The Fine Art Society Auction Results

The first auction of the year to include photographic lots took place earlier this week. Hosted by Sotheby’s London the auction was a celebration of one of London’s oldest galleries.

The Fine Art Society: 142 Years on Bond Street took place on Tuesday (5th) with 312 lots on offer including multiple photographic prints from artists such as Herbert George Ponting, Howard Coster and a collection of salt prints cataloguing the Great Exhibition of London, 1851. In all the auction realised a combined sales total of £2,692,695.

The most expensive photograph was Howard Coster’s Gluck, CA (view here) taken in 1932. The silver print was estimated to sell for between £4,000 and £6,000 and sold squarely for £5,000. 

Though Herbert George Ponting’s print A Dog Team Resting By An Iceberg, 1912 (featured) was estimated to sell for £2,000 to £3,000, the lot received a few more bids and realised a sale price of £3,750. However, the most successful photography lot was, arguably, the collection of 39 photographs from the Great Exhibition in 1851 London (view here), which was expected to fetch no more than £800 but saw a hammer price of £1,125. Though the images were captured by unknown photographers the prints have historical value.

View the results of this auction, including the sale of various sculptures, paintings, etchings and items of furniture, on Sotheby’s page here. 

The next auction to include photographic lots take place next week, also hosted by Sotheby’s, and will be reviewed here on Photography At Auction. View a preview of that auction here.