Cathy's Art Diary

Fascinating online discussion from London Art Week bringing together a panel of younger dealers to talk about how the idea of ‘sleepers’ in the art market is changing. The speakers talked about how it is becoming harder to find traditional ‘sleepers’ ie unrecognised Old Masters with better promotion of auctions online making it easier for more people to see what is available which can push prices up on potential finds. They then each introduced works they had acquired recently by artists they felt should be better known and explained how it was more about discovering stories that particular works. They also discussed issues you can face when researching such as women who change their name when they marry. Will Elliot of Elliott Fine Art mentioned a selection of artists but I loved the picture I use here by Lily Steiner who worked in Vienna and Paris. He talked about how you can also add value by identifying a sitter which he has not yet done in this case. Ellie Smith of Philip...

Thoughtful online discussion from London Art Week on black figures in portraits. Samuel Reilly of Apollo Magazine chaired the event with Aloyo Akinkughe, Founder of @ablackhistory of art; Michael Ohajuni, Cultural Historian, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, Arthur Timothy, artist and architect and Will Elliott, Elliott Fine Art. The talk started with each speaker picking two or three pictures to illustrate their thoughts and I was introduced to several works I didn’t know plus it placed others in a new context. I must admit I had never thought about the black boy in Rosetti’s “The Beloved” who evidently cried while posing but in a letter mentions how his tears made his cheeks shine. The artists, Timothy, had been invited to show a couple of his own works showing himself and his brother when they were still in Sierra Leonne. The discussion talked about how we look differently at a picture when we know the names of the sitters and more about them. One speaker took John Martin’s ...

Useful online discussion as part of London Art Week Digital about the definitions and use of terms around attribution of old master pictures. Megan Locke from Art Tactic from Art Tactic excellently quizzed the participants, David Pollock from Sotherby’s, Molly Dorkin of Simon Dickinson Gallery and solo dealer Will Elliott of Elliott Fine Art. Pollock took us through the various attribution definitions from artist and studio through “Circle of” and “Manner of”. All the speakers agreed that this was commonly used vocabulary as so many dealers had some through the auction house training. They also pointed out that these were increasingly being used like legal terms and were defined in good Old Master sale catalogues. The panelists then discussed the effect of attribution on valuations with Elliott pointing out that this was partly due to the age of a painting. Earlier works are harder to attribute and attaching an artist’s name is less important however as Dorkin said “You don’t g...