Like father, like son

An Omobono Stradivari and two Vuillaumes were the standout lots during a varied spring auction season in London, as Kevin MacDonald reports

Vuillaume was the maker of I&H’s two most important offerings

Going for £420,000 this 1862 Vuillaume cello set a world auction record for the maker at I&H

VUILLAUME PHOTO COURTESY INGLES & HAYDAY

Spring sales are usually that little bit less grand than autumn ones, and such was the case in 2024. Ingles & Hayday (I&H) offered only 164 lots after withdrawals (down from 307), and Brompton’s 257 (down from 270). Only Tarisio, which continues to edge its way back into the London market, increased its offerings to 63. Tarisio also had the belle of the ball this season with the c.1725–30 ‘Josefowitz’ Omobono Stradivari violin selling within estimate for £472,000. This instrument, long held at the Royal Academy of Music, was published in Rattray’s Masterpieces of Italian Violin Making. It is nearly the last of the loaned David Josefowitz collection, which has been gradually sold by the heirs in recent years. Two other ex-Josefowitz lots were also sold in March at Tarisio: a smallmedium (400mm) 1764 Michele Deconet viola at £78,000, and a c.1750 Pietro Antonio Dalla Costa violin, formerly ascribed to Tononi, which made around top estimate at £156,000.

Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume was the maker of I&H’s two most important offerings. The first of these was an immaculate cello of 1862, part of a quartet commissioned for the music room of the great violinist and composer Henry Vieuxtemps. The other parts of the quartet have been sold over the years, but this Stradivari model instrument remained with his descendants until now. It went above top estimate selling for £420,000: a new world record for a Vuillaume cello at auction. The other was one of Vuillaume’s better ‘Messiah’ copies, made in 1856 and in clean, virtually unused condition. Indeed, such is its quality that it appeared as a representative instrument in the 2012 Sotheby’s Vuillaume exhibition. This spring it made £240,000.

Another I&H lot that merits attention is a c.1690 Francesco Rugeri & Sons violin, previously ascribed to Giacinto Rugeri by Dykes in the 1940s. The instrument was chosen by British virtuoso Albert Sammons for his student Margit Pauson, in whose family it had remained until now. It sold well above estimate for £132,000. Also at I&H, a violin previously identified by the Hills as being by Giovanni Tononi, but recently re-attributed with the aid of dendrochronological work to Gioffredo Cappa c.1700, went within estimate at £96,000.

Brompton’s had some major 20thcentury Italian violins on the block including a Fagnola and a Rocca, but for interest it would be hard to match a slightly more humble instrument by Marino Capicchioni (of Rimini, 1929). This instrument was awarded to Sergio Scarpa in 1933 when he was a virtuoso music student in Novara. Later years would see him gain greater fame in the post-1943 armistice, pro-Allied Italian partisans, and subsequently as a political leader in the Italian Parliament and Senate. This fine and historic violin sold near top estimate for £38,400.

Another violin of particular interest was a creation of the great John ‘Jack’ Lott II (see page 97), an artefact of the shadier side of the Victorian violin trade. A composite instrument blushed with Lott’s distinctive dark-red varnish, it was passed from dealer to collector to dealer until eventually challenged by the Hills. Its piqued owner then pursued supportive certificates for it as a ‘del Gesù’ starting with Joseph Chanot of London in 1919 and Chardon & Fils of Paris in 1920. A 2023 dendrochronological evaluation of the front by Peter Ratcliff has given a latest ring date of 1756, thus definitively placing it post ‘del Gesù’. The f-holes have been modified, so the belly’s actual roots are obscure. Effectively it remains a remarkable product of Jack Lott’s art and was sold by Tarisio within estimate for £72,000.

LOTT AND LUPOT PHOTOS COURTESY TARISIO. CAPICCHIONI PHOTO COURTESY BROMPTON’S

A c.1840–50 cello by ‘Jack’ Lott’s father John Frederick I sold for £42,000 at I&H alongside a c.1800 Thomas Dodd cello with that firm’s distinctive varnish at £54,000. Truly, this was a good season for outstanding cellos at I&H, with a Carlo Antonio Testore instrument, previously ascribed to Carlo Giuseppe, going well above top estimate at £144,000.

Also at I&H a Richard Tobin viola was particularly eye-catching. This 389mm alto, which sounded much bigger, is one of the best-preserved and most clearly labelled instruments I have seen by this esteemed maker. Dated 1820, it has a cello-type head and no locating pins. It sold for £16,800. It is worth having a copy of I&H’s well-produced catalogue to have a visual record of such reference instruments.

Two other I&H lots that sold quite well, doubling their estimates, were a c.1720 Francesco Gobetti violin at £102,000, and an 1812 Franz Geissenhof violin at £45,600. As previously noted in this column, Geissenhofs – like other fine Austrian instruments – are routinely under-estimated and remain comparative bargains.

Another interesting violin which went over estimate was a composite Antonio and Girolamo Amati violin having an early 18th-century front by another (Cremona?) maker, which sold at Brompton’s for £33,040. It was accompanied by an 1893 letter from Hills.

It is said that it only takes two determined bidders to chase a lot up to unexpected heights. However, in the case of a Baroque violin bow made by Luis Emilio Rodriguez Carrington, six Tarisio bidders more than doubled its top estimate to £5,700. Rodriguez Carrington, originally from Mexico, is based in The Hague and produces fine, bespoke period bows. One only rarely sees contemporary Baroque bows at London auction, but those by outstanding modern makers with waiting lists tend to go very well. Other notable violin bows at Tarisio included a c.1860 Pierre Simon (stamped ‘Lupot’) which sold over estimate at £33,000 and an early 19th-century François Lupot II at £25,960.

Geissenhofs are routinely under-estimated and remain comparative bargains