Dame Kiri’s collection for sale
An art collection owned by famed Kiwi opera singer Dame Kiri Te Kanawa will be up for auction.
Works worth between $4 million and $5m will go under the hammer at an auction of Important and Rare Art at the International Art Centre in Parnell, Auckland next Tuesday.
The collection is under tight security, with the show taking place almost exactly one year after a ram-raid heist at the same gallery saw two Gottfried Lindauer paintings stolen.
Te Kanawa’s collection includes three major paintings by New Zealand artist Charles Goldie, and several works by top Australian artists, including Arthur Boyd and Lloyd Rees.
Most of Te Kanawa’s collection up for sale has been on a 25-year loan to the Auckland Art Gallery, Toi O Ta¯ maki.
The three works by Goldie include an oil painting of Wharekauri Tahuna, a chieftain of the Arawa Tribe. Another work by Goldie of the same subject sold at the International Art centre in
2016 for a record price of $1.38m. Te Kanawa’s Goldie painting is estimated to sell for between
$700,000 and $1m.
Other Goldie paintings in Te Kanawa’s collection to be sold include a 1940 oil of Tamati Pehiriri which is expected to sell for between $800,000 and $1.2m, and a 1940 oil of Te Hei, a chieftainess of the Nga¯ ti Raukawa tribe which is estimated to sell for between $500,000 and $800,000.
International Art Centre director Richard Thomson said Te Kanawa’s Goldie paintings were among the artist’s finest works.
He said there had already been wide interest, and he expected that to increase ‘‘significantly’’ before the sale.
Goldie paintings were so scarce, so to have three major examples of his work on the market in one auction was unprecedented, Thomson said. ’’From a collector’s perspective this is as good and as solid as it gets.’’