Joyner Canadian Sale Squeaks By

The Globe and Mail has the results from Joyner Waddington’s CAN$3.2 million sale of Canadian art on Tuesday night:

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.