Lehman Art Does Well in Philadelphia

Lindsay Pollock writing for Bloomberg reports the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy art sale at Freemans auction of Philadelphia was a success.   The sale totaled $1.35 million, nearly double expectations for the 283 lots, although as Pollock points out, it does very little to satisfy the $250 billion debt of the bankrupt investment house. The top lot was Roy Lichtenstein’s Statue of Liberty print which sold for $49,000.00 against a high estimate of $25,000 (see image).

From an appraisal perspective, and I mentioned this in an earlier post post about Lehman Brothers art where I was assuming the sale would do better than expected to track the lots for provenance adjustments.  Given there were so many prints,the sale results are excellent for tracking the impact and degree of notoriety and provenance on works of art.  Excellent results for use as parallel examples for that comes out of a known collection.

Pollack states

Other pricey lots included a 1975 primary-colored set of seven Robert Indiana prints called “Polygons.” Expected to fetch no more than $6,000, the set went for $23,750. Arturo Herrera’s “Mine,” a looping blue-and-white collage, sold for $16,250 to a Venezuelan collector attending his first auction. All of the 283 lots sold, and the majority were offered without a minimum price.

“I think there was a certain amount of trophy hunting,” said Alasdair Nichol, Freeman’s vice chairman and auctioneer, after the sale, noting the presence of former Lehman employees and staffers from other financial companies. “What’s not to like? It’s nice boardroom art, presented nicely, ready to go up on the walls. People lapped it up.”

‘Piece of History’

“This gives you a piece of financial history -- good, bad or indifferent,” said art adviser Scott Drucks, of the New Jersey-based Forrest Scott Group, who works with corporate and bank clients including Barclays Plc, Hewlett-Packard Co. and AT&T Inc. “Prices were fair and the estimates were low.” Barclays, which purchased part of Lehman, declined to exercise an option to buy some of the art collection.

 To read the full article, click HERE.