Women artists take centre stage at Lyon & Turnbull’s flagship winter sale

The work of women artists took centre stage at fine art auctioneers Lyon & Turnbull’s flagship winter Scottish painting sale this year. 

A rare painting by Anne Estelle Rice, whose work became eclipsed during her lifetime by former partner, the Scottish Colourist John Duncan Fergusson, sold for £112,700. 

Rice’s A Bowl of Fruit had been estimated to fetch between £30,000 and £50,00.

The work was created by Rice in 1911 during a key period when she and Fergusson were living in Paris and were steeped first hand in Post-Impressionism and the latest developments in French art. 

ANNE ESTELLE RICE (AMERICAN 1877-1959) – A BOWL OF FRUIT – LYON & TURNBULL

This included the works of the Fauves (tr: Wild Beasts), such as Henri Matisse and André Derain. 

Lyon & Turnbull’s Alice Strang described it as a ‘a highly confident, sensually charged and boldly coloured image of female empowerment, which re-casts some of Paul Gauguin’s interests from a female perspective.’

Other highlights of the sale, the overall total of which was £1.43million, included a work by revered Anglo-Scottish artist Joan Eardley.

The pastel drawing, Girl in Striped Jersey, exceeded its £15,000-£20,000 estimate to sell for £30,200, pointing to increasing demand for the work of Eardley.

BESSIE MACNICOL (SCOTTISH 1869-1904) THE VEILED HAT (PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST’S SISTER) – LYON & TURNBULL

A beautiful painting by Bessie MacNicol, of her sister Minnie, sold for £47,700, more than doubling its estimate.

There was also strong interest in a painting by acclaimed Scottish artist, Anne Redpath, focusing on a key period in her life in the 1940s and 1950s when she beginning to receive recognition within a male-dominated art world. Farm at Spittal on Rule sold for £27,000.

An iconic depiction of Kelso in the Scottish Borders, painted by William Daniell in the early nineteenth century, achieved a world record for one of his views of British landmarks.

WILLIAM DANIELL R.A. (BRITISH 1769-1837) VIEW OF THE NEW BRIDGE OVER THE RIVER TWEED AT KELSO – LYON & TURNBULL

Daniell’s View of the New Bridge over the River Tweed at Kelso, which had an estimate of £15,000-£20,000, sold for £150,200.

Read more Culture stories here.

Subscribe to read the latest issue of Scottish Field.