SOLD Hammer price €480
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A Drawing, watercolour on paper, circa 6 ins x 7 « ins, showing two young women in flowing robes playing musical instruments, some damage to paper, in an old frame. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €700
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)An original Drawing, ink and wash on Card, signed, circa 5 « ins x 4 ins, inscribed ‘Sosimus [?] calling about him the cherubim and seraphim’, further inscribed ‘J.B. Yeats, 3 Blenheim Rd., Bedford Park, W.’; and a larger watercolour drawing of a young woman playing a guitar, 25cms x 35cms (10″ x 14″). (2)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €480
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A large Drawing, watercolour on card, 21 ins x 14 ins, showing two girls seated in a landscape, possibly plucking chickens, the girls probably modelled on his two daughters. With a second drawing, watercolour and white on card, circa 10 ins x 7 ins, showing a girl and a cavalier foreground, a cadaver background filling the girl’s glass, and a third drawing, related, showing only the girl with outstretched glass, somewhat foxed.Presumably all three are intended as illustrations.As a collection, w.a.f.Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €4100
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A wonderful Collection of about A5 original Drawings and Sketches, mostly pencil on paper, mostly of family and friends, some mounted, some double sided, some signed and/or inscribed, various sizes, about 45 in all, including sketches of York Powell (several), F. Gregg, Uncle Isaac Yeats, T.W. Lyster, Mrs. (Susan) Yeats (repeatedly), A. Harvey, John Pollexfen, Lily Yeats, also ‘Man feeding sparrows in Paris 1900’, etc. etc.* Condition varies, but this is a splendid collection showing to the full the artist’s appreciation of character and his mastery of expressive line and shade, using only the simplest means.As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €1700
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A collection of about thirty Drawings, various sizes, including a sketch of his wife Susan and daughter Lily dated Feb. 13th 1870, inscribed rear ‘Mrs.Yeats & Lily, a few weeks before the birth of Bobby, who died 1873’; also other sketches of his wife Susan, a watercolour portrait of a woman, a sketch inscribed ‘Aunt Lolla’, another inscribed ‘Aunt Gracie’, another inscribed ‘Burtschaell’, other figure studies, including an interesting nude study, two landscape drawings, etc., some a little rubbed, a good collection.* ‘Bobby’ was JBY’s second son, born 1870, the year before Jack. He contracted croup while JBY was away painting, and died in a single night. Who knows what he might have become? As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €380
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)’The Angel Child’Yeats (John Butler). A well-modelled Drawing of Mrs Harry Thaw, inscribed ‘The Angel Child’, with a sketch of a judge and barrister to left; also a good watercolour of a mountain stream.* See Murphy, Prodigal Father p. 335-6. Harry Thaw was a rich New York socialite who killed his wife’s former lover, Stanford White, in a jealous rage. John Quinn arranged that JBY could attend the trial, but Murphy says his sketches have disappeared; this appears to be the only survivor. (2)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €1300
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A very good Collection of approx 9 Original Drawings and Sketches, mostly pencil on paper, some inscribed, some mounted, 9 in all, including an early watercolour drawing probably of his wife Susan stitching, with a classical sketch verso, another sketch identified as Nelly Whelan, also Aunt Gracie Yeats, Great Uncle John Yeats? [the inscription probably in Lily Yeats’ hand], two studies of MP’s, and a fine drawing probably of his daughter Elizabeth (Lolly, manager of the Cuala Press). As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €800
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A collection of Original Drawings, mostly watercolour on card, various sizes, 7 in all, including a view of Ben Bulben inscribed rear (probably in Jack Yeats’ hand) ‘By J.B. Yeats Senior’, an old man reading a book, a girl in a red skirt, a girl in a pink dress, a nude young girl in a forest background, and a woman in red dress in a landscape (oil on card). Some of these may have been intended as illustrations. In the later years of the 19th century JBY illustrated some 20 books for London publishers.As a collection, w.a.f.Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €1150
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A very good collection of 9 Original Drawings and Sketches, mostly pencil on paper, some inscribed (mostly by Lily Yeats), some mounted, nine in all, including a sketch of a child in a pinafore and apron, inscribed rear ‘Willy 1866’, a sketch of ‘Clancy MP’ with a white bearded man (possibly John O’Leary), also William Steward, Louis Purser FTCD (titled rear), T.W. Rolleston, Vyvyan Steward (‘Papa’s cousin’) (two versions), a lady in a hat, and Sydney P. Hall. As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €1200
John Butler Yeats R.H.A. (1839 – 1922)A small Collection of about fifteen Drawings, pencil on paper, mostly family members, inscribed, including Lolly Yeats, Mrs. Farrer, Aunt Agnes (two versions), John Pollexfen, Aunt Alice (three versions), Aunt Lolla, Isaac Yeats, Aunt Isabella Pollexfen, also Rosa Butt, dated July 1902, T.W. Russell (two sketches), ‘L.C.P[urser]’, ‘At the Abbey Theatre, 27th Aug. 1906’, signed, and a bench of judges dated May 9 1907, signed initials. A good collection, some a little rubbed or soiled. As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €500
John Butler Yeats in New York. The celebrated Photograph showing Yeats with other guests of John Quinn at a dinner at Delmonico’s, June 24 1908, about fifteen people grouped around a splendidly appointed round table, circa 10«” x 13″, mounted, a little spotting.No wonder he never wanted to come home! (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €560
