Lucian Freud’s sketchbooks, drawings and letters have been acquired by the UK from the estate of Lucian Freud, allowing the artist’s estate to sidestep its tax bill as part of the country’s Acceptance in Lieu Scheme.  “This rare collection of Lucian Freud drawings and letters provides a fascinating glimpse into the work of one of our most pioneering artists,” Culture Minister Ed Vaizey says.  “Bringing these never seen before treasures into public collections means that everyone can enjoy and see the early beginnings that shaped his most celebrated work.” (more…)

Louise Bourgeois, Spider (1997), via Rae Wang for Art Observed

Christie’s continued its impressive run of record-setting sales last night, with a steady, competitive sale tonight that ultimately brought a final tally of $331,809,000, with 13 of the 70 lots offered passing (barring several withdrawn, high-priced lots).  (more…)

In response to the efforts of Lucian Freud‘s son, Paul McAdam Freud, challenging the secrecy of the painter’s will, a High Court judge has ruled that the will’s contents are to remain undisclosed to the public and most of his 14-odd children. When he died in 2011, Freud left behind his estate equally to his solicitor and one of his daughters, with the understanding that they were to hold the estate in trusts for undisclosed recipients. The secrecy of the will has been a point of contention among his many children and beneficiaries. (more…)

When the famous artist Lucian Freud died in 2011, he left behind assets of £95 million, none of which went to his daughter Lucy Freud nor her siblings. Allegedly enduring a difficult childhood with a detached father of multiple affairs, Lucy Freud still believes she is a rightful heir to the fortune and continues to speak up for her siblings,”I don’t believe Dad had it in him to be specifically derogatory to us as a group. I don’t believe he would have done it.”

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The late Lucian Freud has left a number of works from his collection, including a late work by Jean Baptiste Camille Corot and several sculptures by Degas, to Great Britain as a token of gratitude for the country’s welcoming of his Jewish family, who fled Nazi Germany in 1938.  The Corot work is now on view at the National Gallery, in room 41.  “Although we have a very strong collection of Corot’s works, we have no example of a late figure painting like this,” says National Gallery director Nicholas Penny. “Its rough-hewn monumentality and abrupt transitions anticipate Picasso’s exercises in the classical manner and make it one of the most modern looking pictures in the collection.” (more…)

Rotterdam Kunsthal, photo Peter Dejong AP

The Kunsthal Rotterdam in the Netherlands suffered the loss of several valuable paintings in a theft around 3:00 a.m. on October 16th, among them Picasso, Monet, Gauguin, Matisse and Lucian Freud. The paintings were part of an exhibition of 150 works in the Triton Foundation’s collection as part of the museum’s 20th anniversary celebration. The burglars set off an alarm at a security agency and authorities responded within 5 minutes, but not in time to catch the suspects.

Picasso Harlequin Head, 1971 courtesy Businessweek

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Breaking: Several valuable artworks were stolen from the The Kunsthal museum in Rotterdam on October 15th or 16th, including paintings by Picasso, Matisse, Monet, Gauguin and Freud. Police said the robbery happened on Monday night or early on Tuesday morning. They are reviewing surveillance video and asking any witnesses to come forward. The museum is showing works from the Triton Foundation in a 20th anniversary celebration. (more…)

Image: Frieze London Courtesy Frieze

Exhibitors are gearing up for the tenth edition of Frieze London, which takes place in London’s Regent’s Park from October 11–14th. The fair kicks off with a vernissage on the evening of Wednesday, October 10th, once again housed in a temporary structure designed by architects Carmody Groarke.

Although mostly composed of UK and US galleries (almost exclusively from London and New York) account for 45% of the main fair, fair organizers are broadening the scope this year, with new sections and exhibitors from 35 countries, making it the most international event to date organized by Frieze.

Image: Mona Hatoum, KAPANCIK, 2012 Courtesy White Cube Gallery

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Yves Klein, Le Rose du bleu (RE 22) (1960)

This week in London, the focus will shift towards Contemporary Art, for the second consecutive week of  summer auctions. According to the Telegraph, these contemporary sales hold the highest pre-sale estimates ever offered by the London houses. Total sales expected from Sotheby’s range from £57.51 – 82.48 million, while Christie’s are in excess of £120 million. Last week’s Impressionist and Modern Sales were more subdued than the record breaking auctions held in New York this past May. Based upon these record pre-sale estimates, there may be similar hopes for this week’s round of sales.

Yves Klein, Rélief éponge bleu (RE 51) (1959)

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‬Nine artworks donated to the Tate, including pieces by David Hockney, Lucian Freud, and Jacob Epstein, “[this gift] greatly enriched the national collection of art”, says director Sir Nicholas Serota

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‪‬Turner Prize winning artist Jeremy Deller, who recently created an inflatable, bouncy Stonehenge sculpture, to represent Britain at Venice Biennale 2013, joining the ranks of Lucian Freud, Anish Kapoor, Tracy Emin, and 2011’s Mike Nelson as UK representatives

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Lucian Freud, Reflection (Self-portrait) (1985). All images © The Lucian Freud Archive.

