Four years ago the James Adam salerooms auctioned a wonderful collection of Hicks furniture which had all come from the same source.
This was the former home in Rathgar of Dublin solicitor and art patron John Leo Burke who died in 1959. Next December, Adam's will be disposing of a number of paintings from Burke's collection during the next Irish art sale.
Inherited by John Burke's daughter Ann, for some time they have been on loan to the University of Limerick and could be seen there until recently. Ann Burke died earlier this year and that is why the group of pictures is now being offered for sale. Principal among the lots is a relatively small but clearly very fine piece by Walter Osborne.
In the Garden shows five young children seated on the grass beneath trees, the leaves of which cause the light to fall in an appealing dappled manner; in the background can be seen a pair of elderly bewhiskered gentlemen.
Probably painted in 1901 two years before the artist's death, the picture is an essay in managing subtly diverse shades of green relieved only by sitters' skin tones and the colours of their clothing.
This really looks like a delightful work and the auctioneers' argue that it could be considered Osborne's masterpiece. For that reason, they expect it to make in the region of £300,000 to £400,000.
The Burke group also contains two other oils by Osborne which are to be sold on the same occasion. Both are earlier in date, the first being the self-explanatory Ploughing (£50,000 to £70,000) which was painted during the artist's English plein-air period in the latter part of the 1880s.
Milking Time, meanwhile, dates from 1892 and carries an estimate of £80,000 to £120,000. Two other highly-regarded Irish artists were also represented in Burke's collection and will feature in the December sale. Nathaniel Hone's Malahide Estuary (£40,000 to £50,000) represents a boy herding cattle along the beach while sailing boats are shown in the sea behind.
William Leech's Twas Brillig, despite its Lewis Carroll-inspired title, also has a maritime theme as a group of children is shown playing in the foreground with the harbour of Concarneau in Brittany visible behind; its expected price is £80,000 to £120,000.
The friend and supporter of many artists across a range of disciplines, John Burke seems to have been one of the most culturally enlightened men of his time. Among his circle were such diverse characters as Jack B Yeats, Maud Gonne MacBride and Lennox Robinson.
For many years he was the private solicitor of Eamon de Valera as well as his close friend. It was Burke, for example, who persuaded de Valera - and through him the government of the time - to purchase Oliver Sheppard's statue The Death of Cuchulain which now stands in the GPO.
In 1939 he gave John Hogan's statue The Reclining Shepherd dating from 1846 to Dail Eireann; it is now in Iveagh House. The viewing days before the sale on December 5th will provide an excellent opportunity to become better acquainted with the taste of this very discerning collector.
