René Magritte’s Miroir Universel sells over estimate for$6,661,000, via Rae Wang for Art Observed
The November auctions are over, as Christie’s capped its final major evening sale of the year to strong results, with 13 lots going unsold out of the 62 offered, tallying a final of $145,545,000. (more…)
Grand Palais, courtesy FIAC
FIAC, or the 39th International Contemporary Art Fair, will open tomorrow (Thursday) in Paris, with a VIP preview today, with 184 galleries exhibiting at the Grand Palais, and this year utilizing the restored Salon d’Honneur as well, which lies at the center of the structure. As in past years, galleries will exhibit sculpture at the Tuilieries Garden nearby. Approximately 65,000 visitors are expected to attend.
Tuilieries Garden courtesy FIAC (more…)
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Max Ernst, The Stolen Mirror, 1941 (est. $4-6 million, realized $16.3 million), via Christies.com
Christie’s evening sale of Impressionist and Modern art on Tuesday night brought in $140 million against presale estimates of $210-300 million. Four of the top 5 most valuable lots failed to sell, including the auction’s cover lot – a Degas ballerina sculpture with a presale estimate of $25-35 million. The Degas had been shopped around privately with no luck and carried what many believed to be a very aggressive estimate. The auction house cited those two facts to explain that lot’s failure, as well as the overall performance of the sale. In general, fresh to market material faired best, and hefty presale estimates deterred bidding on the priciest works. What turned out to be the evening’s top lot – Max Ernest‘s The Stolen Mirror – was both fresh to market and carried an estimate in line with the artist’s records and with heightened interest in Surrealist material over the past few auction cycles. The canvas set the record for the artist at auction when it sold for $16.3 million against a high estimate of $6 million. The previous record was set this past June at Christie’s London with a 1923 work that brought $4.4 million.
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Pablo Picasso, Femmes Lisant (Deux Personnages), 1934 (est. $25-35 million), via Sothebys.com
The New York spring sales begin this week as Sotheby’s and Christie’s hold their Impressionist & Modern evening auctions on May 3rd and 4th, respectively. Sotheby’s 59-lot sale is estimated to fetch $158.9-227.9 million, while Christie’s 55-lot sale is expected to bring in at least $160 million. Five works to hit the auction block (one at Sotheby’s and four at Christie’s) carry estimates of $20 million or more. The headlining work at Sotheby’s is a 1932 portrait by Picasso of his mistress, Marie-Thérèse Walter. The painting is similar to the portrait of Walter that led the February Impressionist and Modern sale at Sotheby’s London and sold for £25.4 million (about $42.4 million) against a high estimate of £18 million ($30 million). Femmes Lisant (Deux Personnages) last changed hands in 1981 and is expected to fetch between $25-35 million.
More text and images after the jump…
Pierre Bonnard, Terrasse à Vernon, 1923 (est. £3–4 million, realized £7.2 million ), via Christies.com
Christie’s London hosted two back-to-back sales on Wednesday evening that brought in a combined total of £84.9 million. The forty-five lot Impressionist and Modern sale realized £61.9 million for thirty-five lots sold. The estimate of £54-80 million for that auction included a Franz Marc painting that was withdrawn from the sale (it carried an estimate of £900,000-1.4 million). Thirty-one lots at the “Art of the Surreal” sale that immediately followed realized £23 million for twenty-five lots sold. Including a withdrawn De Chirico, the Surreal sale carried a presale estimate of £19-28 million. Bidding stopped at £5.8 million for a featured Gauguin painting (est. £7-10 million) that carried the highest presale estimate of any work offered at both sales. Instead, the evening’s top lot was a fresh-to-market Bonnard painting that broke the auction record for the artist when it sold for £7.2 million against a high presale estimate of £4 million. At the press conference the auction house revealed that the seller of the painting intended to use the proceeds to purchase land in France in order to “save horses.”
