Art collectors on pre-Budget spending spree

A Sinéad O’Connor nude makes €24,000 as art sales defy the gloomy economic backdrop

NOT SINCE the Horse Show has so much flesh been on show at the RDS – although clearly not enough to frighten the punters. A nude portrait of singer Sinéad O'Connor, painted by artist Jim Fitzpatrick and titled Strange Days, caused quite a flutter at Whyte's art auction there on Monday evening.

A private collector in Co Wicklow paid €24,000 for the cheeky image of the Glenageary girl – considerably more than the estimate – and outbid a hotelier reputedly based in Lisdoonvarna.

Despite the impending doom of next week’s Budget, art collectors went on a spending spree this week. Auctioneers reported that between 70 and 80 per cent of the works on offer were sold.

The mood was best summed up by John de Vere White, managing director of de Veres auctioneers, who e-mailed his emigrant son in Australia with news of their sale and said: “Not a bad result considering that the financial world might be coming to an end, if you believe what you read.”

The top sellers were the traditional old reliables – comforting Irish landscape paintings by Paul Henry – who was the top seller at both de Veres and Whyte’s. His pictures, like those by Jack B Yeats, are regarded as safe, blue-chip investments.

Nostalgia ruled and modernism was largely out of favour.

Among the casualties were paintings with hefty estimates by Robert Ballagh and Louis le Brocquy which failed to sell. Overall, though, sales were strong in all price categories.