Palazzo Merati, Cannaregio, Venice: Highly Decorative Piano Nobile for sale

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Cannaregio, Palazzo Merati, Venice

View from Palazzo Merati.

Entrance.

Interior views.

Palazzo Merati, Cannaregio, Venice, Piano Nobile for sale at Sotheby’s International Realty

Platinum, Fancy Yellow Diamond and Diamond Ring

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Fancy yellow diamond and diamond ring, pear-shaped Fancy Yellow Diamond

Platinum, 8.96 cts. Fancy Yellow Diamond and Diamond Ring. Estimate $80,000-120,000. Photo Doyle

Centering one pear-shaped Fancy Yellow Diamond approximately 8.96 cts., flanked by 2 tapered baguette diamonds. Size 7, with bumpers.

With GIA report no. 14640411 dated August 7, 2005 stating that the diamond is Fancy Yellow color, SI1 clarity.

Center diamond: Fancy Yellow, SI1, even distribution, faint blue fluorescence, closed culet, brilliant. GIA report dated August 17, 2005.

Doyle New York. Important Jewelry. Thursday, December 11, 2014 at 10am

Platinum and Diamond Ring

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emerald-cut diamond, Platinum and Diamond Ring

Platinum and 9.43 cts. Emerald-cut Diamond Ring. Estimate $100,000-150,000. Photo Doyle

Centering one emerald-cut diamond approximately 9.43 cts., flanked by 2 tapered baguette diamonds. Size 5 1/2, with adjustable shank. Good condition.

With GIA report no. 5161680399 stating that the diamond is I color, VS1 clarity.

Estate of a Florida Lady

Diamond: I-VS1, no fluorescence, very good polish, excellent symmetry, very nice cut, very lively. With GIA report. 

Doyle New York. Important Jewelry. Thursday, December 11, 2014 at 10am

Antique Double Strand Silver, Gold and Diamond Necklace

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Double Strand Silver, Gold and Diamond Necklace

Antique Double Strand Silver, Gold and Diamond Necklace. Estimate $150,000-250,000. Photo Doyle

Centering one old-mine cut diamond approximately 3.60 cts., 5 old-mine cut diamonds approximately 11.00 cts., 31 old-mine cut diamonds approximately 40.00 cts., and 76 old-mine cut diamonds approximately 32.00 cts., completed by a clasp centering one old-mine cut diamond approximately 2.40 cts., encircled by 10 old-mine cut diamonds approximately 1.30 cts., and 10 old-mine cut diamonds approximately 4.00 cts., clasp detachable as pendant and strands detach to form two necklaces, with two pairs of mounted diamonds to be used as clasps, totaling 4 old-mine cut diamonds approximately 1.50 cts. Length 17 1/4 inches. With fitted box signed S.J. Philips Ltd.

Color grading in so far as mounting permits. Diamonds face up slightly whiter.

Center diamond: J-K-VS-SI (clean except for chip on crown facet near girdle and chip at edge), brilliant, with hinged pendant-loop.

5 diamonds (over 2.00 cts. each): K-L-VS-SI, several chips at edge, larger diamond in shorter strand appears slightly whiter, J-K-VS, chip on crown facet by edge, brilliant. Large diamond of shorter strand with hinged pendant-loop.

31 diamonds (1.00-2.00 cts.): several I-J, mostly J-K-several VS,
mostly SI, some Imp., not visible to eye, several small chips at edge, brilliant.

76 diamonds (under 1.00 ct.): G-H-I-J-K-VS-SI-Imp., not visible to eye to slightly visible to eye, several small chips at edge, 2 chips on one diamond on crown facets, brilliant.

Clasp: 15/16 x 1″.
Center diamond: K-L-M-I1, faces up whiter, brilliant.
Smaller diamonds: J-K-L-SI-Imp., lumpier cuts, lively.
Larger diamonds: I-J-K-VS-SI, several Imp., brilliant.

4 diamond attachment so each strand can be worn separately.
Good condition.