The sale room at Christie’s London on Wednesday evening, via Art Observed
more story and images after the jump…
Alberto Giacometti, Grand Buste de Diego Avec Bras, executed 1957, cast 1958 (est. £3.5–5 million, bought in), via Sothebys.com
Tuesday evening’s forty-two lot sale of Impressionist and Modern Art at Sotheby’s London brought in £68.8 million (or $111 million) for thirty-two lots sold. The auction house reports being “very pleased” with the total, which is the fourth highest ever in the department at the London location. The featured lot, Picasso’s La Lecture, exceeded its presale estimate after slow, thoughtful bidding by at least seven interested parties that increased in increments of £500,000. It sold to a telephone bidder for £25.2 million against a presale estimate of £12-18 million (estimates do not include the buyers premium, prices realized do). The real surprise, though, came when both Giacometti lots which carried the second and third highest presale estimates failed to sell. Bidding for an oil on canvas portrait of the artist’s brother ended at £2.7 million and a bronze sculpture of the same subject passed at £3.2 million.
The sale room at Sotheby’s London on Tuesday, via Art Observed
more story and images after the jump…
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Pablo Picasso, La Lecture, 1932 (est. £12–18 million), via Sothebys.com
February’s round of major art auctions begins in London next week with Impressionist & Modern sales at Sotheby’s and Christie’s. On Tuesday evening Sotheby’s will offer forty-two lots estimated to bring between £55-79 million. Sotheby’s will also hold a 60-lot sale of Impressionist, Modern, and Contemporary works titled “Looking Closely: A Private Collection” on Thursday, February 10th that is expected to fetch up to £54 million. All the works in that sale are from the collection of George Kostalitz, a Geneva-based collector who died last year. Christie’s forty-six lot evening sale on Wednesday is estimated to bring £54-80 million and, as was the case last year, will be immediately followed by a thirty-one lot auction of Surrealist works estimated to fetch an additional £19-28 million. While it is uncertain whether these auctions will produce a buzz-worthy sale on par with last year’s £65 million paid for Giacometti’s L’Homme Qui Marche I, both houses are offering a number of strong works led by canvases by Picasso and Gauguin.
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Alberto Giacometti, Diego, 1958 (est. £3–5 million), via Sothebys.com
more images and story after the jump…
Marcel Broodthaers, Les Portes, 1969. Vacuum-formed plastic, hand painted, 192 x 178 cm. All images courtesy of Michael Werner Gallery.
Currently on view at Michael Werner Gallery is Marcel Broodthaers “Major Works.” The exhibition marks the second this fall of Belgian conceptual artist Broodthaers, who began his career as a poet before turning to visual art at age 40. Stemming from his roots in poetry, Broodthaers’ visual practice involved playful, provocative juxtapositions of word and image, poetry and object, language and art. His work is varied, dabbling in appropriations, film, image and text combinations, and mixed media installations he called decors.
The artist found inspiration in the Surrealists and American Pop artists, citing influence from Oldenburg, Segal, Mallarmé, and Magritte. Unfortunately, the artist’s career was tragically cut short when, a mere twelve years later, he succumbed to liver disease on his 52nd birthday. However, he leaves behind an astounding number of works, many of which have had a profound impact on future artists, including Richard Prince, Rachel Harrison, Philippe Parreno and Tino Sehgal.
Marcel Broodthaers, Dites Partout Que Je L’Ai Dit (Say Everywhere That I Have Said It), 1974. Parrot under bell jar, audiotape, 2 framed works. Variable dimensions.
