Sotheby’s New York sale of 19th Century European Art including The Orientalist Sale on October 23 features a tightly curated selection of choice, high-quality works across the range of artistic genres which flourished at the time. A separate catalogue, entitled Painters of Perfection, will be dedicated to a selection of paintings by the French Academic painter William Bouguereau and his followers. Complementing these artists’ style of depicting peasant life will be a strong offering of works by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Jean-François Millet and Gustave Courbet. These works will include a major discovery, The Corn Sifters (Les Cribleuses de Blé) (lot 139, est. $600/800,000), by Courbet, who earlier this year was the subject of a retrospective exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York and at the Grande Palais in Paris. The afternoon session will feature The Orientalist Sale, for which there is an independent catalogue, featuring masterful works by artists including Jean-Léon Gérôme, Leopold Carl Müller and Rudolf Ernst. The pre-sale exhibition will take place at Sotheby’s 5th floor galleries, with Orientalist works in the 10th floor galleries, from October 18th to 22nd, and the 215 lots in the sale are expected to bring $26,330,000/37,644,000.

Posted: 10|9|08 at 10:56 am. Filed under: US News.