Doyle New York. Important Jewelry. Thursday, December 11, 2014 at 10am

A Longquan jar with associated lid, Ming dynasty

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Longquan, Ming Dynasty

A Longquan jar with associated lid, Ming dynasty. Estimate US$ 4,000 – 5,000 (€3,200 – 4,000). Image: Courtesy of Bonhams.

The jar stoutly molded in two parts, including the short neck and body of compressed ovoid form incised with a band of flowering peony branches above lotus petal bands rising upward from the flared foot, the base sealed with a concave plate applied to the interior and all surfaces except the rim and foot pad covered with an olive green glaze; the associated lid of lotus leaf shape incised with a band of composite lotus flowers and leaves, the concave interior stamped with a crossed vajra beneath the olive green glaze also applied to the exterior, leaving a russet-burnt ring around the underside. 10in (25.5cm) largest diameter; 10in (25.5cm) height overall

Bonhams. FINE CHINESE WORKS OF ART, 16 Dec 2014 10:00 PST – SAN FRANCISCO

A Longquan celadon censer with carved floral decoration, Yuan dynasty

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censer, Longquan celadon, Yuan dynasty

A Longquan celadon censer with carved floral decoration, Yuan dynasty. Estimate US$ 8,000 – 12,000 (€6,500 – 9,700). Image: Courtesy of Bonhams.

Thickly molded with a flat rim to the canted walls carved with alternating flower heads and leaf sprays bordered by raised string bands, the three small legs attached on the exterior of shorter size than a circular sectioned ring extruding from the base that actually supports the censer, the circular hole at the center of the ring filled with clay at a later date, the olive-green glaze stopping unevenly around the inside and outside surfaces of the base, leaving cinnamon-burnt patches where the clay is exposed. 9in (22.7cm) diameter; 6 1/4in (16cm) high

The projecting ring on the base of this censer was fired with a hole at the center, which was later plugged. The censer actually rests on the base of the projecting ring instead of the three short legs. For another censer from the Yuan period, of slightly larger size, but of very similar shape, carved floral decoration and showing the original circular opening through the base, see Zhu Boqian, Longquan yao qingci, 1998, cat. no. 181, p. 204. See also the circular hole at the base of the censer molded with trigrams to the exterior walls, cat. no. 182, p. 205: here, Zhu Boqian notes that Yuan censers of this type are unique in that the three feet are decorative additions, the censers actually resting on the projecting ring at the center of the base.

Bonhams. FINE CHINESE WORKS OF ART, 16 Dec 2014 10:00 PST – SAN FRANCISCO

A Longquan celadon deep dish, 14th-15th century

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14th-15th century, deep dish, Longquan celadon

A Longquan celadon deep dish, 14th-15th century. Estimate US$ 1,500 – 2,000 (€1,200 – 1,600). Image: Courtesy of Bonhams.

Thickly molded with a raised outer edge to the rim, a band of vertical lines cursorily carved into the curving walls to surround a circular peony roundel impressed to the center of the well, the exterior walls smoothly finished and all surfaces except a cinnamon-burnt firing ring on the recessed base covered with an olive green glaze. 11 1/4in (28.5cm) diameter

Bonhams. FINE CHINESE WORKS OF ART, 16 Dec 2014 10:00 PST – SAN FRANCISCO

Sir Anthony van Dyck (Antwerp 1599-1641 London), Head study of a man in a ruff

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Sir Anthony van Dyck

Sir Anthony van Dyck (Antwerp 1599-1641 London), Head study of a man in a ruff, oil on canvas, 20 7/8 x 16¾ in. (53 x 42.5 cm.). Estimate £200,000 – £300,000 ($312,400 – $468,600). Price Realized £494,500 ($775,871). Photo Christie’s Image Ltd 2014

PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE EUROPEAN COLLECTION

Notes: Executed with tremendous freedom and vitality, this hitherto unrecorded head study is a preparatory sketch for van Dyck’s celebrated group portrait of The Magistrates of Brussels, painted in 1634 for the city’s town hall. It is an important addition to the group of head studies associated with the Brussels commission and a further example of the artist’s masterful ad vivum painting technique and ability to capture a likeness with speed and deft handling of the brush.