More text and images after the jump… (more…)
Tête de femme (Jacqueline), Pablo Picasso. Estimate $4,845,000 – $6,460,000 Price Realized:$12,887,348. Image via Christie’s
Christie’s Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale and the auction of Art of the Surreal took place last night in London and fetched $122,167,093, over a pre-sale estimate of $87 – $124million. The sale illustrated a buoyant market in reflection of last year’s equivalent sale that raised $101 million as buyers and sellers held back in the financial crisis. Another observation is the continuing appetite for important works of art – most specifically large, colorful works fresh to the market from long-established private collections. Competitive bidding for 4 works by important artists Picasso, Kees van Dongen and Natalia Gontcharova pushed prices over £5 million – in total 21 lots realize over £1 million, compared to 26 at both last year’s major London sales combined. Despite recent musings on buyers in China’s ascendant economy who are displaying a new appetite for 20th Century Art, Thomas Seydoux, Christie’s international head of Impressionist and modern art, was most surprised by the amount of bidding from Russian and former Eastern Bloc buyers who dominated the action on the telephone – only 2% of lots were sold to Asian buyers in relation to 25% UK, 48% Europe and 25% Americas.
More text, images and related links after the jump…..
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Pure Beauty 1966-1968, Acrylic on canvas © John Baldessari, Courtesy of Baldessari Studio and Glenstone
Tate Modern are currently exhibiting the largest ever UK retrospective featuring the work of the prolific Californian artist, John Baldessari, through January 10. Tate Modern’s exhibition, John Baldessari: Pure Beauty, acts as a parallel to the Ed Ruscha exhibition only minutes away at the Hayward Gallery in London’s Southbank Centre; both artists employ humor and a compulsion toward language and American pop culture in their works.
Bloody Sundae 1987 Black and white photographs, vinyl paint © John Baldessari, Courtesy of Baldessari Studio
More text, images, video and related links after the jump…. (more…)
Olympia, Rene Magritte (1948). Via Telegraph.co.uk
This morning two men stole an oil painting by the Belgian Surrealist Rene Magritte with an estimated street value of $1.1 million. The painting, Olympia (1948), was part of an appointment-only exhibition at The Rene Magritte Museum, Brussels.
Journalists gather outside the Magritte Museum in Jette, Brussels. Via NYTimes
It has been reported that the two men, one armed with a pistol, entered the museum shortly after it opened at 10 am. Brussels city police spokesman, John Berckmans announced today that one thief entered the building first after ringing the doorbell, “and as soon as he came in he threatened personnel with a weapon.” Museum staff, along with two tourists – a Japanese couple – were forced to lie on the ground by the first thief, while his accomplice took the painting from the wall.
Berckmans has added “The investigation is continuing but we have found no trace of the culprits.”
Related Links:
Rene Magritte Museum Homepage [MagritteMuseum.be]
Magritte painting stolen at gunpoint [Guardian.co.uk]
Magritte painting stolen [NYTimes]
Armed thieves steal Magritte work [BBC News]
Pablo Picasso’s ‘Homme à l’épée’ sold for £7 million, falling squarely within estimates of £6-8 million, via Sotheby’s
Sotheby’s Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale last night in London yielded fairly strong results, due mainly to a slimmed down offering of high quality works. The 27 lot sale realized £33.5 million, towards the higher end of estimates of £26.8-37.3 million, with only 4 lots going unsold and a sold-by-lot rate of 85.2% and a sold-by-value rate of 90.8%. Despite trouble finding sellers, choosing lots carefully paid off for Sotheby’s with spirited bidding throughout the auction. The sale’s big star, Picasso’s ‘Homme à l’épée,’ sold for £7 million against estimates of £6-8 million. Another late Picasso painting, ‘Nu debout,’ was the second-highest lot, selling for £4.3 million, above estimates of £3-4 million.
