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Lot 3145
Bronze Age Scabbard Chape and Lead Model.A late bronze age bag-shaped scabbard chape associated with the 'carp's tongue complex' of South-East England, dating to the Ewart Park metalworking phase c. 1000 BC - 800 BC. 34mm x 27mm, 15.9g.Together with a contemporary lead model of a bag-shaped chape, probably used for the manufacture of a clay mould, or for testing a mould prior to casting bronze chapes. Lead models of Bronze age metalwork in Britain are rare, see PAS DENO-A24823 for an example of a palstave axe cast in lead.50mm x 49mm x 14mm, 164g. (2).
Lot 115
Frederick E. McWilliam HRUA RA (1909-1992)Crossed Legs (1978)Bronze, 38 x 40 x 28cm (15 x 15¾ x 11'')Signed with initials and numbered 4/5Cast by the Fiorini FoundryPlaster maquette, collection of F.E.McWilliam Gallery and Studio; edition 1/5, coll. Ulster Museum, Belfast, purchased 1980.Provenance: edition 4/5, purchased from the artist’s studio by the present owners, 1981.Literature: McWilliam’s notebook, work is numbered 78.10, ie the 10th work of 1978. When he embarked on his series of of ‘Legs’ 1977 - 1981, ‘he began the practice of making small accurate sketches of each work beside his notebook entry, which was not just for his won identification, but for the foundries, in this case the Fiorini Foundry, with whom he worked closely’. ‘The Sculpture of F.E.McWilliam’ Ferran & Holman, Lund Humphries, 2012. Exhibited: 'FE McWilliam', Taylor Gallery Dublin 1979; 'FE McWilliam Retrospective', the Arts Councils of Northern Ireland, 1981, cat. no. 143; exhibition tour, Ulster Museum, Belfast, April - May; Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin, May - June; Crawford Municipal Gallery, Cork, July - August. Tate Gallery, 1989, cat. no. 64, illus. p. 63; Beaux Arts, Bath, 1991; Shambles Gallery, Hillsborough, Co. Down, 2003; Inaugural exhibition at the F.E.McWilliam Gallery & Studio, 2008, exh.cat., illus. p.110. ‘Women of Belfast’ and ‘Woman in a Bomb Blast’ were a highly charged response by McWilliam to the devastating bombs in Belfast and in particular the bombing of the Abercorn restaurant in 1971. This series was followed by the ‘Banners’ which again focused on the Northern Ireland problems, a series instigated by the Peace People, mainly women, including his longtime friend Sheelagh Flanagan and many others, who marched for peace. After five years, reacting through his work to the effect of politics, McWilliam or ‘Mac’ as he was, affectionately called, by his friends, turned for respite to the subject matter he loved most, the beauty and form of female legs. The walls of his studio in Holland Park had many photographs of female forms, especially legs, some from Selfridges advertisements for ladies’ tights. The capriciousness of McWilliam’s imagination, used the subject of women’s legs as a means to create movement, beauty and intrigue. His observation of Indian carvings, especially in the temples of Orissa, which he studied first hand, informed him that the entire human form did not need to be present to give meaning to the subject. His return to the Surrealist idea of complete fragment and his use of legs, to convey this, as here in ‘Crossed Legs’ provides all the sensuality, smoothness and playfulness, as ever associated with the subject, stopping short of eroticism. His ability to give meaning in every foot movement and toe position portrays his love of fun and admiration for the female form. His friendship with the Dublin born ballerina, Ninette de Valois (1898 - 2001) founder of the Royal Ballet, whose portrait he carved in 1963, influenced him greatly, leading to his love of ballet and an appreciation of such an exacting art form in which arm and leg movement were paramount. Feet were important to McWilliam as a means to express emotions whether terror in ‘Women of Belfast’ which to him were - ‘the women as victims of man’s stupidity’ or the joy, anticipation and excitement in ‘Crossed Legs’.Denise FerranOctober 2017
Lot 116
Frederick E. McWilliam HRUA RA (1909-1992)Sitting Up Girl II (1970)Bronze, 25 x 22 x 15cm (10 x 8¾ x 6'')Signed with initials and numbered 1/5, Galizia FoundryProvenance: Acquired from the Ulster Museum exhibition, April- May 1981, by the present owners. Exhibited: Waddington Gallery, 1971; ‘FE McWilliam Retrospective’ Arts Council of Northern Ireland touring exhibition, Ulster Museum, April - May, 1981, cat. no. 88; Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin, May - June 1981; Crawford Municipal Gallery, Cork, July - August 1981; Gordon Gallery, Derry, 1984; Shambles Gallery, Hillsborough, Co. Down, 1988; New Art Centre.Literature; F.E.McWilliam, Arts Council of Northern Ireland Catalogue no. 95, illus. p. 68; ‘The Sculptor F.E.McWilliam’ Ferran & Holman, Lund Humphries, 2012, no. 356, illus. p. 151; New Art Centre, Roche Court, Salisbury, England.McWilliam regarded sculpture primarily as a means of personal expression and as Roland Penrose wrote in 1964 that “McWilliam is an inventor of styles. The variety we see in his work is a symptom of his restless enquiry into the substance of living things..” and added that “He has the capacity to relate our daily existence with existence which is fundamental and timeless. He has above all the understanding and instincts of a poet.”McWilliam, who evolved a new series every year, began his playful Girl Series in 1969, which ended in 1972 when he began his emotionally charged Women of Belfast in response to the bombing of the Abercorn Restaurant in Belfast. The Girl Series is McWilliam at his most playful and joyful, depicting each of his girls in various conversational or provocative poses. He loved the coquettishness and movement of women, as they reclined, kneeled or sat, as in Sitting-up Girl II, depicting women with the keen observation of an admirer who was a loving husband and father of two daughters. McWilliam brings movement into the Sitting-up Girl by using contrasting surfaces of polished bronze against textured, darkened bronze, using the planes of the outstretched resting leg against the strong upright form of the raised leg, upon which the girl’s right arm rests. She exudes an air of silent patience, waiting for the resumption of the conversation or the end of her modelling session. After one year at the Belfast Art School, McWilliam trained at the Slade School of Art in London where he met a fellow Slade student, Beth Crowthers, who became his wife in 1932. The Slade was renowned for its emphasis on accurate and fine drawing and McWilliam was enrolled as a fine art student in painting with sculpture as a secondary subject. The Slade training is evident in the fine drawn lines, etched in the face, the legs and the hands of the female sitter, especially in the fine delineation of the fingers of the left hand, defined against the sitter’s thigh. The simple depiction of the face has echoes of the women in Picasso’s etchings of the 1930’s, understandably so, as McWilliam went to Paris with Beth in 1931 to settle there and become a fulltime artist. He later recalled ‘When I lived in Ireland, I only wanted to get out of it to where the action in the visual arts was - Paris.’ McWilliam’s lifelong friend, the Irish landscape painter, the late T.P. Flanagan, believed that these defined figures of the Girl Series, best exemplified McWilliam’s drawing ability, his mastery of form, his creative use of the pose, highlighting the contrast of shadow and light; polished smooth surfaces against dark unpolished areas, emphasizing the three dimensional qualities of this perfectly posed and tranquilly balanced figure. Dr Denise FerranOctober 2017
Lot 30
Philip Flanagan (b.1960)Portrait Bust of Seamus Heaney Bronze on limestone base, 31.5 x 57cm overall (12½ x 22½'')Signed with artist's device and signed AC (Artist's Copy), edition of 9Signed also by poet Seamus Heaney and dated 1990 on plaque insideProvenance: The Eamonn Mallie Collection, bought from Shambles Gallery, Hillsborough.If knowing your sitter as a sculptor stands for anything then there was no excuse for Philip Flanagan not unlocking the soul of Seamus Heaney. TP Flanagan, Sheelagh his wife, Seamus Heaney and his wife Marie had been friends for over half a century. Terry responded to Heaney's poems in paint and vice versa and TP's son Philip, who trained as a sculptor at Camberwell College in England, would have known Seamus Heaney from childhood.I purchased this Heaney (AP) head from Sheelagh Flanagan in the early Nineties. I had no reticence in parting with my money. I had met Heaney several times down the years and despite the fact that our legs hung out of the same nest in many ways, we did not get beyond a passing acquaintance. I loved the way Flanagan latched onto Heaney's rural ruggedness and his unruly head of hair. The artist didn't play at nicey nicey…..he went rural. I had a discussion with the Irish sculptor Rowan Gillespie about when is the right time to paint or sculpt a head. He contends this is a matter of judgement. Gillespie lamented he had not had the opportunity to sculpt Polish Pope John Paul II, not as the handsome fatherly figure he was when he surfaced firstly, but as he was dying in public wracked with disease. Over the years I have seen some very poor sculptural attempts at winning the essence of Heaney. Flanagan left me with no doubts in his choice of timing to capture Heaney. For some time Heaney's head has faced motionlessly out into our street as its maker Flanagan walks by. I wonder what thoughts go through Philip's head Perhaps