拍品 261
261
Georg Dionysius Ehret (Erfurt 1708-1770 London)
An 'Individual Talent' - The late Mrs T.S. Eliot In her own right Valerie Eliot was an esteemed editor, astute collector, dedicated philanthropist and supporter of literature and the arts. Yet she spent her life 'in continual surrenderto something more valuable' . She was entrusted by Thomas Stearns Eliot to be the sole protector of his legacy - a role that was first and foremost of her concerns and the driving force behind her professional and personal choices. Born in Leeds and educated at Queen Anne's School in Caversham, Esm Valerie Fletcher first encountered the work of T.S. Eliot when she heard Sir John Gielgud's recording of Journey of the Magi as a schoolgirl of fourteen. She decided that she wanted to seek out TSE and work with him and she did, becoming his secretary when he was a director at the well-known publishing house Faber and Faber in 1949. It was not until 1956 and after a long and successful professional relationship that the couple married in secrecy at St. Barnabas' Church in Kensington and thereafter lived in a flat in Kensington Court Gardens. The flat became the backdrop for their happy marriage and following his death in 1965, Valerie often reminisced about their time together. She delighted in recalling the auspicious occasions when Igor Stravinsky and Groucho Marx visited them and equally the 'prosaic' moments shared reading aloud in front of the fire. From the gin and tonic before supper, to dining at the Connaught and the Savoy Grill, shared habits and daily routines were the way she kept her 'beloved Tom' alive . In death their dedication to one another remained absolute. TSE left instructions for Valerie to be buried with him in East Coker, a village in Somerset to which his ancestry can be traced and the eponym of the second of his Four Quartets. The lines of East Coker, published long before he met Valerie, seem to prefigure the devotion which belied the years that separated them: 'Love is most nearly itself/When here and now cease to matter.' It was perhaps the enduring strength of their professional relationship, however, that precipitated Eliot's decision to entrust the safeguarding of his legacy and the editing and publishing of his correspondence to her. In the many years that followed his death she scoured the globe for letters penned by him that she purchased, often at great expense, from auction houses and private collections. The undertaking was enormous and by 1988 Valerie was still working on Volume I (letters dated 1898-1922). This was subsequently revised after her tracing some two hundred additional letters and re-issued to coincide with the publication of Volume II. It was a huge undertaking and Valerie dedicated herself to the task for the rest of her life. Volume IV (1928-29), co-edited with John Haffenden, was published in January of this year, just two months after her death, and the important work of collating and editing future volumes continues today. In her professional capacity as an editor Valerie showed levels of attention to detail, mental acuity and thoroughness of approach that were undoubtedly the traits that led TSE to trust her so implicitly with preserving the legacy of his work and the important task of bringing his prolific epistolary life to a new readership. The collection of Valerie Eliot, though formed almost entirely following the death of her husband, would seem as indivisible from her relationship with the poet and man as any other aspect of her life. It was the huge success of the West End musical CATS (based on Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats) that allowed her to amass one of the finest collections of portrait miniatures and British art over the course of twenty years. Valerie's spirited collecting was motivated by both a rigorous academic interest in art and a deeply personal and aesthetic response to the works themselves. At first sight, the collection in its entirety presents few apparent threads of unity. Beyond a strong bias towards British art and an insistence on quality, what connects such disparate works by Hilliard, Freud, Gainsborough, Spencer and Moore is not immediately clear. Yet one hardly has to scratch the surface of Eliot's prose to find the most wonderful of parallels: 'No poet, no artist of any art has his complete meaning alone. His significance, his appreciation is the appreciation of his relation to the dead poets and artists. You cannot value him alone; you must set him, for contrast and comparison, among the dead.' Observing the many works as they jostled for position on the walls of the Kensington flat they shared, one sensed an understanding of how Eliot observed the relationship of artists to one another across time. With the weight of critical art historical thought behind us we are able to observe that Constable's deployment of line is as expressive and 'modern' for his time as Hockney's or Freud's are today. Valerie approached these artists (and many others) equally and without prejudice as a collector. The 'contrast and comparison' invited by the sheer scope of Valerie's collection signals her belief in Eliot's assertion that 'art never improves' it is rather that the 'material of art is never quite the same.' Where so many collectors focus on one historical period, artist or medium, the eye of Valerie Eliot showed a true 'historical sense' which is to say 'a sense of the timeless as well as of the temporal and of the timeless and of the temporal together.' Valerie's love and appreciation of the visual arts was something she shared with TSE. His poetry and prose is resplendent with references to music, the visual arts and the inter-relationships between these different disciplines. TSE himself collected art, albeit in a modest fashion; he purchased a landscape by Wadsworth from Frank Rutter's Adelphi Gallery in 1919. Wyndham Lewis was a lifelong friend and correspondent of TSE and Valerie added drawings by Lewis to her collection (see lots 364 and 365) as well as wartime prints by C. R.W. Nevinson (lots 360 and 361), Eliot's fellow contributor to the Vorticist BLAST magazine. There are earlier poetic and literary references in the outstanding group of British drawings and watercolours that Valerie acquired. Two beautiful works on paper by Joseph Mallord William Turner are each inspired by poetic endeavour. Lot 275 is a memorial to Byron, Scott and Moore, painted for Walter Fawkes as the title page to six illustrations for the poets listed and is inscribed 'three Poets in three different Kingdoms born' - a conceit that seems to owe its roots to Dryden - 'Three Poets in three different ages born...' (John Dryden, Under Mr. Milton's portrait before his Paradise Lost). Lot 274 is Turner's vignette entitled The Wreck, one of many works the artist produced to accompany verse (in this instance, a poem by Edward Howard). Turner expounded that 'Painting and poetry, flowing from the same fount mutually by visionreciprocally improve, reflect, and heighten each other's beauties like . . . mirrors' (J.M.W. Turner, January 