A PORTRAIT dubbed the ‘most famous golfing painting in the world’ is being offered for sale by the famous auction house Bonhams.
Painted by Leicestershire artist Lemuel Francis Abbott, ‘The Portrait of Henry Callender standing in a landscape, in the red coat of Captain General of the Blackheath Golf Club and holding a putter’ is expected to fetch as much as £800,000 when it goes under the hammer.
The portrait is one of the earliest artist’s depictions of golf and, for the last 150 years, it has hung in the clubhouse of the Royal Blackheath Golf Club in London. It is being sold, however, to help the club fund the acquisition of the freehold of its course and the clubhouse from The Crown Estate.
Royal Blackheath Golf Club can, reportedly, trace its origins back to 1608, shortly after the Union of the Scottish and English Crowns saw James VI of Scotland journeying south to London, with his golf-loving courtiers in tow.
Read the latest issue of UK Club Golfer online
