B4U India: Prices solid at New York contemporary art auction

Prices solid at New York contemporary art auction
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reuters india on 14 November, 2007 04:22:00
 
By Chris Michaud
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Christie's auction of a private collection of
contemporary, post-war and folk art took in $52.4 million on Monday, hinting
that prices in the booming contemporary market could well hold in the next two
nights of critical sales at the auction house and rival Sotheby's.
Works from the Allan Stone collection sold briskly, setting 12 new artists'
records including one for Wayne Thiebaud, whose "Seven Suckers" fetched
$4,521,000 including Christie's commission, making it the sale's 3rd-highest
priced work.
Christie's said the sale's results, with 90 percent of the 71 lots on offer
finding buyers, showed the strength of the art market and also demonstrated the
continued input of international capital.
"This evening we enjoyed fantastic participation from around the world," said
Christopher Burge, Christie's honorary chairman who also served as auctioneer,
after the sale.
The total of $52,423,400 came in just under the high pre-sale estimate of $55
million, providing some relief to an art market rattled by Sotheby's flat
Impressionist and modern art auction last week, which sent its share price
plummeting.
Both auction houses have major contemporary and post-war sales this week, with
some half a billion dollars worth of art hitting the block.
Monday's sale was limited to the collection of Stone, a Manhattan gallery owner
and obsessive art collector who died last year.
The top two lots were both by Willem de Kooning, an untitled work from 1942 and
1967's "Man," which sold for $5.3 million and $4.5 million respectively. But
both came in below their low pre-sale estimates.
Other top works included another Thiebaud, "Tie Rack," which fetched $3.4
million or nearly twice its high estimate, and John Chamberlain's "Hatband,"
which went for $2.84 million, in the mid-range of its estimate and a new record
for the artist.
The big tests of the durability of the contemporary and post-war market, which
saw works by Mark Rothko and Andy Warhol break the $70 million barrier last
spring, come on Tuesday at Christie's and Sotheby's a day later.
The sale also was the auction house's first evening sale to make use of its new
on-line bidding service, Christie's LIVE.