Four other head studies for the group portrait are known, including two in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, one in a private collection, and the picture rediscovered on the Antiques Roadshow and later offered in these Rooms on 8th July 2014 (lot 18). These sketches would have been rapidly taken from life in the artist’s studio and employed by van Dyck when he came to execute the finished painting. They are all of almost identical dimensions to the present work, and share the same unusual priming of the canvas – the application of a scumbled grey wash over a layer of red bole, which enabled the artist to achieve a remarkable tonal range with a limited palette and an economy of brushwork. Prior to these individual head studies, the magistrates would have approved van Dyck’s idea for the portrait as a whole, which he envisaged in a sketch executed en grisaille (fig. 1; Paris, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts), showing the magistrates positioned around a personification of Justice in a grandiose setting.

The head study in a private collection (S. Barnes, et al., Van Dyck: A complete catalogue of the paintings, New Haven and London, p. 416, no. III. A33 ) can immediately be connected with the seated figure second from left in the Paris sketch, by virtue of it showing the only magistrate to look directly towards the viewer, while the Antiques Roadshow picture is thought to be a study for the figure on the extreme right. The Oxford pictures have until now been associated with the two seated men flanking the central figure of Justice (ibid., pp. 388-9, nos. III. 196 and 197), however, the emergence of the present work would seemingly provide an alternative candidate for the sitter on the left. It could also have served as a study for the sole standing figure to Justice’s right or, indeed, that of the magistrate on the extreme left of the composition.

The figures in the finished portrait were lifesize and once hanging in the Town Hall the impact of the group would have been impressive, as several travellers who saw the work confirmed. The oil sketches are, however, now all that remains of van Dyck’s commission, as the painting itself was destroyed during the French bombardment of Brussels in 1695.

CHRISTIE’S. OLD MASTER & BRITISH PICTURES EVENING SALE, 2 December 2014, London, King Street

A Longquan celadon deep dish, 14th-15th century

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14th-15th century, deep dish, Longquan celadon

A Longquan celadon deep dish, 14th-15th century. Estimate US$ 5,000 – 7,000 (€4,000 – 5,700). Image: Courtesy of Bonhams.

Thickly potted with a raised edge to the foliate rim and slightly recessed ribs along the curving interior and exterior walls, the floor of the well stamped with an indistinct roundel within an incised double band, the olive green glaze covering all surfaces except for a russet-burnt ring on the recessed base also etched in Arabic with the name of an owner partially reading Ravy. 13 3/8in (34cm) diameter

Bonhams. FINE CHINESE WORKS OF ART, 16 Dec 2014 10:00 PST – SAN FRANCISCO

Pieter Brueghel II (Brussels 1564/5-1637/8 Antwerp), A country brawl

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A country brawl, Pieter Brueghel II

Pieter Brueghel II (Brussels 1564/5-1637/8 Antwerp), A country brawl, signed and dated ‘•P•BRVEGHEL•1610’ (lower right), oil on panel, 15½ x 22½ in. (39 x 57 cm.). Estimate £700,000 – £1,000,000 ($1,093,400 – $1,562,000). Price Realized £842,500 ($1,321,883). Photo Christie’s Image Ltd 2014

Provenance: (Possibly) Govaert Flinck (1615-1660), Amsterdam, and by descent to his son,
Nikolaas Antoni Flinck; his sale, Rotterdam, 4 November 1754, lot 49, ‘Een Boere-Gevegije, zeer aardig, door P. Breugel, hoog 9½, breet 13½ duimen’ (14.10 guilders).
(Possibly) Hendrik Domis, Alkmaar; his sale, Alkmaar, 2 June 1766, lot 60, ‘Een Boere Battallje, door den Boere Breugel, op panel; hoog 11½, breet 17 duimen’ (18 guilders).
Dr. Karl Lanz (1873-1921), Mannheim; sale, 1917, lot 7, as ‘Pieter Bruegel the Elder’.
with Galerie de Heuvel, Brussels, by 1928, when acquired by Baron Evence III Coppée (1882-1945), Brussels, Belgium, and by descent to the present owner.

