Christie's Has Record Evening

There does not appear to be any economic uncertainty at the top of the art market when quality is for sale.  On Tuesday evening Christie's held its Fall evening Post War/Contemporary evening fine art sale.  What a difference a week makes, as last weeks Christie's Imp/Mod was considered lack-luster at best, the PW/Contemporary sale set many all time records, including the high mark for an art auction.

The details are a fine art auction total record of $691.58 million (beating the previous record of $495 million set by Christie's in May).  You are reading the correct, the new record is nearly $200 million higher than the previous record total. The sale offered 69 lots, with 63 selling for a strong 91% sell through rate.  Even with the 6 unsold lots, the sale achieved an amazing 98% sold by value rate.

Other items of interest, the top selling piece was by Francis Bacon, Three Studies Of Lucian Freud, oil on canvas, in 3 parts, painted in 1969. It sold for $142.40 million  (see image).  It broke the world record for a piece of art, beating the "Scream" record sale in 2012 by Sotheby's by $20 million. The buyer of the Freud was the Acquavella gallery (Michael Findlay, Director Acquavella Galleries will be speaking at the ISA conference in April in Kansas City, registration is now open, click HERE for more info).

We typically mention sales over a million dollars, well, out of the 69 pieces of art selling, 11 sold for over $20 million. 10 individual artist records were also set Tuesday evening.

Bloomberg reported on the sale

Sotheby’s activist investor Daniel Loeb and Blackstone Group (BX)’s James Tomilson Hill III attended the packed postwar and contemporary art auction that totaled $691.6 million -- well in excess of the previous record of $495 million set by a Christie’s sale of contemporary art in May. Eleven of the 69 lots last night sold for more than $20 million and only six failed to find buyers.

Records were smashed for 10 artists, including Willem de Kooning, Donald Judd, Ad Reinhardt, Lucio Fontana, Christopher Wool, Wade Guyton and Wayne Thiebaud.

“It’s a new world,” said Abigail Asher, with art advisory Guggenheim Asher Associates. “It feels like a reinvention of the art market. I’m overwhelmed.”

Major Reversal

The results were a reversal from Christie’s disappointing Impressionist and modern art sales last week. Its Nov. 5 evening sale tallied $144.3 million, just $2 million more than the Bacon last night.

“After the flat sales last week, it’s incredible to see how much energy there is in the contemporary-art market,” said art dealer David Zwirner, the underbidder for Koons’s puppy.

Closely held Christie’s estimated the 1969 Bacon triptych - - three canvases depicting artist Lucian Freud -- at more than $85 million. At least half a dozen competed for it, including two Asian bidders, over six minutes.

Acquavella bought it through Lock Kresler, Christie’s head of private sales based in London. Last week, the gallery bought the top lot at Sotheby’s Impressionist and modern art sale, an Alberto Giacometti sculpture, for $50 million.

Koons’s 10-foot-tall stainless-steel puppy was consigned by newsprint magnate Peter Brant. Christie’s estimated it at $35 million to $55 million and guaranteed “Balloon Dog” would sell for an undisclosed minimum, financed through third parties.

Two Richters

The price smashed Koons’s previous record of $33.7 million and the record for the most expensive living artist, held by Gerhard Richter, whose 1968 painting, “Domplatz, Mailand,” sold for $37.1 million at Sotheby’s in May.

A Richter painting owned by Eric Clapton fetched $20.9 million, just above the low end of the presale estimate. While the bidding was measured, it brought a good return to its owner, being part of a trio of paintings that sold at Sotheby’s for $3.4 million in 2001. (Prices include buyer’s commission; estimates do not.)

In all, 22 lots, or almost a third of the sale, were guaranteed. One was “Apocalypse Now,” a 1988 painting by Wool, who’s the subject of a retrospective at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. The work spelled “Sell the house sell the car sell the kids” in black on white. It fetched $26.5 million, more than three times Wool’s previous record. Art dealer Christophe van de Weghe bought the work for a client.

“People look at art as a hard asset,” the dealer said.

Brett Gorvy, Christie’s chairman of contemporary art, said the sale wasn’t indicative of a market bubble. Paris-based art adviser Loic Malle wasn’t sure.

“It’s either a beginning of something or the end of something,” Malle said.

Source: Christie's and Bloomberg