A 19th century painted print of a Maori took top honours at Heliers Auction (18% buyer’s premium) in Blackburn, Lancashire.
Consigned locally, the 22 x 21in (56 x 53cm) gelatin silver print of the sitter wearing a traditional huia-feather headdress sold to a UK buyer for £6400 against a £6000-8000 estimate on January 26.
The print was painted over in 1885 by Helen Stuart (fl.1880s), one of a few recorded colourists who emigrated to New Zealand from Scotland. She mostly used photographs taken by her brother, Samuel Stuart Jnr, and those of Josiah Martin (1843-1916), an English teacher who travelled to New Zealand in the 1870s.