he will share those thoughts with me one day. I will not have that luxury in the case of Heaney. My neighbour who went to Annahorish Primary School attended by Heaney, told me The day Seamus Heaney was leaving our school our teacher Mrs Murphy told us 'a genius' is leaving our school today”. I still find it hard to believe, having penned the words 'Noli timere’, the book closed on this genius son of a South Derry farmer. Think however of what Heaney left us in 'Cure at Troy.' So hope for a great sea-changeOn the far side of revenge.Believe that further shoreIs reachable from here.Believe in miracleAnd cures and healing wells. Eamonn MallieBeneath my finger and my thumbMy snug pen restsUnder my windows, a clean rasping soundWhen the spade sinks into gravelly groundMy father digging, I look downTill his straining rump among the flowerbedsBends low, comes up twenty years awayStooping in rhythm through potato drillsWhere he was diggingThe coarse boot nestled against the leg, the shaftAgainst the inside knee, was levered firmlyHe rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deepTo scatter new potatoes that we pickedLoving their cool hardness in our handsBy God the old man could handle a spadeJust like his old manMy grandfather cut more turf in a dayThan any other man on Toner’s BogOnce I carried him milk in a bottleCorked sloppily with paper. He straightened upTo drink it, then fell to it right awayNicking and slicing neatly, heaving sodsOver his shoulder, going down for the good turf,DiggingThe cold smell of potato mould, the squelch and slapOf soggy peat, the curt cuts of an edgeThrough living roots awaken in my headBut I’ve no spade to follow men like themBetween my finger and my thumb The squat pen rests. I’ll dig with it.Seamus Heaney, Digging from Death of a Naturalist, 1966This head of Seamus Heaney was made in the cottage at Roughra in August 1990. Seamus Heaney agreed to sit with me and we made it up in Donegal. There were three sittings for the head, each sitting lasting two hours. I decided that, because I had such a limited time to make the head, I would make it more like a large charcoal drawing, in that I would keep everything very general - very loose kind of modelling, but at the same time a tight framework of measurement under the surface, so that the head would not sway away from my intentions to get a likeness and to express Seamus Heaney’s personality.In Seamus Heaney’s head, I am particularly pleased with the modelling of the hair. As this head was sculpted in 1990, this was a kind of breakthrough for me in terms of the way I was modelling. Before that, I had been tutored in a very academic kind of way, but the Heaney head was a departure in that I really buttered the clay on, giving a casual feeling to the hair, but at the same time strong directional lines so that it is quite a forceful piece of modelling. The way that the clay is modelled also reminds me of bog cuts. Around the cottage in Donegal, we are surrounded by bog and it gives me great pleasure to walk in the bog and let the feeling of that dark solid earth take over. I find it very sculptural. This head has a classical feel to it and I hope it gives the impression of Heaney as a bog king.Philip Flanagan
Lot 122
A SMALL STONE RELIEF DEPICTING KRISHNA, ORISSA (NOW ODISHA), 20TH CENTURYstanding under a fruit tree, playing the flute, with Radha and a devotee, two cattle in the foreground, partially painted with black pigment(‘), inscribed in English and Oriya on the reverse, together with a Bronze Figure of Siva Nataraja and a Dancing Couple, 20th century15 x 12.5 x 4cmProvenance: Private Collection, acquired by the vendor while working in Asia in the mid-20th century.
Lot 21
A SINHALESE BRONZE FIGURE OF A DVARAPALA (?), SRI LANKA, LATE 19TH/EARLY 20TH CENTURYstanding on raised plinth, wearing elaborate inlaid jewellery and tall headdress, holding a staff in his right hand, a prabha with kirtimukha behind, sinhala inscription underneath53cm high Provenance: Private Collection, acquired by the vendor while working in Asia in the mid-20th century.
Lot 23
VISHNU WITH SRIDEVI AND BHUDEVI, SOUTH INDIA, 20TH CENTURYbronze, the Hindu trio seated in lalitasana on a coiled cobra with seven heads forming a canopy over the god’s head, Vishnu’s primary hands in abhaya and vitarka mudra, his upper hands holding cakra and sankha, his consorts each holding the stem of a padma35cm high
Lot 24
A TRIBAL BRONZE FIGURE OF DURGA, HIMACHAL PRADESH, INDIA, 18TH/19TH CENTURYon rectangular base, the goddess riding on her lion, a sword and club in her hands11.5cm highFor a related figure of Durga from Chamba in the Museum of Folk, Tribal and Neglected Art, see Subashini Aryan, Unknown Masterpieces of Indian Folk and Tribal Art, Gurgaon 2005, p.20, no.5.