1811). Edward Lear's Girgente in Sicily, with its 'warm sky', mirrors the last line of Tennyson's poem You ask me, why, tho' ill at ease of 1833 (see lot 289). The watercolours of Turner and Lear set against more modern masters such as Lewis and Nevinson in the collection invite the very 'contrast and comparison' that Eliot sought for his poetry within the literary tradition of his poetic predecessors. Perhaps the most 'individual talent' displayed by Valerie Eliot as a collector was in her extraordinary acquisition of portrait miniatures. The first volume of the present catalogue is almost entirely devoted to the art of the miniature - some two hundred lots ranging from the magnificent full-length portrait depicting Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex (1566-1601) by Isaac Oliver (lot 171) to the precocious charm of the young girl depicted in Andrew Plimer's double-sided miniature (lot 33). Valerie Eliot began to show an interest in the subject following the publication by Faber and Faber of a Dictionary ofBritish Miniature Painters in 1972, written by Daphne Foskett. In the years that followed, Daphne became a friend and advisor to Valerie, often accompanying her to auctions and exhibitions of miniatures. It would seem that collecting miniatures was both an academic and a pragmatic endeavour. The Kensington Court Gardens flat was modest in size; miniatures were the perfect solution to assembling an extensive collection within a limited space. Initially the works were focused around the hearth with Valerie alternating between sitting in her or TSE's fireside chair, each offering contrasting vantage points from which to view her acquisitions. As the collection evolved it became a matter of finding a space within the densely hung drawing room, and latterly the hallways, to accommodate each piece. The poet Craig Raine commented that the clusters of miniatures were "as if some lavishly decorated veteran, some extraordinary hero, weighty with honours, were standing to attention". Pictures and miniatures were hung at eye level with surprising juxtapositions created through happy accident - Valerie was known to return from an auction and hammer a nail into the wall in order to position a newly acquired work of art for immediate enjoyment. As with her acquisition of works on paper, literary threads are readily discernable in some of her most treasured miniatures. Lot 42 was the subject of a lengthy (though now widely refuted) academic study which aimed to prove the sitter was William Shakespeare and portrait miniatures historically identified as Dryden, Dickens and Keats feature alongside a charming portrait painted by author Charlotte Brontë. Valerie's Yorkshire heritage was reflected in some of her earliest purchases; the view of Stapleton Park near Pontefract, by Leeds-born artist Atkinson Grimshaw, was one such example, the figure studies and sculpture of Henry Moore are others (lots 292 and 386) along with a view of Skelton Church by John Piper (lot 387). A love of animals became a leitmotif. Through her friends Deirdre and Mark Simpson, Valerie became acquainted with one of Elisabeth Frink's stepsons, who in turn introduced Valerie to Frink just shortly before the artist's death in 1993. The magnificent bronze horse (lot 369) was even taken to dinner by Valerie - the excitement of her buying it at Christie's one November afternoon led her to take it to the Simpsons' flat where it lay on the table to be admired over the course of the evening. Frink's bronzes of dogs and the remarkable drawing Tut by Wyndham Lewis (lots 364, 370 and 382), brought back memories of her Scottish terrier 'Rags' of whom she was incredibly fond. This lighter side of Valerie's character and love of animals was again something she shared with TSE. Valerie's consent to allow Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats to be made into the Lloyd Webber hit musical brought Eliot's poetry to a much wider audience and into the arena of popular culture. Where previously Eliot's readership had demanded a certain academic solemnity, CATS promoted Eliot's whimsical and comic agility within the English language. By devoting her personal and professional life to the faithful preservation of T.S. Eliot's memory, Valerie Eliot became the architect of her own legacy. She was distinguished in 1971 following the publication of the facsimile edition of Eliot's The Waste Land which included original manuscript drafts and Ezra Pound's annotations. For many this remains her most notable professional achievement. Matthew Hollis, Poetry Editor at Faber and Faber, said of the facsimile edition: "Valerie Eliot opened a window on to the work of T.S. Eliot which leaves generations of readers and scholars wiser and grateful. Her scrupulous editing of The Waste Land facsimile in 1971 became a landmark publication, vividly revealing the meticulous process by which T.S. Eliot, with the help of Ezra Pound, had set about preparing his seminal poem for publication half a century before." In recognition of her many achievements, Valerie was awarded a number of honorary doctorates from institutions in England and North America including one from the University of Kent. She was made a fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge, in 1991. In addition to editing, Valerie spent a large part of her personal time and wealth supporting charitable organisations and promoting contemporary British poetry. In 1990 she established the Old Possum's Practical Trust, a charitable organisation supporting literary, artistic, musical and theatrical projects and institutions. In 1993 Valerie provided the funds for the inaugural Poetry Book Society's now highly coveted award - The T.S. Eliot Prize for Poetry - a practice she continued throughout the remainder of her life. In addition, she was one of the London Library's most significant benefactors, providing the funds for its latest development and new wing, T.S. Eliot House. She was made Vice-President of the Library in 2009. TSE's working library and first editions have been bequeathed to Magdalene College and the archive of letters which Valerie collected so devotedly throughout her life is to be retained by the T.S. Eliot Estate to ensure the important work of editing and publishing further volumes of Eliot's correspondence continues. It is a fitting tribute and a mark of her magnanimity that the proceeds from the sale of her art collection go towards ensuring future of the Old Possum's Practical Trust. In her multifarious roles as esteemed editor, talented collector and devoted wife, Valerie Eliot displayed throughout a 'fidelity to thought and feeling' worthy of Eliot's delight. A debt of thanks is owed to the following individuals whose contributions and insights inform this introduction: Dame Elizabeth Esteve-Coll, DBE, FRSA, Craig Raine, Mark Simpson, Debbie Whitfield and the Trustees of the Old Possum's Practical Trust, Judith Hooper, Deirdre Simpson and Clare Reihill. Gemma Sudlow Associate Director, Private Collections & Country House Sales
Georg Dionysius Ehret (Erfurt 1708-1770 London)

