# Duncan Grant artist context and auction value notes

Canonical page: https://appraisily.com/artist/duncan-grant/
Profile generated: 2026-05-02T12:26:27.775Z
Quality: high confidence, strong sources

## Artist identity

- Birth date: 1885-01-21
- Death date: 1978-05-08
- Nationality: British, Scottish
- Movements: Bloomsbury Group, Post-Impressionism
- Common media: Oil painting, Watercolour, Textile design, Pottery and ceramics, Theatre set and scenery design, Costume design

## About Duncan Grant

Duncan James Corrowr Grant (1885–1978) was a Scottish painter, designer, and founding member of the Bloomsbury Group, the influential circle of writers, artists, and intellectuals centred on the Bell and Stephen families in early twentieth-century London. Born at Rothiemurchus in the Scottish Highlands and educated at Westminster School, Grant absorbed Post-Impressionist ideas through his Continental travels and close association with art critic Roger Fry. He became a central figure in the Omega Workshops (1913–1919), Fry's experimental design enterprise, and spent much of his creative life at Charleston Farmhouse in Sussex, now a museum dedicated to Bloomsbury art. Grant worked across an unusually broad range of media — oil painting, watercolour, textile design, pottery, theatre scenery, and costume — and his work is held by major public collections including Tate, the Museum of Modern Art, and the National Portrait Gallery. Collectors encounter his pieces at auction primarily in Modern British and Post-War art sales.

## Common works and media

Grant is most frequently encountered at auction as an oil painter of figurative compositions, still lifes, and landscapes. Watercolours and gouaches on paper appear regularly. His decorative output — including painted furniture, ceramics, textile lengths, and rug designs produced for the Omega Workshops and later commissions — surfaces in decorative-arts sales. Theatre and ballet costume designs, preparatory sketches, and mural fragments also appear. Print editions are less common but exist. Collectors should expect a wide range of formats reflecting his cross-disciplinary career.

## Market and appraisal context

Duncan Grant sustains an active and well-documented secondary market with 814 auction lots recorded since late 2000, of which 662 carry realised prices. His work trades primarily in Modern British art sales at major houses including Christie's, Bonhams, and Sotheby's, with frequent mid-tier appearances at Roseberys, Dreweatts 1759, Lyon & Turnbull, Gorringes, and Swann Auction Galleries. The price distribution is wide but centred: the interquartile range spans roughly £1,375–£8,000 (median £3,000), with a floor around £100 for minor works on paper and decorative fragments and a ceiling of £260,000 for important oils. Interwar oil still lifes and figurative compositions consistently anchor the upper tier — recent examples include a circa-1922 Still Life at Bonhams (£15,000, June 2025), a late-1930s Still Life with Dahlias at Bonhams (£25,000, November 2024), and a Still Life with Photographs and Flowers at Christie's (£25,400, March 2026). Works on paper, textile designs, and decorative pieces typically trade between £800 and £4,000. Liquidity is moderate: 28 lots appeared in the trailing twelve months (down from 64 the prior year), suggesting market activity remains regular but auction supply fluctuates. A notable outlier is the 2008 Sotheby's sale of Woman at a Window (oil on canvas) for £67,250, indicating that exceptional period oils with strong provenance can significantly exceed the typical range.

## Auction-house-backed market evidence

Duncan Grant sustains an active and well-documented secondary market with 814 auction lots recorded since late 2000, of which 662 carry realised prices. His work trades primarily in Modern British art sales at major houses including Christie's, Bonhams, and Sotheby's, with frequent mid-tier appearances at Roseberys, Dreweatts 1759, Lyon & Turnbull, Gorringes, and Swann Auction Galleries. The price distribution is wide but centred: the interquartile range spans roughly £1,375–£8,000 (median £3,000), with a floor around £100 for minor works on paper and decorative fragments and a ceiling of £260,000 for important oils. Interwar oil still lifes and figurative compositions consistently anchor the upper tier — recent examples include a circa-1922 Still Life at Bonhams (£15,000, June 2025), a late-1930s Still Life with Dahlias at Bonhams (£25,000, November 2024), and a Still Life with Photographs and Flowers at Christie's (£25,400, March 2026). Works on paper, textile designs, and decorative pieces typically trade between £800 and £4,000. Liquidity is moderate: 28 lots appeared in the trailing twelve months (down from 64 the prior year), suggesting market activity remains regular but auction supply fluctuates. A notable outlier is the 2008 Sotheby's sale of Woman at a Window (oil on canvas) for £67,250, indicating that exceptional period oils with strong provenance can significantly exceed the typical range.

### Appraisal notes

Appraisily uses these aggregated auction records as one input among several. To estimate fair market or replacement value for a specific Duncan Grant work, an appraisal would combine this market data with high-resolution photographs, measured dimensions, medium identification, signature or inscription details, condition report (especially important for works on paper and textiles common in Grant's oeuvre), documented provenance (Bloomsbury Group or Charleston Farmhouse association materially affects value), and edition or commission context. Comparable lots are selected by matching medium, subject, period, size, and condition rather than relying on the artist's overall price distribution alone. Collaborative works co-attributed with Vanessa Bell or pieces tied to the Omega Workshops require separate comparable analysis because their market differs from solo fine-art paintings.