Sotheby’s Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale Results [Sotheby’s]
Sotheby’s Lean Strategy Pays Off [NY Times]
Sotheby’s London auction hits target at $55 million [Reuters]
Picasso’s $11.5 Million Musketeer Tops Sale as Bargains Hunted [Bloomberg]
Homme a l’epee Sells for 7 Million and Leads Sotheby’s Sale of Impressionist & Modern Art [Artdaily]
Lot by Lot: Sotheby’s I/M London Evening Sale [Art Market Monitor]
Picasso Musketeer Tops Sale by Sotheby’s [NY Times]
En Garde! Sotheby’s Sells Picasso Musketeeer Painting for $11.5 Million [WallStreetJournal]
Picasso musketeers duel at London auction houses [The Art Newspaper]
Sotheby’s Imp/Mod Sale Small but Solid [Artinfo]
Summing Up Sotheby’s I/M Evening Sale in London [Art Market Monitor]
Homme a l’epee Leads Sotheby’s Sale of Impressionist & Modern Art [Auction Publicity]
AO coverage of Christie’s Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale on Tuesday
King Albert II and Queen Paola of Belgium looking at René Magritte’s ‘Black Magic’ at the inauguration of the Magritte Museum in Brussels via Artdaily
A museum dedicated to Belgian Surrealist artist René Margritte opens today in Brussels. The Magritte Museum houses the world’s largest Magritte collection, with two hundred and fifty artworks as well as archival material, and is the product of a partnership between the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, the Magritte Foundation, the Belgian Régie des Bâtiments, the Belgian Federal Science Policy Administration, and the GDF SUEZ Group. Following in the footsteps of other recently built single artist museums, such as the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam or the Zentrum Paul Klee at Berne, the Magritte Museum is intended as a research center for the life and work of the artist.
René Magritte Museum
Who said there weren’t any famous Belgians? Two museums honour country’s most celebrated sons [GuardianUK]
New Magritte Museum Houses the Largest Collection of Magritte Works in the World [Artdaily]
Magritte Museum Opens as Surreal House, Tintin Gets Spaceship [Bloomberg]
Petite Danseuse de Quatorze Ans (1879-1881) by Edgar Degas, sold for £13,257,250, ($18,993,194) above the high end of its range (£12,000,000 / $18,129,626). Image via Sotheby’s.
Following mixed results at last week’s Old Masters auctions, the art market was looking closely at Sotheby’s Impressionist and Modern Art evening sale for further clues on how the rest of the year might unfold. The auction generated £32,564,300, selling 22 of 29 lots or 75.9% of what was offered. Several records were set, and 40% of the lots exceeded the high end of expectations. While there were some very notable successes, 67.7% of lots were sold by value, with the final result well below the pre-sale estimate range of £40,620,000-£55,680,000
The star of the night was indisputably the Petite Danseuse de Quatorze Ans, a sculpture by Edgar Degas previously owned by Sir John Madejski, a British sports entrepreneur and philanthropist, news of its sale previously covered by Art Observed here. The sculpture was sold to an unnamed Asian collector for £13.25 million or almost $19 million. The final price was above the £12 million high end of its estimate range, setting a record for a Degas sculpture and ultimately becoming the top price of the night. Petite Danseuse, one of a series of 28 bronze and fabric sculptures made several years after the artist’s death in 1917, made a tidy profit for Madejski, who bought it for £5 million for it in 2004. “Petite danseuse de quatorze ans is the most important sculpture by Edgar Degas and it is undoubtedly one of the most iconic sculptures of the Impressionist period,” commented Helena Newman, Vice Chairman, Impressionist & Modern Art, Sotheby’s Worldwide. “The recordbreaking price achieved for this exceptional sculpture tonight is a testament to the strength of the market for rare works of exceptional quality.”
Another high value lot that sold above its expectations was Joan Miro’s Femmes et Oiseaux dans la Nuit, which sold for £2 million ($3 million). Bought by David Nahmad on behalf an anonymous telephone bidder, the painting sold for two times the high end of its range.
