London Art Week brings the world's art to the UK capital

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London Art Week

4 to 11 July 2014

From ancient Egyptian sculpture to 20th-century drawings, the scope of works of art to be offered by the 26 specialist dealers during Master Drawings & Sculpture Week (MDSW) is truly remarkable.  For the second year this event, which will take place from 4 to 11 July 2014, joins forces with Master Paintings Week (MPW) under the London Art Week (LAW) umbrella.  For collectors, this is a great buying opportunity – for the rest of us, it’s a chance to see great art from every period before it is snapped up into a private collection. There are lots of exhibitions – titles emboldened below.

Such is the success of MDSW that a number of major dealers from Madrid, New York, Paris, Rome and Zurich will join their London colleagues with exhibitions staged in galleries in Mayfair and St James’s.  MDSW welcomes four newcomers this year: Ariadne Galleries, Martyn Gregory, Richard Nathanson and Galerie Sismann.  Probably the oldest piece on view will be the Egyptian bronze seated cat, Late Dynastic Period, 25th–31st Dynasty, 715–332 BC, included in Rupert Wace Ancient Art’s exhibition ‘Sculpture from the Ancient World’, while amongst the 20th-century works will be Kneeling Caryatid, c. 1911, by Amedeo Modigliani (1884–1920) at Richard Nathanson.

Among the numerous fine master drawings to be found during the week will be a large panoramic drawing View of the banks of the river Neva facing downstream between the Winter Palace of Her Imperial Majesty and the buildings of the Academy of Sciencesby Louis-Nicolas de Lespinasse (1734-1808) in Didier Aaron Ltd’s exhibition‘European Master Drawings, 1600–1900’.  Lespinasse probably learned how to draw at the military academy by studying topography and perspective and whilst the reasons for his stay in St Petersburg are unknown, his views of the city can be dated with great precision by studying the architecture he depicted.

Katrin Bellinger at Colnaghi will offer a superb watercolour and gouache view of The Saint Mary Chapel outside Schwäbisch Gmünd by Victor Paul Mohn (1842–1911), one of the highlights of her exhibition of ‘German Landscape Drawings of the 19th Century’.  The New York dealer C. G. Boerner LLC will be exhibiting a two-sided study of The Christ Child for The Vision of Jerome by Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola, called Parmigianino (1503–40).  This delicate work bears the stamp of the Dutch artist Peter Lely (1618–80), who succeeded Van Dyck as court painter to Charles II.  In contrast, Day & Faber’s exhibition ‘Portraits from Four Centuries’ includes a startling chalk portrait by the French draughtsman Charles Lucien Léandre (1862–1934) of Maurice Eliot (1862–1945), who produced lithographs illustrating the works of Victor Hugo and Maupassant – today the lycée in his home town of Epinay-sous-Sénart is named after him.

The Roman dealer Antichità Alberto Di Castro srl will stage an exhibition entitled ‘Rediscoveries in Italian Primitive Art’with works by English artist William Young Ottley (1771–1836) and Dutch artist David Pierre Giottino Humbert de Superville (1770–1849).  Works by Ottley include Triumph of the Cross: Emperor Heraclius Carrying the Cross, 1798, pen and black ink, inscribed by the artist Frescoe in the Choir of the Church of St Maria Novella by Agnolo Gaddi.  A collector and amateur artist, Ottley was Keeper of the Department of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum, and an early English enthusiast for 14th- and 15th-century Italian art, or the ‘Italian Primitives’ as they were then often called.  Works by de Superville, scholar, draughtsman, lithographer, etcher, and portrait painter,will include a graphite drawing, Resurrection of the Dead Child, after Giotto’s fresco in the Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence. 

