John Constable sketches fetch £100,000 at auction

Constable sketched Coleorton Hall during a visit to its owner Sir George Beaumont

Sketches by landscape painter John Constable have fetched £101,000 at auction in London.

Five lots, owned by the late Michigan collector Jasper Moores, were put up for sale at Bonhams.

The highest price was for a drawing of Coleorton Hall in Leicestershire, which fetched £67,250, a study of a castle went for £17,500 while one of Salisbury Cathedral reached £16,250.

Two sketches of Brighton beach and a river landscape, did not sell.

Dave Dallas, global head of old masters at Bonhams, said: "The sketches were all done very briskly and probably took little more than 10-15 minutes each, but he manages to get a sense of light, space and distance which compensates for the fact they don't have any colour in them."

Constable (1776-1837) lived in Dedham and East Bergholt on the Essex/Suffolk border, in what is now known as 'Constable Country'.

The three sketches which sold did not exceed their expected sale price.