Roseberys’ Prints & Multiples auction on Tuesday 25 November is led by a striking Andy Warhol screenprint of Superman from his Myths series, created in 1981 and estimated at £180,000-£200,000. This rare Artist’s Proof (3/30), aside from the edition of 200, is printed in colours with diamond dust on Lenox Museum board, signed and numbered in pencil and carries both the Ronald Feldman Fine Arts stamp and the DC Comics stamp to the reverse. Printed by Rupert Jasen Smith, New York, Superman remains one of the most recognisable works from Warhol’s late career. The work, embellished with Warhol’s signature “diamond dust” - finely ground glass sprinkled over wet ink - exemplifies the artist’s fascination with celebrity, mass media and the iconography of popular culture. The Myths portfolio comprises ten screenprints depicting some of the 20th century’s most instantly recognisable fictional characters. Provenance includes an American collection and the Halcyon Gallery in London. There were only 30 Artist's proofs produced of Superman, the last one to appear at auction was in 2018, seven years ago.
Lot 238: Andy Warhol, Superman, from Myths, (F and S II.260) 1981
Estimate: £180,000 - £200,000
The auction also features Warhol’s iconic Mick Jagger (1975), a screenprint in colours with silver on Arches Aquarelle wove, signed by both Warhol and Jagger and printed by Alexander Heinrici, New York.
Modern British prints are represented by works from Bridget Riley and David Hockney. Riley’s Blue and Pink (2001) is signed and numbered 40/60 and comes from the artist’s studio and a private London collection. Hockney’s Blue Hang Cliff (1993) is a lithograph and screenprint in colours on Arches wove, signed and numbered 22/68 with provenance from Christie’s London and a private collection in London.
Lot 6: Bridget Riley CH CBE, Blue and Pink, 2001
Early and 20th-century photography includes rare works by Margaret Bourke-White, such as Niagara Falls Power: Hydro-generators (1928) and an untitled resin-coated gelatin silver print, both signed and framed. Bourke-White was an American photographer and photojournalist, celebrated for her early work documenting industrial architecture in striking black and white images of factories and skyscrapers. Horst P. Horst’s Marlène Dietrich (1942), gelatin silver print on wove, signed in pencil and Sir Cecil Beaton’s Cole Porter photograph are also included, representing some of the most influential photographers of the 20th century.
Lot 279: Margaret Bourke-White, American 1904-1971, Untitled
Historic prints round out the sale with Rosa Bonheur’s studies of bulls, monochrome lithographs demonstrating her meticulous observation and technical skill, and Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes’ Disparate de Bestia from Los Proverbios (c.1824), etching, aquatint and drypoint from the third edition, as published in Paris by François Liénard.
Lot 52: Rosa Bonheur, French 1822-1899, Study of a bull; Study of two bulls; two monochrome lithographs.
Estimate: £1,500 - £2,000
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