oil on canvas, signed unframed

overall size 122cm x 92cm

Provenance: Private Hertfordshire collection. Note: Bellany's work is included in The Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) New York, The Metropolitan Museum, New York, The Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Connecticut, Tate Britain, London and at numerous other prestigious public collections around the world. UK public collections feature 279 examples of his work. His well known enthusiastic and long term collectors included David Bowie and Damien Hirst. In 2003 Damien Hirst praised Bellany as "one of the major painters of the twentieth century." John Bellany was awarded a CBE (1994) and honorary degrees from the Universities of Edinburgh (1996) and Heriot-Watt (1998). Note 2: Collector demand has never been higher for the work of John Bellany and numerous examples have been sold in recent months by both McTear's and others at ever more impressive prices. In The Scottish Contemporary Art Auction of 29th May 2022 "The Finnon Smoker" by Bellany sold for £80,000 (hammer) and in the same sale, "Bass Rock Fable" (a 76 x 61cm unframed oil) sold for £12,000 (hammer). In our 21st August 2022 auction, lot 137 "The Newspaper Hat" (a 61 x 51cm oil) sold for £9500 (hammer). "Like-for-like" auction prices for original paintings are usually difficult to assess, but in The Scottish Contemporary Art Auction of April 2023, two Bellany paintings which had been acquired in our auctions in September and November 2014 were consigned for sale by the same owner. The original 2014 selling prices were £1800 and £4000 and the same paintings sold in April for £3800 and £7000 (all hammer prices). This equates to a growth in value of 86.2% in fewer than nine years. In The Scottish Contemporary Art Auction of 25th May 2023, lot 282, "Restless Wave" a 90 x 90cm oil (by Bellany) sold for £9000 (hammer) and in our auction of 9th November, lot 92 (2023), "Harbour" a 90 x 120cm oil by Bellany sold for £11000 (hammer). More recently, "The Players" lot 50 in our auction of 28th March 2024 sold for £30000 (hammer).