Strauss & Co brings historical artworks by blue-chip artists Maggie Laubser, J. H. Pierneef, Alexis Preller, Irma Stern and Vladimir Tretchikoff to market this week with a live auction at its new Woodstock premises on Tuesday 28th March.
The auction is the culmination of the auction house’s Cape Town Art Week which included an earlier auction of modern and contemporary art, fine wine and decorative arts such as jewellery, silver and furniture.
Tuesday’s sale will include an in-sale focus on South African painters who explored East Africa. Irma Stern’s devotional composition called Children Reading the Koran (estimate R10–11 million) from her 1939 visit to the island of Zanzibar, leads a fine selection of travel paintings by Freida Lock, J.H.Pierneef and Pieter Wenning. The catalogue also includes historical paintings from two important art collections.
“Strauss & Co is privileged to be handling works from the Naspers and Stellenberg Collection,” says Bina Genovese, Managing Executive of Strauss & Co.“ Naspers Limited is a venerable South African company with an impressive holding of art to match its long trading history. We are delighted to present five paintings from the Naspers Collection, including works by Gregoire Boonzaier, Hugo Naudé and Irma Stern. We are particularly thrilled to also be offering J. H. Pierneef’s serene ravine painting Red Kloof [estimate R5–7 million], which was produced a mere 13 years after Naspers was founded in 1915.
Adds Genovese: “The Stellenberg Collection takes its name from a grand Cape Dutch homestead founded in the late 1600s in what is today upper Kenilworth. We are honoured to present six historical paintings by Pranas Domšaitis, Maud Sumner and Jean Welz from the private collection held at this important historical home, the last example of its kind in Cape Town’s central southern suburbs.
The preview exhibition for Tuesday’s auction is at Strauss & Co’s public gallery at Brickfield Canvas, 35 Brickfield Road, Woodstock in Cape Town.
