The fall auction season for Canadian fine art got off with not so much a running start Monday evening as a hop, skip and a jump.
Joyner Canadian Fine Art, hosting the first of three sales this week (Tuesday it's Sotheby's turn, followed on Thursday by Heffel), had close to 300 lots for sale in Toronto. When the bidding stopped around 10:30 p.m. ET, 3½ hours after the auction's start, the auctioneer had sold about 75 per cent of its offerings to gross around $3.2-million, including the 18 per cent premium it charges on the hammer prize of each lot sold.
This was enough for Joyner vice-president Rob Cowley to characterize the evening as "a successful sale" - even if the $3.2-million just nudged past the low end of the $3-million to $4-million estimate, sans premium, that Joyner had affixed to its total offerings.
Admittedly, there were some impressive individual sales but the overall result reflected Joyner's proclivity to set keep its reserves - the so-called "secret price" auctioneer and consignor agree pre-auction will be the minimum selling point for a lot - low.
Fetching the most dollars was a massive 1892 oil by Paul Peel titled Orchestra Chairs. This was the second time that the canvas had come to auction in the last eight years, this time sporting a $400,000-$500,000 estimate. It sold for $350,000 on the hammer, $413,000 including premium, with the successful bidder based in the United Kingdom. A solid result in short - but far short of the extant auction record for a Peel, $489,500, set in 1995 for his famous oil, Before the Bath.
One painting that did shatter a record was Semi-Draped Nude in the Artist's Studio, a rather saucy oil from the early 1920s by Randolph Stanley Hewton, one of the founders of Montreal's famous Beaver Hall Group. The canvas, of a female model, went into bidding with a $40,000-$60,000 estimate but sold in less than 70 seconds for an impressive $130,000 on the hammer, $153,000 with premium, to easily best the previous Hewton auction record of $88,750 set in May 2007. "Definitely one of the finest nudes we've ever handled," observed Cowley, "and deserving of the value it realized."
Another record-breaker, this one from the modern era, was Jack Bush's Attacca, a large, lyrical acrylic abstract that the Painters Eleven co-founder completed in 1975, just two years his untimely death at 68. Pre-sale the canvas's estimate was $50,000-$70,000. Spirited bidding, however, drove its value ever upwards and in less than 90 seconds the painting was sold to Vancouver art dealer Torben Kristiansen for $165,200, including premium - $2,000 more than the old Bush record established three years ago.
Disappointments? A few. Paul Peel's large oil, Young Girl with Terrier, painted in Paris in 1889 just a few years before his death, was expected to sell within or surpass its pre-sale estimate of $200,000-$250,000. But bidding never rose past $150,000 and the work was declared unsold. Also unsold were three paintings by the late David Bierk (1944-2002), including two large ones which had estimates of $30,000-$40,000 and 425,000-$30,000, respectively.
"We're always delighted to feature his work," said Cowley. "In this case . . . it's difficult to sell in a condo society because they're very large works and only certain spaces can take them."