PROPERTY OF A DESCENDANT OF EVENCE III COPPÉE

Literature: (Possibly) G. Hoet, P. Terwesten (ed.), Catalogus of naamlyst van schilderyen…, The Hague, III, 1770, pp. 104 and 540, no. 49.
(Possibly) G. Hulin de Loo, R. van Bastelaer (ed.), Peter Bruegel l’Ancien: Son oeuvre et son temps, Brussels, 1907, p. 336.
Gemäldesammlung Dr. Karl Lanz, Mannheim, Mannheim, 1917.
Amsterdam, Galerie Pieter de Boer, Helsche en fuweelen Brueghel, 1934, under no. 17.
G. Marlier, J. Folie (ed.), Pierre Brueghel le Jeune, Brussels, 1969, pp. 268-9 and 272, no. 8, fig. 159.
P. Greindl, La Rixe, unpublished MS, 1987-1988, Archives baron Coppée, Brussels.
M. Wilmotte, La collection Coppée, Liège, 1991, pp. vi, showing the work in situ, and pp. 54-5, illustrated.
K. Ertz, Pieter Brueghel der Jüngere (1564-1637/8): Die Gemälde, mit kritischem OEuvrekatalog, Lingen, 2000, II, pp. 747, 766 and 787, no. E1054, pl. 608.

Exhibited: Mannheim, Kunsthalle, 42 Gema¨lde aus der Sammlung Dr. Karl Lanz, December 1912-February 1913.
Brussels, Galerie Finck, Trente-trois tableaux de Pierre Brueghel le Jeune dans les collections privées belges, 1969, no. 32.
Brussels, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Bruegel: Une dynastie des peintres, 1979-1980, no. 91.
Tobu, Japan, The World of Bruegel: The Coppée Collection and Eleven International Museums, 1995, no. B26.
Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Breughel—Brueghel: Pieter Breughel le Jeune (1564-1637/8)—Jan Brueghel l’Ancien (1568-1625). Une famille des peintres flamands vers 1600, 3 May-26 July 1998, no. 143 (note by K. Ertz).
Cremona, Museo Civico Ala Ponzone, Breughel—Brueghel, Tradizione e Progresso: Una famiglia di pittori fiamminghi tra Cinque e Seicento, 1998, no. 26.

Notes: Dated 1610, this exceptionally well-preserved work is the earliest version of one of the rarest and most dynamic of Pieter Brueghel the Younger’s subjects: The Country Brawl, known in French as La Rixe. Described by Dr. Klaus Ertz as ‘une merveilleuse version de 1610’, he places it within his catalogue raisonné at the head of ten autograph versions of the composition, four of which are in museums: Montpellier, Musée Fabre, inv. no. 876-3-4 (Ertz no. E1056*); Prague, Národní galerie, inv. no. VO 1371 (E1058*); Berlin, Staatliche Museen Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Gemäldegalerie, inv. no. 676 (E1060*); and Philadelphia, Museum of Art, John G. Johnson Collection (E1063*). These nine other works can be further subdivided into groups with differing sizes: six works which are roughly 40 x 60 cm., three which are roughly 75 x 100 cm., and one odd format at 27.4 x 32.8 cm. (Ertz no. E1059). Only eight of these works are dated (one indistinctly, E1062) and only five are signed and dated. All of the dated versions were painted in the same four-year period, 1619- 1622, with the exception of the present work. The form of the signature, using the spelling ‘BRVEGHEL’, is unique amongst the various versions, the other signed ones using the spelling ‘BREVGHEL’, which seems to have been adopted by Pieter Brueghel the Younger only after circa 1616.

