Hugh Lane: The Art Market and the Art Museum, 1893-1915 | National Humanities Center

Work of the Fellows: Monographs

Hugh Lane: The Art Market and the Art Museum, 1893-1915

By Morna O'Neill (NHC Fellow, 2012–13)

Art History; Art Dealers; Art Collectors; Art Industry; Museums; Sir Hugh Percy Lane

New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2018

From the publisher’s description:

This book charts a geography of the art market and the art museum in the early 20th century through the legacy of one influential dealer. Born in Ireland, Hugh Lane (1875–1915) established himself in London in the 1890s. With little formal education or training, he orchestrated high-profile sales of paintings by the likes of Holbein, Titian, and Velázquez and described his life’s work as “selling pictures by old painters to buy pictures by living painters.” Lane assembled a collection of modern art for the Johannesburg Art Gallery, amassed a collection of Dutch and Flemish paintings for Cape Town, and gave his own collection of modern art to the National Gallery in London. He also donated paintings to the National Gallery of Ireland, where he was named director in 1914. Each chapter in this revelatory study focuses on an important city in Lane’s practice as a dealer to understand the interrelationship of event and place.

Subjects
Art / Art History / Art Dealers / Art Collectors / Art Industry / Museums / Sir Hugh Percy Lane /

O'Neill, Morna (NHC Fellow, 2012–13). Hugh Lane: The Art Market and the Art Museum, 1893-1915. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2018.