Results: Christie's NY Imressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale

On Wednesday evening Christie's held its NY Impressionist and Modern evening sale. Overall the results were considered only fair, although many popular and collectible artists such as Picasso, Monet and Matiesse were selling very well. The sale results overall were considered a disappointment to many, with comments from the trade that the quality was only fair, and the reserves were high.

The sale offered57 lots with 47 selling for a very respectable 82% sell rate, and it sold 81% by value.  The sale totaled $155.99 million including buyers premiums against a pre sale low estimate of $162.3 million without a buyers premium.  The previous evening sale at Sotheby's saw the sales total better the low estimate of $158.9 million with a $170.4 million sale with buyers premium.

The top selling lot at Christie's was a Claude Monet with a pre sale estimate of $20-$30 million selling for $22.48 million including buyers premium.

Christie's reported on the sale

Christie’s Impressionist & Modern Art Evening Sale achieved $155,995,500 (£93,597,300/€104,516,985), demonstrating the continuing appeal of this category among collectors worldwide. Three works sold for over the US$20 million mark, and two new artist records were set for the Fauve artist Maurice de Vlaminck and the neo-Impressionist artist Maximilien Luce. In total, sell-through percentages were strong, with 82% sold by lot and 81% by value.

The top lot of the sale week for any auction house was Claude Monet’s Les Peupliers, one of the most celebrated of the artist’s great series of works from his years in Giverny. Painted en plein air during the summer of 1891, the work is the largest of the artist’s paintings devoted to a picturesque arrangement of poplar trees. Offered in pristine condition from an important private collection, the painting sold for $22,482,500 (£13,489,500/€15,063,275) to a private American collector. The painting was last sold at Christie’s in 2000 for $7 million – a three-fold increase in value just over 10 years.

“The results demonstrate the lasting appeal of great works in the global marketplace. Masterpiece-quality works performed very well, as did Modernist and Surrealist works from important private collections. It was fascinating to see this marked increase in value play out across multiple genres tonight, from Monet’s Poplars, to the record-breaking Vlaminck landscape, which sold for $6.8 million in 1994 and went on to achieve more than 22.5 million in our saleroom tonight,” said Marc Porter, Chairman of Christie’s Americas.

In addition to the top-selling lots by Monet and Vlaminck, Pablo Picasso’s Les femmes d'Alger, version L, from the artist’s groundbreaking 1955 series of 15 paintings, fetched $21,362,500 (£12,817,500/€14,312,875). Maintained in a private collection for over 50 years, the painting sold to an anonymous bidder.

In total, three lots above $20 million, and four lots above $10 million, and 19 lots sold above $1 million. Buyers (by lot / by origin) were 47% European, 36% American, 4% Asian and 13% other. Eleven different countries were represented, with 70 clients bidding by phone.