A Sir John Lavery painting that spent more than sixty years in a Belfast convent will go to auction in Newry next month. The work is a smaller version of the Madonna of the Lakes triptych altarpiece that hangs in St Patrick's Church, Belfast.

The painting was discovered by Victor Mee auctioneers during the cataloguing of items from five former convents in Belfast and Newry. It is believed Lavery presented the piece to Fr John O'Neill, then administrator of St Patrick's, when the original altarpiece was unveiled in 1919. Fr O'Neill bequeathed it to the Sisters of Mercy on Crumlin Road upon his death in 1960, and it remained there ever since.

Lavery, a Belfast-born portrait painter and war artist, was baptised in St Patrick's Church. For the Madonna of the Lakes, he used his wife Hazel and his daughter Eileen and stepdaughter Alice as models for the Madonna, St Brigid and St Patrick. The painting carries an estimate of €5,000 to €10,000.

The auction, held in the former Sisters of Mercy convent on Catherine Street in Newry, runs from June 9 to 11. It features 1,700 lots, including 18th and 19th century furniture, antique clocks and two rare 22-carat gold ciboriums. The ciboriums, discovered in the Convent of Mercy in Newry, each carry estimates of €30,000 to €40,000.

Musical instruments from the convents will also be sold, including two violins, a cello, a bass trombone, a grand piano and several harps made by Belfast craftsman James McFall. One of these is the "Armagh harp," estimated at €2,000 to €4,000.

In a separate result, a painting by Belfast-born artist Gerard Dillon set a world record on May 27. "Tea Party," an oil painting of a cottage interior in Connemara with the artist and friends, sold for €1.375 million at Adam's auction in Dublin. The price was nearly seven times its upper estimate of €200,000. The previous record for a Dillon work was £378,000 for "The Dreamer," sold in London in 2020. "Tea Party" had first been exhibited in 1955 at the Irish Exhibition of Living Art in Dublin. It came from the collection of Frank and Reeta Hughes of Warrenpoint, Co Down.