Meet the Specialist

What do you do at Bonhams?

I am Head of the 19th Century and British Impressionist Art Department.

Where are you from? And what inspired you to go into the art world? 

I was born in Sussex and there were quite a few pictures in the family - my grandparents had a good collection which I remember liking from a young age. I went to St Andrews University to read Medieval History, but having chosen a subsidiary course in Art History, I enjoyed it so much I changed direction and did my Masters in that subject instead.

What was your first job? 

My first job was working in the picture department at Sotheby’s in Sussex. We had about 15-20 sales a year and I would catalogue pictures and prints from all periods - estimates would vary from about £40 up to tens of thousands. It was the best possible way to learn as we handled well over 3,000 pictures a year!

 Name one of your triumphs.

Over ten years ago, I visited an elderly lady on the South Coast who had an incredible work by the Turkish Orientalist artist Osman Hamdi Bey which she and her late husband had bought in 1972. I gave her an indication of the likely value, which was then around £1m, but she had no intention of selling it at that time. I continued to write to her from time to time, but never heard back. On a wet Friday afternoon in January 2019, the phone rang in the department and her nephew told me that sadly, she has passed away some years earlier, and that the family were thinking of selling the picture. We offered the painting, 'Young Woman Reading', for them eight months later and it sold for just under £7m.

What has changed in the business since you first started? 

When I first started, most of the valuation work was done by visiting clients, assessing the picture and then hopefully consigning it for sale. Nowadays so much of our work, initially anyway, is electronic. While that has undoubtedly had great practical benefits, nothing replaces the importance of it does the personal relationship with a client - this remains as important as ever.

What is your strength as a specialist? 

I would have to say that nearly 40 years in the business has given me huge experience; that and always believing that another good picture is just around the corner. I’m as enthusiastic now as ever, and I hope I communicate that to our clients.

What’s exciting you about your next sale?

Each sale has its own character and personal highlights for me. On 3 June we’re offering a wonderful painting by Charles Burton Barber. 'Only a Shower' depicts a young girl stuck inside – something I think we can all relate to in the present circumstances. She is surrounded by her pet dogs and staring wistfully out of a window at the rain. It is beautifully painted, and in addition to his meticulous attention to detail and technical prowess, Barber – who was a great favourite of Queen Victoria’s – had the rare gift of making his dogs look like real animals and not sentimentalised projections of human emotions. We also have an important work by another great Victorian animal painter, John Emms. A master of this genre, Emms too had the uncanny ability to breathe life into his subjects, as the painting, 'The Bitch Pack of the Meath Foxhounds', shows. And of course I love the vibrancy and energy of the oil sketch 'Gather Ye Rosebuds While Ye May' by John William Waterhouse.

Do you have a hidden talent? 

I can still reverse a tractor and trailer, and I have a pretty impressive knowledge of 70’s prog rock!

Which work of art has changed your life? 

'Richmond Hill in the Summer of 1862' by Jasper Francis Cropsey.
It was a painting that we discovered in 1995, but we didn’t sell it until late 1999 when it made a world record price of £1.5m. The research was intriguing – Cropsey chose a classic English panorama, which he painted with an almost Pre-Raphaelite attention to detail, but infused with the light one would expect from a Hudson River school painter. It gave me the chance to go to the US for the first time, and it was an exciting and fascinating journey both from an art historical point of view and for the first real taste it gave me of the international art market.

Charles O'Brien is Head of the 19th Century and British Impressionist Art Department. He can be reached at charles.obrien@bonhams.com