Exploration & Travel

Exploration & Travel sales bring together paintings, photographs, books, manuscripts and artefacts relating to the historical voyages and expeditions of renowned navigators and explorers, amongst them Cook in the Pacific; Humboldt and Darwin in the Americas; Stanley and Livingstone in Africa; Burton in the Middle East; and Mallory on Everest. As well as narratives by early travellers, the sales include topographical pictures by itinerant artists in the Americas, Africa, the Middle East, Australasia and the Pacific, South East Asia and the Far East, including the East India Company trade and China Trade paintings. Since our inaugural sale in 1996, the Exploration & Travel sales have attracted such landmark collections as The Scott Relics (£313,348, September 1999); The Shackleton Collection (£338,216, September 2001); The Henry Morton Stanley Collection (£891,711, September 2002); The Bligh Relics, (£144,595, September 2002); The Freycinet Collection (£1,570,403, September 2002); The Quentin Keynes Collection (£3,358,000, April 2004); and The P.R. Sandwell Collection of Pacific & Arctic Voyages (£629,700, September 2005).

For over a decade, Christie's has held The Polar Sale featuring pictures, artefacts and narratives relating to the search for the Northwest Passage and expeditions to the North and South Poles, most notably Scott and Shackleton’s expeditions and the heroic age of Antarctic exploration. More recently, Christie's has launched a dedicated Alps to Everest sale, featuring the history of mountains and mountaineering from the Alpine Golden Age to the assaults on Everest in the 20th century. Beginning in 2009, The Polar Sale and The Alps to Everest sale will be showcased together at South Kensington in a combined celebration of snow and ice dedicated to the history of exploration in these the toughest of all environments.