THE WINTER CHATSWORTH FINE ART & ANTIQUE SALE December 3rd & 4th, 2025

105 Fonsie Mealy’s Est. 1934 932. An important pair of large French Empire period bronze and ormolu figural four branch Candelabra, each modelled with elegant lady with breasts exposed wearing flowing dress, issuing ornate leaf decorated branches, with fruit garlands, surmounted on green marble plintyh with moulded bronze capital and base, with further ormolu embellishments either side, each approx. 71cms (28”) high. Some repair to branch. (2) €6,000 - €8,000 “Market Scenes,”O.O.C., (a pair) c 1775, each approx. 36cms x 36cms (14” x 14”). (1) Painted around the mid-eighteenth century, this pair of matching canvases depict a street market, with stall-holders chatting, laughing and arguing. In the foreground of the first painting, two women appear to be fighting in front of a fountain, while on the left a man carries, on a yoke, two pails brimming over with liquid. His mouth open, he seems alarmed at what is happening behind him. Other figures gathered at the fountain are talking and gesticulating. Behind them, on a plinth, a statue of Neptune stands holding a trident aloft. In the background can be seen a curved Classical building. This same architectural feature is in the background of the second painting, but this time it is embellished with a slender obelisk, rather than a statue. The second canvas again depicts a street market, with tents made of ragged canvas stretched over poles. In front of the tents, three women are engaged in animated conversation. One, wearing a white bonnet, looks quizzical. Beside her, her head in a scarf, a woman holding her hands up in an attitude of surprise, listens to the story told by a market woman, who sits with clenched fist raised. Whether or not these two lively paintings are by William Hogarth is open to debate, but in their vivid depictions of street life, they are captivating and skilled works of art. Using the architecture to identify the location is tempting, but the setting may well be a ‘capriccio’, or imagined scene. There are few enough statues of Neptune in British or Irish cities: there was one in Bristol, but not beside a curved Classical arcade. The paintings are ascribed to Hogarth, and certainly the tumult of figures in a street setting accords with his work. However, the bonnets and dresses, and the sharp features of these market women, suggest the scene could well be located in the Netherlands or France. The features of Hogarth’s revellers are generally more rounded. Were the scenes to be set in Ireland, these two delightful paintings could, with reasonable confidence, be attributed to the Cork artist Nathaniel Grogan. €700 - €900 931. William Hogarth (Attributed) (1697-1764)