“It is an excellent sale with many new artworks and photographs,” Newrick said.
Those included original paintings by notable Kiwi painters Peter McIntyre (Waterfall in the King Country) and John Weeks.
A portrait by Queen Victoria’s eldest daughter, Victoria the Princess Royal, is also up for purchase.
Newrick launched Heritage Auctions in 2021 as in-person auctions, but later shifted to online-only, timed auctions.
“This is Heritage House. With all those beautiful walls, we can’t go shoving nails into the walls to hang paintings. The landlords wouldn’t be too happy,” Newrick said.
“More recently, with the advent of software and that, and particularly since Covid came along, timed auctions have become very popular.”
He had already received numerous bids, but said the savvy people typically hold back till the last couple of hours.
“They don’t want to disclose their hand so early in the piece,” he said.
“Already in this auction we’ve got one registration from the UK – I expect there will be more – and in the United States.”
Newrick will turn 80 in August.
“I’m slowing down.
“I’m here till midnight, normally. Then I go home, have a coffee, do some more work, go to bed at 2am.”
But he’s not retiring and has plenty of projects ahead.
They include writing a step-by-step guide, taking aspiring authors through the entire process of publishing a book.
“Getting a book published by the main publishing houses is very difficult, you know. The rejection’s really high ... you need to have a real story.
“A lot of people just want to write it for their family, limited circulation just so they’ve got history.”
The Heritage House is currently listed for sale.
Newrick said his lease ends at the end of 2027.
“Hopefully, there may be a person, or even an existing auction house, that might carry on the business I started,” he said.
Noam Mānuka Lazarus (Ngāti Whātua o Kaipara) is a multimedia journalist at the Whanganui Chronicle.
