16 May 2014
Sotheby’s Contemporary Art Evening Sale in New York has totaled $364,379,000 85% Sold by lot Sale Estimate $336,650,000 – 474,000,000 Tonight’s auction saw a sell through rate of 85%, marking the 12th consecutive contemporary sale with a sell-through rate of over 80%. o 51% of sold works brought above their high estimates. Global participation evident […]
15 May 2014
Christie’s has set a new benchmark for the Post-War and Contemporary art market, raising a record total of $975 million and setting 35 new price achievements during its successful sale week. “The current commentary on the art market currently avoids what is truly driving it. It is the work of art itself,” said Steven Murphy, Chief […]
8 May 2014
Christie’s NY Evening Sale of Impressionist and Modern Art on Tuesday, May 6, has realised $285,879,000 (£168,668,610/€205,832,880), selling 89% by lot and 96% by value. This marks the highest total for Christie’s New York in this category since May 2010. Of the 53 works offered, 9 lots sold for over $10 million, 18 for over […]
6 May 2014
The hedge fund activist Dan Loeb will be appointed a seat on the board of Sotheby’s, after a seven month battle, avoiding a feared shareholder vote, which was set to challenge the direction of the 270 year old auction house. The move came after Donald Parsons, a Delaware judge rejected a request to delay Tuesday’s […]
29 April 2014
A rare bronze “Maquette by Henry Moore from the collection of the legendary Hollywood actress Lauren Bacall is being offered at Bonham’s New York. The work titled “Curved Mother and Child,” was gifted to the actresse’s son Stephen Bogart, who has consigned the lot. The small bronze carries a pre-sale auction estimate of $150,000-200,000. Lauren […]
28 April 2014
An exhibition of major Irish artworks from Sotheby’s upcoming auction of British and Irish Art will be shown in Dublin, ahead of the sale. The exhibition will take place from Thursday 8 to Sunday 11 May 2014. Headlining the group is a stunning portrait by William Orpen and a selection of works by Ireland’s leading […]
28 April 2014
Specialist insurer Hiscox has released figures, which for the first time show that there is increasing confidence with purchasing art online. Click-and-buy – which means online art buying platforms with an online presence only, rather than a physical space – is becoming a trusted channel for buying art, with as many as 40% of those […]
23 April 2014
Records have been broken for works by the British printmakers, C.R.W. Nevinson (British, 1889-1946) and C.E. Power (British, 1872-1951) as the Grosvenor School dominated the Prints sale at Bonhams on 15th April. Returning to the Trenches, a terrific wartime study of marching troops by Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson took the top spot in the sale […]
19 April 2014
The May sale of Photography at Sotheby’s opens with a 16-lot selection of generously donated photographs by leading contemporary photographers in support of the Bodleian Library’s campaign to save the personal archive of William Henry Fox Talbot. The bid to acquire the archive of Fox Talbot’s life and work was launched by the institution in […]
12 April 2014
Sotheby’s New York will feature a unique group of Six late Self Portraits by Andy Warhol in their Evening Auction of Contemporary Art on 14 May 2014. The series are among the final works the artist created before his untimely death in 1987. Executed in 1986 – 20 years after the artist’s last great series […]
11 April 2014
Sotheby’s New York is offering Jeff Koons’s gleaming, seven-foot tall statue of the cartoon character and American pop culture icon Popeye. The sculpture is one of an edition of three, from which no example has appeared at auction until now. The present Popeye has never been exhibited publicly, and will make its debut in Sotheby’s […]
3 April 2014
Christie’s Auctioneers has announced the sale of Property from the Estate of Edgar M. Bronfman, the distinguished businessman, philanthropist, and diplomat, in the upcoming auction season. Bronfman’s acquired collection was formed over the course of several decades and spans the categories of Impressionist & Modern Art, American Art, Post-War and Contemporary Art, Prints & Multiples, […]
26 March 2014
Dan Loeb, the American hedge fund manager and chief executive of Third Point LLC, a New York-based hedge fund with a portfolio worth $14 billion has sued the directors of auction house Sotheby’s in order to force the removal of ‘poison pill protections’ that prevent ‘him from acquiring more seats on the board. New York […]
23 March 2014
An important late Jackson Pollock titled ‘Number 5’ (Elegant Lady, 1951) goes under the hammer at Christie’s New York as part of their May evening sale of Post War and Contemporary art. The work comes from the E.ON art collection and carries an estimate of $15 – 20 million. E.ON, which has been an important […]
15 March 2014
The opening of TEFAF Maastricht, yesterday is always an event of great importance in the fine art calendar. Considered the world’s greatest art and antiques fair, it showcases the best works of art from 7.000 years of history currently on the market. TEFAF always uncovers the limited number of important objects that collectors chase and […]
13 March 2014
The sale of the important collection of the French Art Deco dealer, author and collector Félix Marcilhac concluded last night with an outstanding total of €24,727,715 ($34,290,170), well above pre-sale expectations (est. €8.7-11.2 million/ $12.1-15.5 million), and 95.2% of lots sold. Over the course of two days, almost 600 collectors and art dealers from Europe […]