Lot 281
~Ferdinand Preiss (1882-1943): Pierrette a German chryselephantine figure, Preiss & Kassler, Berlin, 1920s, modelled as a young girl with arms akimbo, the patinated bronze with cold-painted red waistband and conical hat, with finely carved ivory head and arms, signed F.PREISS. in the bronze and with PK monogram, affixed to original Brazilian green onyx octagonal plinth18.5cm high overallAssociated literature: Bryan Catley, Art Deco and other Figures, Woodbridge, 2003, p.284
Lot 282
~Julius Schmidt-Felling (1835-1920): female figurea German chryselephantine figure, Preiss & Kassler, Berlin, circa 1920, modelled as a young woman clutching her dress to one knee, the bronze with silvery patination, with finely carved ivory arms and head, signed in the bronze, PK monogram, on original Brazilian green onyx square plinth16.5cm high
Lot 292
THE ‘FILM WEEKLY’ AWARD, 1937: A BRONZE REPRESENTING TRAGEDY AND COMEDY, SIGNED ‘F.V.B’the rectangular base engraved with an inscription below the legend ‘THE FILM-WEEKLY AWARD,’ two naked female figures above, ebonized wood base30cm high overallThe inscription reads: ‘HERBERT WILCOX for the production and direction of VICTORIA THE GREAT Judged the best British film of 1937’Herbert Wilcox’s triumph with his film, Victoria the Great, was assured when it was awarded first-class honours at the 1937 International Film Exhibition in Venice and also received encouraging comments following preview showings in the United States. Its world premier, on 16 September 1937 at the newly-decorated Leicester Square Theatre, London, confirmed its success. The stars were Anna Neagle (who became Mrs Herbert Wilcox in 1943) as Queen Victoria and Anton Walbrook as Prince Albert.Another bronze of this model, the Film Weekly award for the best performance of 1938, which was given to Ralph Richardson for his portrayal of Robert Carne in the film South Riding, was sold in the Ralph Richardson Collection sale at Sotheby’s, London, 27 April 2001, lot 268.Provenance: The Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund (see the following lot and lots 344, 392-395 for further items with the same provenance.)
Lot 293
A MATCHED THREE-PIECE GILT-BRONZE CLOCK GARNITURE, FRENCH, CIRCA 1900the clock with eight-day movement striking on a bell signed Rollin … Paris, the white enamel dial (damaged) similarly signed and with Roman hour numerals within a minute track and outer Arabic numeral five minute intervals, the shaped balloon case with openwork rocaille surmount and embellished with further rocaille and foliage, diaper panels, fixed to a shaped base applied with an inscribed plaque to the front, the pair of Rococo style candelabra each with four scrolling branches and central openwork finialclock 54.5cm high, candelabra 46.5cm highThe inscription reads: Presented to Sir William F. Jury on the occasion of his Knighthood by Members of the CINEMATOGRAPH INDUSTRY 1st January 1918Provenance: The Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund (see the previous lot and lots 344, 392-395 for further items with the same provenance.)
Lot 294
A LARGE GILT-BRONZE THREE-PIECE CLOCK GARNITURE, FRENCH, LATE 19TH CENTURYeight day bell striking movement by Samuel Marti et Cie. of Paris, pendulum and movement both numbered 1975, with key, the dial with Roman numerals on enamel shields, the case and accompanying pair of nine-light candelabra richly openwork cast with scrolls and foliage, the bases applied with Renaissance dolphins, the candelabra complete with detachable nozzles and removable central finialscandelabra 82.5cm high including openwork finials, clock 69cm high
Lot 34
TWO HINDU BRONZE IMAGES, DECCAN, INDIA, CIRCA 17TH CENTURYdepicting Bhudevi and Vithoba, the former with right leg flexed, holding the stem of a padma, the other standing with hands on his hips, a conch in his left hand11, 9.2cmProvenance: Private Collection, acquired by the vendor while working in Asia in the mid-20th century.
Lot 39
THREE BRONZE IMAGES OF HINDU DEITIES, SOUTH INDIA, 19TH CENTURYcomprising a brass figure of Bhairava, holding sword and bowl in his primary hands, a small figure of Vishnu and a figure of Balakrishna14cm highProvenance: Private Collection, acquired by the vendor while working in Asia in the mid-20th century.
Lot 41
A SMALL BRONZE FIGURE OF GANESHA, WESTERN INDIA, 15TH/16TH CENTURYthe pot-bellied, elephant headed, four-armed deity seated on a cushion, his primary hands holding sweets which he eats with his trunk, and in abhaya mudra, his upper hands holding attributes7.5cm highProvenance: From the collection of the late Peter Cochrane.
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