A dramatic pencil and watercolour landscape depicting The Phlegraean Fields (Campi Flegrei), the steaming volcanic crater west of Naples, by Irish artist Edward Dodwell F.S.A. (1767-1832), will be shown by Martyn Gregory.  Master drawings from Florian Härb will include a delightful pen and brown ink of The Holy Family, circa 1635-40, by the Italian Baroque painter Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, called il Guercino (1591–1666).

Hill-Stone Inc. of New York will be showing master drawings at The Fine Art Society including Christ Crowned with Thorns by the Genoese painter Domenico Piola (1627–1703) while a late 18th-century watercolour,A Lake scene with a walking peasant couple in the foreground by an unknown French artist will be on view at Daniel Crouch Rare Books LLP by Zurich dealer August Laube.

Lowell Libson Ltd will present a poetic portrait of A Young Man – St Petersburg, 1819, by George Dawe RA (1781-1829).  This English portraitist painted 329 portraits of Russian generals active during Napoleon’s invasion of Russia for the Military Gallery of the Winter Palace. He relocated to St Petersburg in 1819, where he won acclaim for his work from the artistic establishment and even received complimentary verses by Pushkin.

James Mackinnon will be showing an intriguing drawing of 1826 entitled Jemmy Ducks, fiddler on board HMS Diamond by Charles Landseer, brother of Sir Edwin.  Landseer accompanied Charles Stuart, later Baron Stuart de Rothesay (1779–1845), to Rio de Janeiro in 1825 to negotiate an Anglo-Brazilian trade treaty that also advanced Brazil’s moves towards independence from Portugal.  After the diplomatic mission’s return in 1826, Stuart laid claim to all of Landseer’s sketches, which were then bound into an album.  The album was eventually sold to a Brazilian collection and is now in the Instituto Moreira Salles, Sao Paolo.  The present drawing appears unique both for not having been included in the album and being the only full portrait.  It was drawn on board HMS Diamond on which the mission returned and the sailor depicted is Daniel Salisbury, known as ‘Jemmy Ducks’, who was then forty, attended by a monkey and a puma charmed by his play. 

The Madrid dealer José de la Mano Galería de Arte’sexhibition ‘From Valdés Leal to Sorolla.  Spanish Old Master & Modern Drawings’will include chalk studies, recto and verso, of male figures by Ramón Bayeu (1744–93) and a pencil, ink and wash portrait by Vicente López(1772–1850) of Louis-Gabriel Suchet, 1st Duc d’Albufera (1770–1826), a Marshal of France and one of Napoleon’s most brilliant generals.   Stephen Ongpin Fine Art’s exhibition ‘The Art of Pastel: Drawings from the 18th to the 20th Century’will include The Cliffs at Langland Bay, Wales, a pastel by the Impressionist Alfred Sisley (1839–1899).  Born in Paris to British parents, Sisley spent most of his life in France but, during his last visit to Britain, stayed in Wales and married his long-term partner Eugénie in Cardiff.  They later stayed at Langland Bay on the Gower Peninsula where he painted a number of these attractive works.

A Seated Male Saint by Giovanni di Benedetto Bandini, called Giovanni dell’Opera (1540–99), is the highlight of Crispian Riley-Smith Fine Arts Ltd’s exhibition dedicated to Bandini and the eleven apostle drawings of thechoir in the Duomo, Florence.  The display will focus on the preparatory drawings for the male marble figures that decorate the recinto (bas-reliefs) of the choir and examine the context in which they were produced.  A charcoal drawing entitled Le vaisselier de Gruchy,1854, by Jean-Francois Millet (1814-1875), is a delightful and intimate scene which was drawn in the artist’s kitchen and is one of the highlights of Stoppenbach & Delestre Ltd’s exhibition ‘Moving into the Modern’, which focuses on French 19th- and early 20th-century drawings and watercolours. 