13 March 2014
Christie’s has just announced another auction of Andy Warhol titled, ‘Andy’s World’, which features more of the artist’s work and personal belongings form the Warhol foundation. This online-only sale gives collectors a glimpse into “A Day in the Life” of one of the most important artists of the 20th century. There are over 150 lots […]
11 March 2014
A Unique Sale bringing together British Art and Design from the Twentieth Century is set to take place at Sotheby’s. Made In Britain showcases great British artists and designers of fine art, sculpture, studio ceramics, photography, prints and furniture, including works by Lucian Freud, Barbara Hepworth, L.S. Lowry, Terry O’Neill, Ernest Race and David Bailey. […]
10 March 2014
Attendance at the 26th Art Dealers Association of America (ADAA) fair the country’s longest running fine art fair was exceptional this year. An abundance of collectors, museum curators, artists, art enthusiasts and press came to view the outstanding works presented by 72 of the nation’s leading art galleries, all members of the ADAA. The Gala […]
15 February 2014
Christie’s Post-War & Contemporary Art London evening auction has realised a total of £124,192,000/ $206,158,720/ €151,017,472 selling 83% by lot and 95% by value and achieving the 2nd highest ever total for a European Auction of Post-War & Contemporary Art*. The top price of the evening was paid for Francis Bacon’s Portrait of George Dyer […]
13 February 2014
Sotheby’s major sale of Contemporary art in London this evening opened with frenzied bidding when as many as eight participants competed for the first lot in the sale. Most of the works offered tonight – two thirds in total – have never been seen at auction before and have attracted more participants than ever before […]
11 February 2014
According to ArtForum there will be nearly sixty international art fairs taking place in 2014. And there must be hundreds of other fairs around the world too. They are everywhere, and whilst not a new phenomenon their numbers have increased inexorably since the end of the 1990s. The art world has become increasingly globalised during […]
9 February 2014
All eyes were on London last week as the city witnessed an unprecedented series of auctions led by Sotheby’s and Christie’s. Sotheby’s two-days of Impressionist, Modern & Surrealist Art sales, brought a total of £215.8 million, the highest achieved for any sale series ever held anywhere in London. This record total represents an almost five-fold […]
6 February 2014
Sotheby’s has reported a 100% sales result for the collection of the art dealer Jan Krugier. The Combined Total of £74.8 million – More than Doubles the High Estimate of lots offered in the auction. In the course of the last two days, 119 works from the Private Collection of Mr Krugier have met with […]
5 February 2014
Christie’s Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale and the auction of The Art of the Surreal which took place on the evening of 4 February in London, has realised a combined total of £176,986,000/ $288,133,208/ €212,737,172 and selling 86% by lot and 95% by value. The auctions had a combined pre-sale estimate of £113.3 million […]
3 February 2014
Sotheby’s has surprized the art market by reporting record prices in their annual Old Masters Week sales. The auctioneers have achieved an impressive total of $71,768,126* as of 30 January 2014. Important Old Master Paintings & Sculpture totaled $51,361,251 (est. $42/60 million) with works from the Dutch Golden Age performing particularly well. Multiple bidders entered […]
31 January 2014
Sotheby’s, today announced the appointment of Alexander Rotter and Cheyenne Westphal as Worldwide Heads of Sotheby’s Contemporary Art Department. The announcement was made by Bill Ruprecht, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of the global auctioneers. “Over the past several years, Sotheby’s global Contemporary team, under the leadership of Alex and Cheyenne and spanning from […]
30 January 2014
Sotheby’s has announced that it will exhibit works by Andy Warhol, Gerhard Richter and David Hockney in India for the first time. The artworks will be open to the public on the 31st January 2014, the exhibition at the Imperial Hotel, New Delhi has been designed to allow Indian collectors to view selected highlights from […]
28 January 2014
A personal collection belonging to the family of one of the most important couturiers of the 20th century, Madame Elsa Schiaparelli, has achieved €1,686,250/£1,385,254/$2,298,359 selling 75% by lot and 94% by value. The top lot of the sale was an Italian pair of carved marble models of leopards which sold for €385,000/£316,278/$524,755. The fabulous Man […]
24 January 2014
One of the most important Collection of Works by L.S. Lowry is to be auctioned by Sotheby’s. A stand-alone evening sale of 15 paintings by the artists will take place at 6pm on 25th March 2014. The A.J. Thompson Collection, estimated to fetch in excess of £15 million, includes well-known masterpieces that have previously been […]
22 January 2014
Christie’s has released their sales figures for 2013 revealing a record year of £4.54 billion, up 16% ($7.13 billion, up 14%), for the year ending December 2013. This figure is the highest sales total for Christie’s or any auction house in the history of the art market. Christie’s sales figures were driven by an increase […]