Christie’s London Sets March 18 Modern British and Irish Art Sale With Auerbach, Chadwick, and Hepworth Highlights
Christie’s London is turning quickly from last week’s marathon modern and contemporary evening sales to a focused test of another corner of the market: modern British and Irish art. On March 18, the auction house will offer a tightly curated selection led by works by British artists Frank Auerbach (1931–2024), Lynn Chadwick (1914–2003), and Barbara Hepworth (1903–1975), alongside postwar and early 20th-century standouts.
Among the top lots is an Auerbach landscape of Mornington Crescent, a North London site near the artist’s Camden studio that he revisited repeatedly over decades. The painting carries a high estimate of £2 million ($2.6 million). Built up in Auerbach’s characteristically dense, worked surface, the work underscores the painter’s physical approach to place, where the city’s familiar geometry becomes something almost sculptural in paint.
Sculpture is also positioned as a headline category. Christie’s will offer a Chadwick bronze appearing at auction for the first time, consigned from the collection of Dr. Robert Holton. The work has a high estimate of £600,000 ($805,000). Conceived and cast more than 30 years after Chadwick won the International Prize for Sculpture at the 1956 Venice Biennale, the piece points back to the city that helped cement his international profile.
Alice Murray, Christie’s head of modern British and Irish art, described the sculpture as emblematic of Chadwick’s later period. “It really represents a culmination of Chadwick’s career,” she said, adding that the timing feels especially resonant with the Venice Biennale set to open later this year. Murray noted that the bronze has remained in the same private collection for almost 30 years and emphasized its scale: roughly 10 feet wide.
Hepworth is represented by two carved works with seven-figure expectations. “Curved Form” (1960), carved from a single piece of walnut, carries a high estimate of £1 million ($1.3 million). “Solitary Form” (1971), carved in white marble, is estimated up to £700,000 ($900,000). Together, the pair highlights Hepworth’s sustained commitment to direct carving and her ability to draw tension and calm from a pared-back vocabulary of curves, voids, and polished planes.
Postwar painting is another pillar of the sale. A key lot is “Recollection” (1986) by British artist Bridget Riley (b. 1931), offered with a high estimate of £1.2 million ($1.6 million). Murray framed the work as a marker of a turning point in Riley’s practice, when the artist, energized by a vivid palette developed after a formative trip to Egypt, began exploring tessellating zigzag parallelograms that generate shifting rhythms of color and spatial vibration.
The auction also includes a rare-to-market example of British Pop: “Motorpsycho/Ace” (1962) by Peter Phillips (b. 1939). The painting is coming to auction for the first time and is being sold from the collection of Italian curator and art historian Enrico Crispolti.
Earlier material is represented by “Balthazar” (1929) by British artist Glyn Philpot (1884–1937). Murray called the portrait — recently shown in an exhibition in Chicago — “probably the strongest work by the artist to come to market.”
On pricing, Murray said Christie’s has set expectations with restraint. “I think we’ve estimated things very reasonably,” she said. “We feel confident in our pricing and we’re looking forward to seeing how the market responds.” She added that the category continues to draw international participation, with particularly strong demand from the United States.
With major modern and contemporary results still fresh, the March 18 sale will offer a more granular read on how collectors are valuing British and Irish material right now — from Auerbach’s thickly built London topographies to Hepworth’s disciplined carving and Chadwick’s late-career monumentality.
