Your chance to own an original Master copy
Sotheby’s to host first sale dedicated to copycat versions of classic art, from Leonardo to Rembrandt
WOULD you like to hang a Rembrandt in the bedroom? Or impress your guests with The Last Supper on the dining room wall? Sotheby’s can offer the next best thing.
The auction house is to stage its first sale of Old Master copies, offering versions of some of the most famous images in art history for as little as £400.
The identities of the artists are largely unknown but in many cases the works can be dated to the same period as the originals.
It was common during the Renaissance period for artists to enter the studios of great masters as apprentices, producing copies of their work.
Paintings that were popular in their day were quickly copied by lesser artists. The most expensive painting in the sale is a portrait of Rembrandt’s mother with an estimate of £8,000 to £12,000. The Dutch artist trained many pupils at his Amsterdam workshop, but this particular work is attributed to someone in the “circle of ” Rembrandt – an artist with whom he associated.
A copy of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper, painted around 300 years later than the 15th century original, can be yours for £2,000-3,000.
That is a bargain when compared to another Last Supper copy going under the hammer next month: Andy Warhol’s Sixty Last Suppers is being offered at Christie’s in New York for $50million.
Some of the lots are copies of works lost to history. A painted cloth portrait of Henry VIII by a “follower of” Hans Holbein the Younger is described as a derivation of the Holbein mural that once graced Whitehall Palace. The building burned down in 1698 and the mural was lost, although copies exist.
There is also a copy of Diego Velázquez’s The Lady With the Fan, bear- ing a very close resemblance to the original that hangs in the Wallace Collection in London.
The work carries an estimate of £4,000-6,000 and is listed as “after Velázquez”, meaning a direct imitation made at a later date.
The sale, Old Master Copies: Imitation
and Influence, will take place online and without a buyer’s premium (an additional charge added in the saleroom as a percentage of the hammer price). Bidding on the 50 lots begins today and ends on Oct 30.
Copies of Old Masters regularly feature in auctions, but this is the first devoted to them. A Sotheby’s spokesman described it as “the perfect opportunity for new buyers to snap up a copy of a loved Old Master, and for established to expand their collections.” And there is a possibility, however small, that a buyer might find themselves the owner of a masterpiece.
The Madonna of the Pinks had hung in Alnwick Castle, Northumberland, since 1853, and was thought to be one of several copies of a lost original.
In 1991, it was identified as a genuine Raphael, and the Duke of Northumberland sold it to the National Gallery for £34.88million. Its provenance is still cause for debate.
Chloe Stead, of Sotheby’s Old Master department, said the sale is aimed at new collectors looking for affordable art. Modern copies made in the last 100 years are not included, nor are copies made by well-known artists who routinely copied old masters.
Sneered at by most serious dealers, the market for old master copies has been picking up. In 2012, a late copy of Caravaggio’s The Cardsharps, estimated at £10,000, sold for £51,650.
“Viewing the object is important to us when evaluating the date and condition of the painting,” said Stead.