Auction results: Sotheby’s
Auction results: Artnet
Auction Record Price For Edgar Degas Sculpture Headlines Sotheby’s Sale Of Impressionist Art [ArtDaily]
Degas Sculpture Makes Record in First Art-Market Test of 2009 [Bloomberg]
Sotheby’s Sale Shows Reassuring Signs of Market Life [ArtInfo]
Previously on ArtObserved:
DEGAS’S ‘LITTLE DANCER’ STEPS OUT INTO THE MARKET [Jan 12]
“Livre, pipe et verres” (1915) by Juan Gris, Christie’s, via Artnet
CHRISTIE’S IMPRESSIONIST AND MODERN ART, New York, Thursday November 6th
Total Lots Offered: 82
Total Lots Sold: 46
Total Sales Value: $146.7 million
Total Sales Pre-Auction Estimate: $240.7 million
This is the first of five articles that will summarize in parts the auction results following AO’s last covered Wednesday November 5th Christies Auction covered by AO here. Following a day where the Dow Jones industrial average dropped over 400 points, overall, Christie’s Impressionist and Modern art auction, the second evening sale of the week, was perhaps successful versus others in the week. Though overall sales were poor, the six guaranteed works sold. In total, 44% of the lots failed to sell, or rather, of the 82 pieces offered 36 works were brought in (37% by value). Auctioneer Christopher Burge quoted to Bloomberg after the sale: “Obviously, prices have changed, we’d be foolish not to recognize that.”
The auction totaled $146.715 million against a pre-sale estimate of $240.7 million to $337.2 million. Marquee works from Juan Gris, Pablo Picasso, and Wassily Kandinsky brought high prices but works by Claude Monet and Henri Matisse met little to no interest. New world auction records were set for Cubist master Juan Gris, Henri Laurens, American artist Alice Neel and for Seurat and Magritte for works on paper. 27 of the 46 works that did sell earned in excess of $1 million. 61% of buyers were Americans, 26% Europeans and 11% (other) with 2% going to Middle Eastern buyers.
Gris Sets Record in Slow Christie’s Auction [New York Times]
World Record For Juan Gris at Christie’s New York – “20.8 Million For Livre, pipe et verre” [Art Daily]
Christie’s Impressionist Sale Falls Short; 44% Fails to Sell [Bloomberg]
Some Gloom, Some Records at Up-And-Down Night at Christie’s [ArtInfo
more detail and pictures after the jump…
On Wednesday November 5th, Christie’s conducted its sale of the estates of two separate widows (the Alice Lawrence and Hillman family collections) bearing similar works of mostly late 19th and early to mid-20th century pieces, in an auction thus titled “The Modern Age.” These auctions included works by headliners such as Pablo Picasso, Paul Cézanne, Mark Rothko, Fernand Léger, Edouard Manet, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Amedeo Modigliani, Giorgio De Chirico and René Magritte. The event followed the latest Sotheby’s auction for Impressionist and Modern art on Monday (as covered by AO here) which disappointedly totaled $223.8 million against the $338 million low estimate. Additionally, the Modern Age sale corresponded to a particularly steep post-presidential race drop in the public equity markets in which the Dow plunged 486 points.
The auction results were no surprise considering the current tepid environment in the art market: The two collections listed 58 lots, of which 17 did not sell, for a total sale of $47 million, which was less than half of its $104 million low estimate. Christie’s said 51% of buyers were American and 29% European. Though Surrealist lots by Magritte (see image above) and De Chirico (see below) did well, of the lots that were brought in were the most expensive of the sale, notably, Manet’s “Fillette sur un banc/Girl on a Bench,” a 1880 portrait of a girl with a wide-brim hat estimated at $12-18 million (see image below), and Rothko’s “No. 43 (Mauve),” estimated at $20-30 million. Other works by Cézanne, Renoir, and de Kooning also failed to sell.
Bleak Night at Christie’s, in Both Sales and Prices [NY Times]
Art-Market Rout Persists: Rothko Snubbed at Auction [Bloomberg]
Buyers Cool to Private-Collection Art at Christies [Reuters]
Market Forces Bring Fire-Sale Prices for Christie’s “Modern Age” [Art Info]
The Modern Age: Property from the Hillman Family Collection [Art Daily]
Christie’s Wan and Woeful Night [CultureGrrl]
Christie’s Website
more auction results, quotes and images after the jump…