A Blue Auricula (Auricula Fille Amoureuse)

细节
Georg Dionysius Ehret (Erfurt 1708-1770 London)
A Blue Auricula (Auricula Fille Amoureuse)
signed and dated 'Auricula G. D. Ehret. pinxit/1757.' (lower right)
pencil, watercolour and bodycolour, on vellum
19¼ x 13¾ in. (48.9 x 34.9 cm.)
来源
Anonymous sale; Christie's, London, 12 July 1996, lot 32.
with Spink, London, 1996.

荣誉呈献

Katharine Cooke
Katharine Cooke
+44 (0)20 7389 2343

拍品专文

Ehret was the dominant influence in botanical art during the mid 18th Century and began his career as a gardener employed by the Margrave of Baden Durlach (Karl Wilhelm). The Margrave founded the new capital at Karlsruhe on the northern edge of the Black Forest where 500 auriculas were planted in the newly designed gardens. While at Karlsruhe Ehret assisted the botanical watercolourist August Wilhelm Sivert (fl. 1720-1760) in preparing his paints and this inspired him to execute his own plant portraits which he presented to his employer. He departed for Nuremberg in 1733, where he met Dr Christoph Jakob Trew (1695-1769), who was to become his life-long friend and patron. Between 1734 and 1735 Ehret visited Paris, where he must have seen Nicolas Robert's botanical miniatures, les Vélins du Roi. He was so impressed by the superior qualities of vellum over paper, that he adopted watercolour and later bodycolour on vellum as his preferred medium.

Ehret settled in England in 1736, remaining there for the rest of his life as a botanical artist and drawing master. His reputation was enhanced by the publication of various flower books based on his drawings, including Dr Trew's Plantae Selectae, 1750-1773 and Hortus Nitidissimus, 1750-1786. Gerta Calmann maintains, however, that his original drawings 'were the true expression of his genius' (G. Calmann, Ehret Flower Painter Extraordinary, Oxford, 1977, p. 99).
Wilfrid Blunt comments that 'Ehret's greatest merit is that he succeeded as few other botanical artists have succeeded; in being at once both botanist and artist' (S. Sitwell and W. Blunt, Great Flower Books, London, 1956, p. 331). This is evident in the botanical accuracy and aesthetic appeal in the execution of Ehret's Auricula Fille Amoureuse (also known as Blue Auricula).

The auricula which is an alpine cousin of the wild primrose had become increasingly popular in the 17th and 18th Centuries owing to its jewel-like colours. By the mid 18th Century the more commonly cultivated striped auriculas gave way to the edged varieties like the Blue Auricula. Ehret's eye for botanical detail can be seen in the minute specks of white which depict the fine powder or farina which characteristically coats the petals of the auricula.

There is a fine comparable drawing in the Victoria & Albert Museum of a Blue Auricula by Ehret dated 1743 which is similar in style but does not include the moth. The moth is probably part of the genus Utetheisa which has one native European species and a related American species.

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