LONDON.- On 10 December in London, Sotheby's will present for sale The Winter Collection, comprising a diverse group of works assembled by the late John Winter, former President of Sotheby’s Italy and Director of Sotheby’s London, and one of the founders of Trinity Fine Art, a company formed in 1984. The selection reflects John's personal and distinctive taste, often described as 'il gusto Trinity', and encompasses objects that he enjoyed living with. The 186-lot sale provides a glimpse of his wide-ranging interest in, and knowledge of, works of art, from Renaissance bronzes to important Doccia porcelain and an extraordinary assemblage of drawings by the great 18th-century Roman designer Luigi Valadier.

Alexander Kader, Head of Sotheby’s European Sculpture & Works of Art Department, said: “The Winter Collection is a testament to the eye of one of the art world’s great connoisseurs. John’s breadth of knowledge from painting and drawing to sculpture, furniture and other decorative arts, above all his beloved Florentine Doccia porcelain, was phenomenal.”

John Winter had an uncanny ability to identify quality. Faced with a famous collection of terracotta sculpture he was still able to discover unappreciated attributions. In recent years he purchased two large terracotta reliefs newly identified as by Girolamo Ticciati in the sale of the Arthur M. Sackler collection. In the continuing reassessment of sculpture from the late Baroque period, Ticciati is one of the artists who is emerging as a defined personality. Recent publications on Ticciati have elucidated his central role in the intellectual life of Florence in the first half of the 18th century. Relief with The Adoration of the Magi (lot 35) and Relief with The Preaching of St. John the Baptist (lot 36) are estimated respectively at £70,000-100,000 and £40,000-60,000.

John’s great love of Doccia porcelain is encapsulated in the beautiful and ambitious Doccia figure group of Apollo and Daphne (lot 65). This feat of porcelain manufacturing is taken from a model by the great Baroque Florentine sculptor Massimiliano Soldani-Benzi. The Doccia Factory was founded in 1737 in Sesto Fiorentino, near Florence, and shortly after began acquiring and commissioning plaster moulds and wax casts of works by Soldani-Benzi and Giovanni Battista Foggini, to be produced in porcelain. Daphne and Apollo as a subject is mentioned three times in a listing of the wax plaster and terracotta models housed at the Doccia Factory. The listing for this version, estimated at £100,000-150,000, references three putti and trees, and twenty-five sections to the mould.

The sale includes a group of drawings from the workshop of the most important Italian goldsmith of the 18th century, Luigi Valadier. The bottega on Via del Babuino in Rome was the principal institute for the decorative arts, producing an array of wonderful oggetti d’arte for prestigious patrons and clients. John Winter’s pioneering work on Valadier, who was not only a talented goldsmith but also an excellent draughtsman, was a valuable contribution to the art world. The majority of the drawings come from an album discovered by John containing 91 sheets of paper mounted with 144 drawings. They include a wide range of subjects from pattern samples of the workshop's standard designs and highly finished presentation pieces to more basis preliminary drawings that explore ideas for a new design or ornament. One of the most significant is a presentation drawing for the cartagloria frame commissioned for the Borghese Chapel in Santa Maria Maggiore, estimated at £1,500-2,000 (lot 134).

John was also an advocate of bronzes. The collection features two virtuoso bronze groups by the Venetian sculptor Francesco Bertos, including an Allegory of Fortune, estimated at £10,000-15,000 (lot 60). Cast in one piece, it shows Fortune with a torn sail, sitting astride a figure of misfortune, who is clubbing a young man who has fallen to the ground, while Cupid dances around the edge of the scene. The demands of Bertos' patrons encouraged erudite iconography which was meant to stimulate debate amongst the observers.

A group of some 25 Old Master drawings features Head of a Man looking down, attributed to Jacopo Vignali (lot 24). Most probably a portrait, executed from life, in two colours of chalk, it is estimated at £5,000-7,000. Leading the group is an extremely charming portrait of A Milkmaid and a Donkey carrying two large baskets of flowers in a wood, by 18th-century French artist Louis Carrogis, called Carmontelle, estimated to bring £40,000-60,000 (lot 103).

Further highlights include Head of an Elderly Man wearing glasses by Jacob Jordaens, in red, black and white chalk, estimated at £10,000-15,000 (lot 25), and A Costume Design for a Moor by 17th-century Italian artist Stefano della Bella, estimated to bring £3,000-5,000 (lot 54).

These works are joined by 19th-century ceramics, and terracotta, wax and pencil sketches by leading 19th-century French and Italian artists and sculptors.

A number of lots are estimated at £3,000 or below, creating exciting opportunities for collectors.