Million plus dollar paintings in Melbourne art auction

Three paintings with high and low estimates of more than $1 million lead Australian art auction house Deutscher and Hackett’s final sale for 2025.

The highest estimate of $1.5-$2 million has been allocated to Howard Arkley’s (1951-1999) The freeway 1999 (lot 24) at its forthcoming Melbourne auction from 7pm Wednesday at 105 Commercial Road, South Yarra.

Commissioned by Roger Wood and Randal Marsh of Wood Marsh Architecture – awarded the Victorian Architecture Medal for Melbourne’s Eastern Freeway extension where they designed interconnected sculptural arcs that also served as sound barriers – to do the painting which took him more than two years to complete, Arkley was impressed with the size of the road project and keen to emulate it in his work.

Another of Arkley’s works entitled O.Y.O Flats 1987 (lot 23) is typical of his fascination with Australia’s urban landscape and carries a catalogue estimate of $800,000-$1.2 million.

One of Australia’s modern icons Jeffrey Smart (1921-2013) has a major work Night stop, Bombay 1981 (lot 16) in the sale – a $1.4-$1.8 million estimate painting.

An artist also intrigued with outlines in the built-up environment, this painting presents a bird’s eye view of the tarmac on an airport runway.

It is one of his most poetic dramatic images, sketched from an aeroplane gangway in the early hours of the morning during one of his many international trips.

The painting on the catalogue front cover is Portrait of Dodge Macknight c1888 (lot 6) by Australian impressionist artist John Peter Russell (1858-1930), the third of the high estimate works at $1-$1.5 million.

As the only known portrait of the American post-impressionist, this painting is historically significant.

Russell’s peers, including such luminaries as Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh, lauded his works, writing admiringly of his portraits as “more serious and higher art”.

Russell became close friends with van Gogh and Claude Monet, with whom he spent time on the storm-tossed island of Belle-Ile off the Brittany coast.

Following in Russell’s and Monet’s footsteps, in November 1888 Macknight made the first of his many trips to Belle-Ile where, pursuing his passion for colour, he produced some of the finest watercolours of his career.  

Other paintings in the auction include Ian Fairweather’s Figure Group I, 1969 (lot 12) and Jetty 1982 (lot 14), New Zealand artist Colin McCahon’s Fish Rock c1959 (lot 13) and John Olsen’s (1928-2023) Flooded River, Kimberley 1983 (lot 19).

Cressida Campbell’s Bougainvillea 2003 (lot 22) watercolour on incised woodblock is a fine example of an artist becoming increasingly popular, while Bronwyn Oliver’s (1959-2006) sculpture Two rings + two, 2005 is bound to attract plenty of interest.