Lucian Freud‘s work spans a seventy year trajectory on view now at the National Portrait Gallery in London in the first ever exhibition to focus solely on the artist’s portraiture, curated in collaboration with Freud over his final years. Born the grandson of Sigmund Freud in 1922 in Berlin, Germany, L. Freud passed away at age 88 last July as perhaps one of the most influential and important artists of his generation. The expansive exhibition includes works from as early as 1940 to the last and unfinished painting Freud was working on, highlighting stylistic developments that occurred over the decades. Freud’s subjects ran the gamut from his family, friends and lovers, to celebrities, criminals and aristocrats.

Lucian Freud, Girl in a Dark Jacket (1947)

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Installation view. All images courtesy of Haunch of Venison, London.

Haunch of Venison’s newly renovated four-gallery space in London currently holds an exhibition showing ten of Britain’s more important painters of the post-war era: Michael Andrews, Frank Auerbach, Francis Bacon, Patrick Caulfield, William Coldstream, Lucian Freud, Richard Hamilton, David Hockney, Leon Kossoff and Euan Uglow. Exploring both personal and artistic relationships amongst the artists, over 40 paintings and drawings are on display, unveiling some works that have not been seen in public for years.
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Yves Klein all photos by Caroline Claisse for Art Observed

This year marked the 2nd iteration of the House of the Nobleman, a privately sponsored exhibition which took place at the Boswall House, 15,000sqft  mansion at 2 Cornwall Terrace, overlooking Regent’s Park and the Frieze 2011 Art Fair.  Art Observed was on site for the private viewing.  On view were works by Claude Monet, Auguste Rodin, Peter Paul Rubens, Edgar Degas, Max Ernst,  Damien Hirst, Marlene Dumas, Yves Klein, Lucio Fontana, Sigmar Polke, Christian Boltanski, Anish Kapoor, Nick Hornby, Matthew Day Jackson, Cecily Brown, Lucian Freud, Peter Fischli and David Weiss, Yayoi Kusama, Robert Longo, Alexander Calder, Eugenia Emets, Francesco Clemente, Salvador Dali,  Peter Doig,  Olafur Eliasson, George Condo, Takashi Murakami,  Hiroshi Sugimoto and Gerhard Richter.

Monet, Claude “ Chemin dans le brouillard”, (1879)

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Alberto Burri, Combustione Legno, 1957 (est. $1.2-1.9 million, realized $5 million), via Sothebys.com

Sotheby’s London hosted a pair of auctions on Thursday evening that raised a combined total of $62 million. The 20th Century Italian Art sale, comprised of 58 lots, was followed by a 47-lot Contemporary Art sale. The $34 million achieved for the Italian auction was the highest total for an auction in this category, while the Contemporary sale fell just short of its $30 million low estimate. The mixed results suggest that there is money to be spent on the most desirable lots and that buyers are not willing to shell out for anything less. The sales progressed amid demonstrations outside the auction house by protestors of the company’s months-long battle with their art handlers in New York.

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Interview with William Acquavella about life, the day of Lucian Freud’s death [AO Newslink]

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Lucian Freud retrospective at London’s National Portrait Gallery in February to include last and unfinished painting, Portrait of the Hound [AO Newslink]

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As the first set of auctions following Lucian Freud’s death approaches, Sotheby’s to sell the painter’s 1952 work, Boy’s Head, for an estimated £4m [AO Newslink]

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This Wednesday, Lucian Freud passed away in his London home at the age of 88. According to Mr. Freud’s dealer, William Acquavella of Acquavella Galleries, Freud suffered a brief illness before his death. Freud’s career is characterized by his thickly-painted portraits of friends and family, which brought forward and repositioned the genre of portraiture in the twentieth century.

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Francis Bacon, Study for a Portrait, 1953 (est. unpublished, realized $28.6 million), via Christies.com

Christie’s sale of Contemporary art on Tuesday night realized $127 million for 53 lots sold. The total, which fell just above the high estimate of $125 million once fees were added, is the highest for any sale at Christie’s in Europe since the boom of June 2008. The top lot was a Francis Bacon self portrait that shows a man sitting in a throne-like chair wearing a suit and glasses. The painting sold for $28.6 million against an unpublished estimate rumored to be about $17 million. A self portrait by the artist sold for $25 million at Christie’s spring sale in New York .

Andy Warhol, Mao, 1973 (est. $9.6-12.8 million, realized $11.1 million), via Christies.com

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Yutaka Sone Little Manhattan (2007-2009) at David Zwirner Gallery – All images by Caroline Claisse for Art Observed

Art Observed remains on site in Basel, Switzerland for Art 42 Basel 2011.  The following is our second of the photosets of the main fair.  Stay tuned for more coverage of the main fair before the end of the week as well as profiles of the satellite exhibitions and events.

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Artist Wim Delvoye before one of his sculptures at Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin

more images and links after the jump…

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