscuro.
MORE IMAGES
1. Allgäu Master, mid-15th century
The Flagellation; Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane
2. Pieter Claeissens the Elder
A triptych: the Virgin of Sorrows and kneeling donor figures
3. Giovanni Battista Salvi, called Sassoferrato
4. Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, called Guercino
5. Hendrick van Balen and Jan Brueghel the Elder and Workshop
The Mystic Marriage of St Catherine
Head study of a bearded, elderly man in profile
Winter landscape with a duck hunter and his dog, skaters on a frozen river, and a village beyond
9. Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn
Christ Crucified between the two Thieves: 'The Three Crosses'
River estuary with sailing boats on the water and a town in the distance
Old woman seated with a young girl before a window
View of the beach at Egmond-aan-Zee
Venice, the Bacino di San Marco looking east with the Punta della Dogana and San Giorgio Maggiore
Portrait of Maria Catherine (b. 1779) and Amelia Goddard (1781–1866)
22. Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A.
Portrait of William Spencer Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire (1790–1858)
Hunters Lying in Wait for a Lion