The date of 1610 gives the present work a special status within the context of the known versions of this subject. Executed during this earlier period of Brueghel’s activity, the Coppée picture is distinguished by its highly elaborate under-drawing (visible in infrared reflectography; fig. 1), its extraordinary attention to detail and the high quality of its execution. These factors combine to make this not only the earliest, but also the finest of all the known versions of this extraordinarily powerful composition.

There is some debate as to the origins of the subject. It is one of the few compositions by Pieter Brueghel the Younger which cannot be matched to a surviving prototype by his celebrated father, Pieter Bruegel the Elder. This could suggest that the composition is entirely of Pieter the Younger’s invention, as would seem to be the case for some other subjects, for example the Payment of the Tithes (also known as The Country Lawyer, see Ertz nos. E489-E511a). It is assumed, however, that it is the only record of a lost painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, which could have been known to Pieter the Younger in the original, or through a studio cartoon or preparatory drawings. As early as 1907, Hulin de Loo argued that a composition of such accomplishment must go back to the Elder: ‘c’est un des groupes les plus complexes, les plus vivants, les plus violents et les plus réalistes et en même temps les plus plastiques dont l’histoire de l’art nous fournisse l’exemple…Bruegel a atteint ici l’apogée de son art’ (‘this is one of the most complex, the most lifelike, the most violent, the most realistic and at the same time the most sculptural figural groups of which the history of art provides example…here Bruegel [the Elder] attains the apogee of his art’, in G. Hulin de Loo, ed. R. van Bastelaer,Peter Bruegel l’Ancien: Son oeuvre et son temps, Brussels, 1907, cited by Marlier, op. cit., p. 265). In his discussion of the present picture in the 1998 exhibition catalogue (op. cit., p. 396), Ertz notes the strong resemblance of the facial types to those in works by the Elder, such as The Nest Robber (Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum) or the drawingSummer (Hamburg, Kunsthalle, Kupferstichkabinett). There is, moreover, an engraving of the composition by Pieter the Younger’s younger contemporary, Lucas Vorsterman (1595- 1675), which shows the event in reverse, and bears within the image rectangle the inscription ‘Peter Bruegel invent’ (fig. 2). Assuming that this is a reference to the Elder and not the Younger Pieter, this would indicate an awareness on the part of the generation of artists which included Pieter the Younger, his brother Jan Brueghel the Elder and the latter’s friend, Sir Peter Paul Rubens, of the authorship of Pieter Bruegel the Elder. To complicate matters, however, the print – which must date to circa 1620 – also bears in its legend a long dedication in Latin to Jan Brueghel the Elder, ‘Clariss. Praestantissimoq. Viro Dño Ionni Bruegelio, Petri Bruegelii sui temporis Apellis Filio, Paternae Artis haeredi ex asse, hoc patriae manus monumentum artifciosissimum’. This effectively dedicates ‘this monument to the art of the father’ to the son of ‘Pieter Bruegel, the Apelles of his time’, Jan Brueghel, ‘the heir of his art’.

On the other hand, like most of his contemporaries, Hulin de Loo was inclined to diminish Pieter the Younger’s creative abilities by comparison to his father’s, and it is not implausible that there was never a prototype by Pieter the Elder, in which case this would be one of the Pieter the Younger’s most successful original inventions. In this respect it can be related to The Bad Shepherd (Christie’s, London, 8 July 2008, lot 38, £2,505,250), a unique composition with no prototype by the Elder, for many years attributed to the Elder because of its high quality (as indeed was the present work), but in fact a masterpiece by the son.

