Last night’s sale did not have the BIG lots to beat the competition and in the end, of the 63 works offered only 55 sold (87%). The sale’s total hit $379.7M – pre-sale estimate was $315-$411M … so even without the buyer’s premium they moved past the low end.
The top lot in this sale was a Rothko that brought $46.5M (they expected $40-$60M). Lichtenstein’s The Ring, which last sold in 1997 for $2.2M, made $41.7M (estimate on request) to an Asian buyer, Wool’s Untitled (RIOT) garnered $29.9M (est. $12-$18M) and Sigmar Polke’s Dschungel (Jungle) made a record $27.1M (it sold just 4 years ago for $9.2M – nice profit). Now while those numbers seem pretty good, it should be noted that they were expecting $50M for the Lichtenstein and the Rothko just squeaked past its low end … not the frenzied bidding we saw the night before for the upper end works.
It is interesting to note that the top three lots in the Christie’s sale (Picasso, Giacometti & Picasso) brought in more than the entire sale at Sotheby’s — $388M vs. $379.7M. As of now, we are at $1.55 billion for the two weeks … and there is more to come.
To read Scott Reyburn’s take on the sale, click HERE.
Rothko “Untitled (Yellow and Blue)”