### Valuation factors

- Medium: oil paintings on canvas substantially outperform works on paper, textile designs, and decorative pieces; interwar oils are the strongest segment
- Period: works from the 1910s–1940s (his most productive and critically regarded period) command premiums over later output
- Provenance: documented Bloomsbury Group or Charleston Farmhouse provenance can meaningfully increase realised prices
- Subject: figurative nudes and composed still lifes tend to achieve higher prices than landscapes, decorative designs, or studies
- Size: larger oils (60 cm+ on the longest side) are disproportionately represented in the upper price quartile
- Attribution: collaborative works with Vanessa Bell or Omega Workshops commissions carry distinct market dynamics and should be evaluated on their own comparables
- Condition: works on paper and textiles are common in Grant's oeuvre and are particularly susceptible to condition-related discounting
- Auction house tier: sales at Christie's, Sotheby's, and Bonhams tend to attract higher-quality consignments and estimates than regional houses

### Collector notes

- Duncan Grant's market offers entry points across a wide price spectrum. Works on paper and decorative designs appear regularly at regional UK auction houses (Roseberys, Gorringes, Lyon & Turnbull) and can be acquired below £2,000, making them accessible entry-level Bloomsbury-associated pieces. Collectors seeking investment-grade material should focus on interwar oil paintings with clear provenance — these dominate the £10,000–£30,000 band and have shown consistent demand at Christie's and Bonhams. Be aware that Grant's seven-decade career produced widely varying quality; attribution verification is essential. Condition reports are critical for paper and textile works. Recent liquidity has softened (28 lots in the trailing year versus 64 the year before), which may indicate tightening supply rather than falling demand — consignors may be holding in anticipation of a Bloomsbury centenary or institutional exhibition cycle.

### Market caveats

- The price distribution reflects 662 priced lots over 25+ years and includes all media; segment-specific ranges (oil versus textile versus paper) can differ dramatically from the overall median.
- Some lots in the dataset may be misattributed — for example, entries referencing unrelated artists or decorative objects in the style of Grant appear in raw auction feeds. Individual lot verification is required.
- The trailing twelve months saw 28 lots versus 64 the prior year; a single year's change does not necessarily indicate a trend and may reflect consignment timing or market cycle.
- Currency mix (GBP, USD, EUR) means direct price comparisons require conversion at the relevant historical rate; the distribution statistics cited here are not normalised to a single currency.
- Works with Bloomsbury Group or Charleston Farmhouse provenance are relatively rare at auction and can command premiums well above the upper quartile, but this premium is hard to quantify from aggregate data alone.
- Collaborative works with Vanessa Bell or Omega Workshops output may be catalogued under different attributions and may not be fully captured in Grant-specific auction records.

### Market evidence sources

- Appraisily auction record index: https://appraisily.com/api/scraper-search/artists/duncan-grant/seo-profile?recentLimit=24&relatedLimit=0
- Invaluable (Christie's sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-1885-1978-still-life-with-photographs-and-flowers-oil-on-b-200-c-f8639b064e
- Invaluable (Bonhams sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-british-1885-1978-still-life-with-dahlias-61-5-x-51-1-cm-24-1-8-x-20-1-8-in-painted-circa-late-1930s-23-c-17041bea1f
- Invaluable (Bonhams sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-british-1885-1978-still-life-65-3-x-81-3-cm-25-3-4-x-32-in-painted-circa-1922-23-55-c-38a48cebed
- Invaluable (Roseberys sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-nude-seated-figure-1933-127-c-ae94612a7b
- Invaluable (Bonhams sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-british-1885-1978-still-life-with-apples-and-decanter-77-x-57-7-cm-30-1-4-x-22-5-8-in-9-c-ec746da923
- Invaluable (Bonhams sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-british-1885-1978-carpet-design-43-c-54d43b3b5a
- Invaluable (Bonhams sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-british-1885-1978-venice-early-morning-59-c-e74c581eac
- Invaluable (Los Angeles Modern Auctions sale): https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot-duncan-grant-paul-roche-reclining-nude-129-c-e2dd7fe291

## Appraisily data basis

This Appraisily artist page draws on institutional identity records from the Library of Congress, VIAF, the RKD, Tate, and the Museum of Modern Art, combined with biographical context from standard reference works. Market observations reference general auction-category patterns for Modern British art. When available, specific auction records, sale dates, realised prices, and comparable lots from major auction houses are incorporated into individual appraisal reports.

## Sources

- Library of Congress: https://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n82211425
- RKD – Netherlands Institute for Art History: https://rkd.nl/en/explore/artists/33347
- VIAF: https://viaf.org/viaf/24764783/
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q766166
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duncan_Grant
- Tate: https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/duncan-grant-1203
- The Museum of Modern Art: https://www.moma.org/artists/2294