One of Joan Eardley’s last paintings to go under the hammer

The Yellow Jumper is valued at between £100,000 and £150,000.

The Yellow Jumper will go under the hammer next week (Julie Howden/Lyon & Turnbull/PA)Alice Strange, Associate Director and Senior Specialist in Modern and Contemporary Art at Lyon & Turnbull with Joan Eardley’s The Yellow Jumper.This is one of the last paintings she made in her Townhead studio in Glasgow before she died aged only 42 in August 1963. Now it’s set to go under the hammer with fine art auctioneers Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh next Thursday (8 December).The painting, valued between £100,000 and £150,000, depicts two of the 12 Samson children, part of a family who lived near to Eardley’s studio.This important work, which has another painting of Glasgow tenements on the reverse, comes from an acclaimed series Eardley began in the early 1960s, depicting two children positioned in front of a bright red graffiti-covered wall. This relates directly to wording on the red wall of a scrap-metal business on the ground-floor beneath Eardley’s studio.

One of the last finished paintings of Glasgow’s street children by Joan Eardley will be sold at auction next week.

The Yellow Jumper, valued at between £100,000 and £150,000, is one the artist’s “glorious” depictions of children in the now largely demolished neighbourhood of old Townhead in Glasgow city centre.

It was one of the final works Eardley made before she died, aged 42, in August 1963.

The painting shows two of the Samson siblings, members of a family of 12 children who lived near her studio and were amongst Eardley’s favourite sitters.

Ann Samson, who appears in many of Eardley’s paintings, said: “It’s great to see this work after all these years.

“It looks like it could be my sister Mary and our youngest brother Brian, who sadly died a good few years ago.”

The painting will go under the hammer along with six other works by Eardley in Lyon & Turnbull’s biannual Scottish paintings and sculpture sale in Edinburgh on December 8.

Alice Strang, senior specialist in modern and contemporary art at Lyon & Turnbull, said: “The Yellow Jumper is one of Eardley’s glorious depictions of Glaswegian children.

“She never fails to capture her sitters’ joie de vivre via an extraordinary painting and collage technique.

“The youngsters’ ease with each other and with the artist is clear. It is a stunning work and we are delighted to present it to the market.”

The Yellow Jumper comes from a series featuring two children positioned in front of a bright red, graffiti-covered wall.

It is related to Eardley’s Two Children, which was found incomplete on the artist’s easel on her death and now hangs in Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum.

Another highlight of the auction is a painting by Port Seton-born artist John Bellany. The Persecuted was inspired by a visit to the site of the Buchenwald concentration camp.

The artwork was created by Bellany while studying at the Royal College of Art in London, which he attended after graduating from Edinburgh College of Art.

Bellany visited East Germany on a cultural scholarship in 1967 and visited the site of the Buchenwald camp, painting The Persecuted the following year.

The work, expected to sell for between £40,000 and £60,000, is one of a range of paintings from the late 1960s which cemented Bellany’s reputation as a significant international contemporary artist.

Nick Curnow, head of fine art at Lyon & Turnbull, said: “The Persecuted is a wonderfully direct and challenging expressionist painting. It places Bellany firmly at the forefront of European post-war figurative painting.

“The Eardley and the Bellany works sit at the heart of a wide-ranging sale of Scottish art.

“We anticipate international interest in this auction, which features nearly 200 paintings and sculptures by some of the most significant Scottish artists of the last 200 years.”