Dear Friends,
Any doubt about the art market and its vitality should have been put to rest after the last two weeks of stellar, if not phenomenal, auctions. The recurring theme is that important works will continue to attract bidding wars. Whether it be a once in a lifetime Klimt or Still, buyers recognized the value of these works for their aesthetics, art historical value and of course financial value. The Klimt was not only magnificent, but had an amazing story.
We will continue to see that those rare works that are available at the high end will cause individuals to open their wallets and wall space to display these trophy works.
We hope our American friends and families have an enjoyable Thanksgiving holiday and we look forward to seeing you in Miami for Art Basel and PULSE (we heard there is a great booth of contemporary art at Benrimon Contemporary at PULSE). Stop by and say hello.
Long live art!
Very truly yours,
David Benrimon |
| Modern and Impressionist Sales |
Christie’s led off the New York auction season with aggressive estimates and works that were not terribly fresh (not a great combination) on its Evening sale of Impressionist and Modern Art. The 82 lots brought in $140M with just over 60% of the lots being sold. Some naysayers immediately wrote off the art market, describing the evening as a “ bloodbath” and more. This was an overstatement, especially in light of the above circumstances. The big lots of the evening: the Degas sculpture failed to sell with an unpublished estimate of $25M, the Picasso painting of Marie-Therese Walter (est. $12-18M) failed to bring a bidder forward. But the big winner of the night was the 1941 Surrealist Max Ernst which garnered $16.3M, despite a high estimate of $6M, but even that brought muted applause. Christie’s was fortunate enough to also sell deaccessioned works from the Museum of Modern Art, including a quite nice surrealist Delvaux. The two highlights of the night were the Brancusi which fetched over $14M (including commissions). The Brancusi was not his best work, but the sheer rarity brought out bidders. And of course the modestly priced Modigliani; which was an anomaly. In an evening where most lots were priced aggressively, this lot was estimated with the teaser amount of $3m-$4M and attracted many bidders bringing the final total to over $8M. The most telling statistic from the evening was “of the 11 Pablo Picasso works offered, seven failed to sell.”
At Sotheby’s the next night, art outsiders were saying what a difference a day makes. The market did not drop almost 3% and the merchandise was much fresher. The Klimt landscape “Litzberg am Attersee” brought in over $40M and the sale totaled just below $200M. The Klimt was recently restituted to a family that had it looted during the Holocaust. Mr. David Lachenmann, a dealer who purchased the piece on behalf of a client, offered more for the work earlier this summer before it was consigned to auction. The final sale result totals is a bit misleading because the Matisse sculpture, that had an estimate of over $20M, was sold privately on November 1, with the other Matisse bronzes from the series. In total the rumor mill said that those 4 lots brought Sotheby’s $120M. Out of the 70 lots, 57 of them found buyers.
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Philips du Pury led off the contemporary auction season. Their strategy should be commended: bring forth the charity auction for the Guggenheim, so they will bring their collectors and then keep them there for the regular evening sale. The strategy seemed strong on paper but in reality their estimates were like Christie’s Modern/Impressionist—far too aggressive. Furthermore, if you wanted to know who the Guggenheim trustees were you could see the well dressed women and men make a bee line for the door once the charity auction reached the second to last lot. Overall, Philips brought in $71M for its evening sale, including $8M plus premiums for a 2006 Cy Twombly painting. Out of the 51 lots, 44 found buyers.
Christie’s pulled out all the marketing stops. They included Spiderman crawling through the Bourgeois spider sculpture. Louise must be rolling over in her grave. The sale also included the White glove affair of Peter Norton’s auction of 26 works which brought in over $26M. This included a McCarthy sculpture selling for $4.5M (including commissions). The sale momentum continued with the prized 1961 Lichtenstein selling for over $43M, including commission, to Guy Bennett (formerly of Christie’s). Christie’s also had the honor of the highest sale ever achieved by a photograph at auction when Andreas Gursky entitled “Rhein II” garnered $4.3M. In total, the marathon auction of 91 works reached over $247M in proceeds and 13 artist auction records.
As reported already, Sotheby’s landed the 4 work consignment of Clyfford Still works from the City of Denver which in sum total brought in over $114M. The four works spanned most of Mr. Still’s oeuvre and demonstrated the progression of his work. The same purchaser who bought two of the Still paintings also bought a Mitchell for a world record. This means they spent over $90M on art at that auction. The 8 abstract Richter paintings brought in another $74M, including a $20M abstraction. The total for the evening was $315.8M including commissions. This was 62 out of 73 lots selling. The biggest casualty of the night was the Sotheby’s stocked Rothko which failed to find a bidder in the room at $8M.
While we usually appreciate the New York Observer’s insight into the art world, Michael Miller missed the mark big time with his 9 works of art to watch. His picks of Auerbach and Kassay could have been made by an Old Master journalist given the amount of press these two have received and the way collectors are fawning over them. The sheer rarity of Walton Ford artworks coming to auction also makes his work a no brainer. Then Mr. Miller picks out Gober and Wayne Thiebaud, really adventurous again considering the Allan Stone collection sold out Thiebaud like they were going out of style and the Gober estimate was laughably low. The one place where he goes out on a limb is that second rate Basquiat which bombed at the auction. |
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| Steinhardt Borrows Against Art Collection |
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What is a Matisse worth? Well in the case of mega-collector Michael Steinhardt, quite a lot. Not only will JP Morgan let him borrow against his art collection, they allow him to keep the art while he borrows against it. Mr. Steinhardt took a low interest loan against some of his artwork for his recent real estate purchase of the former American Stock Exchange Building. The works that Mr. Steinhardt borrowed against would make any museum blush: “three oil paintings that Picasso created between 1922 and 1936, along with two works on paper, including a charcoal entitled ‘Homme a la sucette’ that he drew in 1938. The collateral also includes four works by Klee, two by Johns, and single works by Honore Daumier, Henri Matisse, Piet Mondrian.”
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