LONDON.- This October Harry Moore-Gwyn’s British and Continental Pictures and Prints auction of over 200 lots, includes a particularly engrossing collection of prints, etchings, lithographs and a linocut by well-known 18th to 20th century artists.

Highlights in this group include the seminal linocut by the great 20th century British printmaker Claude Flight entitled ‘Speed’ (estimate: £15,000-£20,000). ‘The Round Tower’ (plate III from Carceri d’Invenzione) by Giovanni Battista Piranesi - an etching and engraving from 1749, probably printed in 1830, carries an estimate of £800-£1000. There is a wealth of good 19th century French Impressionist lithographs including ‘Carnaval’, ‘Marie-Louise Marsy’ and ‘Jeanne Granier’ (from portraits d’acteurs et d’actrices’) by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Also ‘Les Boulevards’ by Pierre Bonnard – estimate £500-£700, and a plate from ‘Les Gens de Justice’ by Honore Daumier. The well-known realist peasant figures of ‘Le Semeur’ and ‘Les Glaneuses’ by Jean Francois Millet are also among these works with estimates of £2000-£3000 each.

Also included is a lithograph entitled ‘Needlework’ and an etching with drypoint ‘Black Lion Wharf’ both by James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903). When he moved to London in 1859, Whistler lodged near the Thames in the docklands, and began to make etchings of the river. This etching was not published until 1871 in A Series of Sixteen Etchings of Scenes on the Thames and Other Subjects (the "Thames Set"). The same year, Whistler also reproduced it on the wall behind his mother in the now famous painting, Arrangement in Grey and Black (Musée d’Orsay, Paris).

Moving onto works on paper, six watercolours by Thomas Rowlandson includes the impressive ‘Highwayman’ –(pictured below left) estimated £2000-£3000 as well as the brilliant ‘The Chamber of Genius’ depicting a struggling artist, which is estimated at £1000-£1500. From a similar period, Robert Dighton’s satirical caricature of ‘A Lawyer and his Agent’ carries an estimate of £2000-£3000. There is an interesting group of watercolours and drawings by Hercules Brabazon Brabazon, among some in his manner and circle.

British drawings from the later 19th and early 20thcenturies include ‘Entrance to 8 Fitzroy Street, Whistler’s Studio’ in pen and brown ink, heightened with white, by Walter Sickert founder of the Campden Town Group, estimated at £1500-£2000. ‘Two Women Seated in an interior’,a watercolour also by Sickert is estimated at £1200-£1800. ‘The Wrestlers’ a drawing of muscular modernism by Henri Gaudier-Brzeska is most likely a study for his sculptural relief of the same name made in 1914, a cast of which is at the Tate (dated 1965). This has an estimate of £1500-£2000.

Five vibrant works by Luke Piper include ‘Battersea Power Station’, a watercolour with chalk estimated at £300-£400. A screenprint by his grandfather John Piper of Ottery St Mary is estimated at £600-£800, and in the same medium, ‘The Glyders’, estimated at £500-£700. From a similar period, Patrick Procktor’s watercolour ‘Ballyconeely’ is estimated at £800-£1200 and Graham Sutherland’s fascinating ‘Tree Form’, is part of a group of studies based on withered oak trees that Sutherland found by the estuary at Picton on this return there in the early 1970s. It became a subject of a number of major pictures and prints. In pen and black ink, it carries an estimate of £1500-£2000. ‘Dantes’ by Scottish painter Alan Davie RA, is estimated at £1000-£1500 and four works by leading figurative painter and fellow countryman Peter Howson range from £1200-£2000.

Among the 19th century landscapes the large (104 cm by 146 cm) ‘Travellers on a Road in an extensive landscape’ in the manner of Meindert Hobbema is estimated at £1500-£2000. The ‘Great Wall of China’, an oil painting by Sir Gerald Kelly PRA is an interesting topographical subject for this well-known 20th century establishment portrait painter.

Finally three works by Kenneth Rowntree, which come directly from the family and featured in the dedicated exhibitions at the Fry Art Gallery and Pallant House, will entice all the many admirers and followers of his works.

Harry Moore-Gwyn says of the sale: "A fine group of prints from a private collection including works by Millet, Bonnard, Toulouse Lautrec and Whistler as well as Claude Flight's iconic twentieth century linocut "Speed" are an undoubted highlight of this sale. Collected with considerable discernment over the last few decades, the same property contains a good group of watercolours by one of Britain's favourite caricaturists Thomas Rowlandson. From the twentieth century are a group of works, all originally from the artist's estate, by the rare and engaging British painter Kenneth Rowntree and a study by Gaudier-Brzeska for his best-known sculptural relief, "The Wrestlers". An intriguing group of earlier European paintings begin the sale, amongst them a highly attractive portrait of a lady holding a red book probably painted at some point in the sixteenth century by a painter from Palma in northern Italy."

Photographs Specialist at 25 Blythe Road, Arnaud Delas has an interesting group of photographs in the same auction following Harry Moore-Gwyn’s Pictures and Prints.

The 14 varied lots coming to sale include topographical, nudes, royal and imperial portraits, Anna Pavlova the famous ballerina, as well as important 20th century infrastructure in Egypt, and an Italian aircraft factory from c. 1917-1921 and c. 1938.
Highlights include a group of twelve albumen prints mounted on album leaves of India by Sache, circa 1880, with images of Government Place, Calcutta, Princeps Ghat and A View from Mazagon Hill, Bombay. This carries an estimate of £300-£500.

There is also a group of approximately 140 photographs of The Nile Reservoir Works - the Aswan Dam, including at least eighteen prints by D.S. George. There are numerous photographs of its construction in diverse formats and conditions, some faded. The group comprises various processes, including platinum prints, matte silver prints, albumen prints, and gelatine silver prints. This has an estimate of £800-£1200.

Also included is a 1920s album of family photographs from the Ukraine, a portrait of Robin de la Lanne-Mirrlees as a young boy by Man Ray, and a group of silver prints of Maharajas and Indian officials circa 1930s - 1960s. 5 CDVs from Russia include portraits of Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra Fedorovna.

The auction takes place at 12 noon.