Yeats (John Butler). An attractive pen-and-ink Drawing, circa 20cms x 28cms (8″ x 11″), apparently showing a theatrical scene, perhaps imagined, with four winged female figures on left, a man in a tunic with a short sword on right, inscribed on left ‘Once upon a time maidens had wings, but these they lost if they loved a man, her companions are trying to rescue [her]’, and on right ‘The rising sun lighting his figure – the girls half lost in gloom’, signed J.B. Yeats. With two further ink drawings, one showing two figures at a grave side, the other (dated May 23rd 1915) an old man approaching a woman in a forest setting.Probably these drawings were extracted from letters. The vast majority of J.B. Yeats’ illustrated letters to his family are now in the National Library of Ireland. As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €200
Goldthwaite (Anne), American School. A dry point (etched) Portrait of ‘John Butler Yeats drawing a young lady’, undated, circa 1910, circa 10″ x 8″, mounted, signed in pencil, edition not stated. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €3700
American ViewsYeats (John Butler) 1839-1922. A Collection of eight Sketchbooks, 1908 and later, mostly circa 20cms x 12.5cms (8″ x 5″), a few smaller, containing sketches from life in and around New York City, mostly head and group studies, mostly in soft pencil with a few in ink, a few inscribed, some identifiable likenesses, notably an excellent study of John Quinn towards rear of one of the later sketchbooks. There are also some passages of prose, apparently impressions of American life, possibly drafts for letters or articles.Condition varies, some sketches smudged, but there are certainly some examples that could be extracted and framed if desired. As they stand, the sketchbooks provide an interesting commentary on life as JBY lived it during his fourteen-years stay in New York, penniless much of the time but never friendless, and resisting to the end his family’s repeated efforts to bring him home. He died there on 3 February 1922, the day after the first edition of Joyce’s Ulysses was published in Paris. As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €4400
Yeats (John Butler). An artist’s Portfolio, buckram, morocco-backed, titled in Lily’s hand ‘Early Sketches & Watercolours’, containing some 140 drawings, mostly pencil on paper, some in ink, including some attractive sketches of his daughters growing up, a few landscapes probably Sligo, a drawing of ‘The Sitting Room, Sea View, Sligo’, also various academic and other studies, showing a gradual improvement in confidence and fluency. As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €9500
Pencil, Paper and a Keen EyeYeats (John Butler). A brown cloth artist’s Portfolio containing some 180 sketches and drawings on paper, mostly face and figure studies, family and friends, mostly in pencil, some heightened with watercolour or white, various sizes, a few inscribed, one identified as T.W. Lyster, another with an inscription about Home Rule, another inscribed ‘Lily’, another ‘Chess at Temple News room’, another ‘Henry Middleton’, also an old man with a long pipe, a woman digging, a girl listening to a seashell, a few landscape and animal sketches, etc. etc.* A superb collection, evidently the work of a man who had little to do for much of the day but draw, and a lesson of what can be achieved with pencil, paper and a keen eye.Some of the sketches are rubbed or soiled, but many are frameable in our opinion. As a collection, w.a.f. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €560
Pollexfen, Elizabeth Middleton [Mrs. William Pollexfen, nee Middleton, b. 1817, Sligo]A group of eight watercolour Flower Studies in Victorian style, circa 3 « ins square, possibly intended as place-markers, with one larger study, circa 8 ins x 6 « ins, the smaller in an envelope inscribed in Lily Yeats’ hand, ‘Painted by Grandmama Pollexfen when a girl’, the larger inscribed rear ‘Painted by Elizabeth Pollexfen. Born 1817, Sligo’, with framing notes.Elizabeth was a daughter of William Middleton, a Sligo merchant and miller who owned a shipping firm in partnership with Elizabeth’s husband William Pollexfen (born in Devon). Elizabeth and William’s daughter Susan Mary married John Butler Yeats in September 1863. As a collection. (1)Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €560
Pollexfen (Susan Mary, later Mrs. John Butler Yeats) An attractive Watercolour showing two travellers by a lake surrounded by hills, a castle above, 7 ins x 10 ins, over a verse written in a careful hand, ‘The way was long, the wind was cold, / The minstrel was infirm and old; / His withered check and tresses grey / Seemed to have known a better day.’ Inscribed rear, ‘Done by Miss Pollexfen for L.A. Tanfest [?] and highly esteemed by her – Oct. 5th 1859’.* A remarkable survival, even in a family which never threw things away. Susan Mary was born in 1841, and so was eighteen in 1859. The watercolour shows some talent for drawing, and a good sense of colour. It may perhaps be a copy, but is none the worse for that. In the course of time Susan Mary became the wife of John Butler Yeats, and the mother of W.B., Jack, Lily and Lolly, and also a third son who died in infancy.Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €750
Yeats (John Butler) A small Drawing of his wife Susan, ‘Grandmother Yeats’, pencil on paper, 3 3/4 ins x 3 5/8 ins, framed, extensively inscribed to rear by Lily Yeats, given by her to her niece Michael Yeats on his birthday, August 22nd 1941. Also initialled rear MY.Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.
SOLD Hammer price €1700
Yeats (John Butler). A good pencil Sketch, circa 4 « ins x 6 « ins, showing William Butler Yeats on his nurse’s knee, dated Sept. 28th 1865, Sligo, inscribed ‘A good likeness but the nose a little too large, JBY’, on verso a watercolour drawing showing women at a lakeside with swans, framed. * WBY was born 13 June 1865, so was just over 3 months old on 28 September. This must be the earliest documented likeness of the future poet.Provenance: The Yeats Family Collection.