Last year, the inclusion of sculpture galleries in LAW proved highly successful and this section has expanded in 2014. Sculpture from throughout the millennia will range from a 2nd-century AD Roman marble statue of Asklepios, the Greek god of healing, in Ariadne Galleries’ exhibition‘Sculpture fromAntiquity’, to a tender and brilliantly carved limestone Virgin and Child Enthroned in Sam Fogg’s exhibition ‘European Sculpture: 1200–1550’, whilst a marble head of John the Baptist by Auguste Rodin (1840–1917) is the highlight of Daniel Katz Gallery’s exhibition ‘Divine Forms’.

Benjamin Proust Fine Art’s ‘European Old Master Sculptures’will include a bronze figure of Andromeda by Robert Le Lorrain (1666–1743), c.1695–1700, which has been in various French private collections since 1745.  Trinity Fine Art Ltd, celebrating its 30th anniversary,is joined by Carlo Orsi and Walter Padovani and has a particularly unusual late 18th-century Portrait of Catherine the Great as Minerva, a cameo in jasper mounted on a malachite ground within an early 17th-century gilt bronze frame set with emeralds, attributed to the Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna, St Petersburg.  The Grand Duchess, née Sophie Dorothea of Württemberg and second wife of the Emperor Paul I of Russia, the son of Empress Catherine II, was skilled in creating cameos and objects in ivory and amber which she enjoyed presenting as gifts.

Newcomers to MDSW, Mullany Haute Epoque Fine Art will feature a large and impressive 15th-century Nottingham alabaster relief depicting The Ascension of Christ with original polychrome and gilding in their exhibition ‘Continental Sculpture from 1200–1700’.  Also participating for the first time is Parisian dealer Galerie Sismann who will present ‘European Sculpture from the Middle Ages to the Baroque Period’ at The Illustration Cupboard, a highlight of which is a Roman marble Bust of a Young Woman.  The technical skill of the sculptor and the polished features imbue the portrait with great vitality and indicate the influence of Gianlorenzo Bernini, the supreme artist of his day, and thus the work can be dated to c. 1630–40. 

Tomasso Brothers Fine Art’s exhibition is devoted to the Grand Tour and will include a pair of bronzes by Francesco Righetti (1749–1819): Ariadne and Bacchus and Amour et Psyche du Comte Foy, signed and dated 1790.  Sculptor and silversmith, Righetti worked on large-scale projects for popes and monarchs but is best known for his small bronze statuettes after famous antiquities.  This genre of sculpture developed in the second half of the 18th-century in response to the burgeoning interest, not only amongst Italian collectors and connoisseurs, but also for the Grand Tour market. 

London Art Week promises once again to provide visitors with a cornucopia of the finest works of art offered byspecialist dealers in the three disciplines: paintings, drawings and sculpture.  By displaying the objects in intimate gallery settings located in Mayfair and St James’s, the event will not only encourage the building of relationships between collectors, curators and dealers but also show the strength of the expertise in the city.  The accompanying fully-illustrated catalogue will be available from 1 June 2014.

Opening hours

Galleries:  Monday to Friday 10 am to 6 pm;

Saturday 10 am to 5 pm, Sunday 12 noon to 5 pm

Auction houses:   Monday to Friday 9 am to 4.30 pm; Saturday and Sunday 12 noon to 5 pm

Auction dates

Tuesday 8 July:        

Christie’s (King Street):  Old Master & British Painting, 6.30pm

Wednesday 9 July:  
Christie’s (King Street):  Old Master & British Painting,10.30am

Sotheby’s:  Old Master & British Drawings, 10.30pm

Bonhams (New Bond Street):  Old Master Paintings & Drawings, 2pm

Sotheby’s:  Old Master & British Paintings, Evening Sale, 7pm

Thursday 10 July:    
Christie’s (King Street):  Old Master & British Painting,10.30am

Christie’s (King Street):  Old Master Drawings, 2 pm

Sotheby’s:  Old Master & British Paintings, Day Sale, 10.30am

Friday 11 July:
Christie’s (South Kensington):  Old Master Pictures Sale, 10.30am