Two years ago, in April 2023, Barry Humphries - aka Dame Edna - died. An amateur painter himself, he was an avid collector of art and books, and the work of the 1890s artists Charles Conder (who lived in Australia from 1884 to 1890) is at the core of the collection that will be auctioned by Christie's in London on 13 February 2025.
The collection not only includes works written, drawn or painted by the usual 1890s suspects like John Gray, Max Beerbohm, Aubrey Beardsley, Marc André Raffalovich, Jan Toorop and, of course, Oscar Wilde, but also by European stars such as Portuguese poet Fernand Pessoa and forgotten artists such as Dutch artist Carel de Nerée tot Babberich, and in between one encounters books by the likes of Mary Shelley, Gustave Doré, Paul Verlaine and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Humphries also owned original drawings by Edward Lear, Edward Burne-Jones, Fernand Khnopff, Duncan Grant and Henri Toulouse de Lautrec.
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| Charles Ricketts, cover for John Gray, Silverpoints (Bookplate of Barry Humphries) |
The sale includes a deluxe copy (not numbered) of John Gray's Silverpoints, bound in full vellum, designed by Ricketts. Officially there were 25 numbered copies, but at least two unnumbered copies have turned up over the years (possibly more).
The Oscar Wilde section is particularly strong, containing a first state binding of A House of Pomegranates, including two leaves from Wilde's autograph draft for 'The Fisherman and his Soul'; a large-paper copy of The Picture of Dorian Gray (with a letter from Wilde to Ada Leverson), a copy of Poems (1892) - not pristine, but once owned by artist and critic Aymer Vallance - and, of course, signed by Wilde; two dedication copies of the French edition of Salomé; Wilde's autograph draft of seventeen of his epigrams, and several copies of a number of his plays in first edition, notably a presentation copy of The Importance of Being Oscar (one of twelve copies on Japanese vellum, dedicated by Wilde to his publishers Leonard Smithers); and a large-paper edition of The Sphinx of which 25 copies exist in the luxurious binding by Ricketts.
The collection is complemented by paraphernalia from Barry Humphries's theatrical career, including eyewear and costumes from his persona Dame Edna - a pair of spectacles may amount to £1,000-1,500.
