A painting titled Sunday Afternoon from British artist LS Lowry has sold for almost £6.3 million at auction.
The big-ticket item, which had not been publicly exhibited for 57 years, was estimated to fetch between £4 million and £6 million at Christie’s Modern British And Irish Art sale on Wednesday.
The painting was last sold in 1967, realising a record price for the artist at the time, and was offered from the collection of Sir Keith and Lady Showering.
#AuctionUpdate #LaurenceStephenLowry's 'Sunday Afternoon' sold for £6,290,000. This superbly balanced painting is one of only 13 large-scale industrial scenes painted by Lowry at the height of his career in the 1950s: https://t.co/QvP0Iqj2lZ pic.twitter.com/V78mLgr4I0
— Christie's (@ChristiesInc) March 20, 2024
The 1957 piece went under the hammer for £6,290,000, including buyer’s premium.
It is the second highest price achieved for Lowry at auction, after his 1953 painting Going To The Match sold at Christie’s in October 2022 for £7,846,500.
Meanwhile, the auction in London also saw an oval-shaped sculpture by Dame Barbara Hepworth exceed its price estimate of between £2.2 million and £3.2 million.
Sculpture With Colour (Oval Form) Pale Blue And Red, carved in 1943, sold for £3,549,000.
#AuctionUpdate Dame #BarbaraHepworth's 'Sculpture with Colour (Oval Form) Pale Blue and Red' realised £3,549,000. This open-form sculpture with interior colour and strings, reflects Hepworth's pioneering use of string as an articulation of interior space. pic.twitter.com/YleK9fMOHf
— Christie's (@ChristiesInc) March 20, 2024
Other works by the Wakefield-born artist also went under the hammer, including the brass 1957 sculpture Maquette For Winged Figure which sold for £277,200.
Also up for sale was Londoner Lynn Chadwick’s metallic sculpture, Sitting Couple On Bench, which was conceived in 1990 and cast in 2001.
It sold for £1,613,000, having been estimated to go for between £1.2 million and £1.8 million.
Subscribe or register today to discover more from DonegalLive.ie
Buy the e-paper of the Donegal Democrat, Donegal People's Press, Donegal Post and Inish Times here for instant access to Donegal's premier news titles.
Keep up with the latest news from Donegal with our daily newsletter featuring the most important stories of the day delivered to your inbox every evening at 5pm.