We are absolutely delighted for Solomon Gallery artist ROWAN GILLESPIE whose sculpture ‘WHEN HOPE AND HISTORY RHYME’ just fetched GBP161,000 (€200k) at today’s Sotheby’s Irish Sale in London. This is the highest price ever paid at auction for an Irish sculpture, and being a contemporary sculptor, is all the more impressive.
SOTHEBY’S CATALOGUE NOTE READS:
This sculpture is the artist’s personal tribute to Seamus Heaney and was inspired by the poet’s words which are engraved on the plinth:
History says, Don’t hope
On this side of the grave,
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.
From ‘The Cure at Troy’ by Seamus Heaney
The artist would like to thank Marie Heaney and the Heaney family for kindly allowing the use of the quotation and to use “When Hope and History Rhyme” as the title of the present piece.
Rowan Gillespie
B.1953
WHEN HOPE AND HISTORY RHYME
signed and dated 2015
bronze
height: 347.5cm., 137in.
Executed in 2015, the present work is unique.
