Canaletto record at Christie's London

London’s Classical Art Week began with Christie’s Old Masters Evening Sale on 1 July. The 39 lots offered, after three withdrawals and five unsold works, raised nearly £55.3 million, including £31.9 million in one lot alone, a record-breaking Canaletto view. Guarantees played a major role, with nine lots protected by third parties, with four likely having to intervene in the absence of further bids. Four of the top six lots were guaranteed to sell, although Canaletto attracted interest from at least three buyers, making the guarantee unnecessary.

Tiziano Vecellio, “Portrait of a nobleman, seated before a window”

The classic large view of Venice with the Return of the Bucintoro on Ascension Day was set to break the artist's previous record from the moment a guarantee was secured on the lot. The 86 x 138 cm painting, one of a pair painted in the 1730s, considered by historians and collectors to be the artist's finest period, came to auction with a long and important noble and historical provenance that significantly added value. Together with the 'twin' view of the Grand Canal and Rialto, they came from the collection of Sir Robert Walpole , the first English Prime Minister until 1742. The paintings subsequently passed through the hands of various English noble families, before having an 'Italian' chapter after the Second World War, when they were bought in London by Mario Crespi, senator and owner of the Corriere della Sera, in the 1950s, before ending up in France and being sold separately. The twin canvas of the Grand Canal with Rialto held the record price of 18.6 million pounds for 20 years, while the painting of the Bucintoro was sold in 1993 by Tajan in France for the equivalent of 10 million euros at the time. The size, quality and history of the painting have led to the new current record, in a context of buyers increasingly focused on the search for the 'trophy'; the buyer could also be the owner of the other pendant painting, happy to raise the bid to reunite the pair.

Gerrit Dou. “A cottage interior with an old woman ('Rembrandt's Mother') delousing a boy's hair”

In addition to the Canaletto, five lots surpassed the £1 million mark, two of which were offered without guarantees: a severe, noble male portrait by Titian from the mid-16th century, which sold after a single bid in the room for £3.4 million with fees, from an estimate of £3-5 million; and one of 45 versions of Pieter Brueghel the Younger's Winter Scene with a Bird Trap, which sold for just under £1.2 million, below its estimate of £1-1.5 million before fees. Three guaranteed Flemish Golden Age paintings topped the million mark: a large, rich still life by Jan Davidsz de Heem of 1649 likely went to the third-party guarantor at £3.6m with fees, from an estimate of £3-5m, while an exuberant pair of mid-18th-century paintings of vases of flowers and fruit by Jan van Huysum changed hands for £1.6m, within the estimate of £1.2-1.8m, probably thanks to a bid above the guarantee. A small interior view by Gerrit Dou , a pupil of Rembrandt , fared better than the guaranteed estimate of £1-1.5m, reaching almost £2.1m; the painting was part of a group of seven lots consigned by the heirs of collector Daniel George van Beuningen (who died 70 years ago); Two of these are likely to have gone to third-party guarantors, a Cranach the Younger’s Venus with Cupid at £630,000 and an El Greco religious painting and study at £756,000, while a Pieter Brueghel the Younger ’s country interior scene beat its estimate of £300,000-500,000 to settle at £819,000 with fees, bringing the six lots’ total sales to around £5m. A second Mickey Cartin collection came close to £1.5m in total, led by a grim, double-bearded female portrait by Willem Key which went above its guaranteed estimate at £882,000, while a Hammershoi self-portrait failed to sell from its estimate of £200,000-300,000. In total, only seven lots beat their high estimates before fees, with more than a dozen failing to reach their low estimates; few re-bids apart from the cases noted above. Sotheby's completed the offering with an evening catalogue on July 2.