Setting aside the question of the uncertain existence of a prototype by Pieter the Elder, the production and dedication of the engraving shows how highly regarded the composition was in the time of Pieter the Younger, Jan the Elder and Rubens. We know that it certainly inspired Rubens, as a drawing by that artist, in black chalk and wash, repeats several of the figures involved in the tussle (fig. 3; Rotterdam, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen), replacing several of the faces with more typically ‘Rubensian’ types – the figure wielding the thresher at left, for example, is given a beard and a wild shock of hair, as well as muscled calves suitable for a Hercules. Interestingly, the Vorsterman engraving records just such a figure in this role. Vorsterman was one of Rubens’s pupils, working in the studio as the ‘in-house’ engraver, and it is likely that he was given the task of reproducing the Brueghel work with Rubens’s approval. Perhaps Rubens himself commissioned the engraving from Vorsterman – the dedication to Jan Brueghel, who was one of Rubens’s close friends (Rubens painted the touching family portrait of Jan Brueghel with his wife and children now in the Courtauld Institute, London), lends credence to this hypothesis.

They even seem to have collaborated on a version of the picture: a version largely by Jan Brueghel I, but probably retouched by Rubens, is in a private collection (94 x 124 cm.; see the catalogue of the exhibition De Bruegel à Rubens: L’école de peinture anversoise, 1550-1650, Antwerp, 1992, pp. 170-1, no. 73, illustrated in colour). Marlier follows Hulin de Loo and van Bastelaer in citing another, smaller (36 x 46 cm.) putative copy by Rubens’s hand (see Marlier,op. cit., p. 267 and notes). Rubens was a great admirer of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, and may have owned as many as twelve paintings by the artist, as recorded by the inventory of his estate (1640). This includes, under no. 142, a painting of ‘Des paysans qui se battent, fait d’après un dessin du Vieux Bruegel’, which would seem to described a painting by Pieter Brueghel the Younger, based on a design by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. It cannot be excluded, however, that Rubens may have owned the prototype by the Elder. Alternatively, it may have remained in family hands, in the possession of Jan Brueghel the Elder – further justification for the dedication of Vorsterman’s engraving of one of Rubens’s favourite Bruegels, which he might have seen in the collection of his friend Jan. Marlier suggests (op. cit., p. 266) that a work which belonged to Jan Brueghel the Elder may be the work which the great British patron and collector, Thomas Howard, 2nd Earl of Arundel, ordered his Antwerp agent Lionel Wake to purchase in circa 1625, ‘a painting begun by Bruegel and finished by Mostaert, showing a peasant brawl over a game of cards, which has been engraved by Vorsterman’. Gillis Mostaert (1534-1598), a sixteenth-century artist, was Fig. 3 Sir Peter Paul Rubens, A country brawl, black chalk and wash © Museum Bojimans van Beuningen, Rotterdam a contemporary of Pieter the Elder’s who outlived him, and who could well have been asked to complete a painting left unfinished. The specificity of the attribution in Arundel’s instructions is striking; assuming it is correct, this may well be the last trace of the prototype. On the other hand, it is not impossible that Arundel’s picture was the present work – it is believed to have come to Amsterdam in 1655, after the death of Arundel’s wife, where it could have been acquired by Rembrandt’s pupil Govaert Flinck, who is known to have owned other pictures formerly owned by Arundel, and to whom the provenance of the present work can hypothetically be traced. The present work was for many years given to Pieter Bruegel the Elder – for example, when in the Lanz collection – an attribution which, given its quality and early date, is not surprising. The early date 1610 makes it that much likelier that the present work may even be the one once owned by Rubens.

The collection of the industrialist Baron Evence III Coppée (1882-1945), was formed in Brussels between 1920 and 1939. The focus was on sixteenth- and early seventeenth- century Flemish painting, with a special emphasis on the work of Pieter Brueghel the Younger whom Coppée much admired for his treatment of humanist themes. In all, he owned nine works by the artist, a group that set the example for many later collectors of Brueghel in Belgium. Much of the collection, including the present lot, was proudly displayed in the beautiful Coppée mansion on the Avenue Franklin D. Roosevelt, Brussels (fig. 4).

CHRISTIE’S. OLD MASTER & BRITISH PICTURES EVENING SALE, 2 December 2014, London, King Street