Mona Lisa, 17th Century copy
On Tuesday, October 1st, Bonhams’ London location at New Bond Street hosted one of the first Old Master sales following a summer slouch in August. While the Old Master market has been progressively weakening in recent years, Tuesday’s sale showed that there was perhaps some pep in its step.
The auction opened with a bang, with the very first lot shooting right to the top. A seventeenth-century copy of da Vinci’s Mona Lisa was the first to cross the block and knocked it out of the park. Bonhams predicted it would sell for between £8K and £12K. But given the popularity the subject has enjoyed over the past century, it’s not too surprising that there would be several interested buyers. Bidding continued until the hammer came down at £80K / $106.3K (or £102K / $135.6K w/p), over six-and-a-half times the presale high estimate.
Portrait of a Young Noble Woman from the circle of Pier Francesco Cittadini
With that, the Mona Lisa copy more or less set the tone of the sale. The entire auction was held afloat by a group of paintings selling for exponentially greater prices than predicted. All three of the top lots had this in common. On top of that, all were portraits. The second place lot was a seventeenth-century portrait of a woman. It captures the embroidery of the subject’s dress in great detail, with a coat of arms in the upper right indicating her rank as a noblewoman. Specialists attribute the portrait to an artist in the “circle of”, or having been inspired by, the Baroque Italian painter Pierfrancesco Cittadini. The painting has been in the same family since it was bought at auction in 2003 for £7.4K. Due to the decline of the Old Masters market in recent years, Bonhams predicted the portrait would sell for a similar amount this time around. So it may have been a great surprise when bidding continued for longer than expected. The painting eventually sold for £40K / $53.2K (or £51.2K / $68.1K w/p), over five-and-a-half times the high estimate.
Portrait of a Young Man attributed to Robert Home
And finally, there was the third place slot, the biggest surprise of that day’s sale: a portrait of a young man attributed to Robert Home. The subject wears a classic bright red British uniform and is possibly a member of the artist’s family. Another portrait attributed to Robert Home sold earlier in the sale, assigned a £2K to £3K estimate range and selling for slightly under at £1.9K. The subject was also similar, a British officer in a red uniform. For whatever reason, though, buyers that day seemed drawn to this other painting to the point that the hammer price ended up far beyond the £5K high estimate. Bidders fought over the portrait until it sold for seven and a half times what was expected at £38K / $50.5K (or £48.6K / $64.7K w/p).
It was a surprising sale, to say the least. Of the two hundred twenty-one lots available at Bonhams that day, sixteen sold for more than double their presale high estimate. Only thirty-four lots sold within their estimates, giving Bonhams specialists a 15% accuracy rate. An additional fifty-three lots (24%) sold below estimate, while forty-two (19%) sold above. The remaining ninety-two lots (42%) went unsold. While the sell-through rate was somewhat of a failure, the handful of surprises helped generate an interesting result; the sale would not have reached the minimum estimate without them. But these sixteen lots, plus the twenty-six others that sold over estimate, brought the sale to within its presale estimate range of £537.2K – £812.8K, achieving £697K / $926.4K.
Bonhams London Old Masters
Mona Lisa, 17th Century copy
On Tuesday, October 1st, Bonhams’ London location at New Bond Street hosted one of the first Old Master sales following a summer slouch in August. While the Old Master market has been progressively weakening in recent years, Tuesday’s sale showed that there was perhaps some pep in its step.
The auction opened with a bang, with the very first lot shooting right to the top. A seventeenth-century copy of da Vinci’s Mona Lisa was the first to cross the block and knocked it out of the park. Bonhams predicted it would sell for between £8K and £12K. But given the popularity the subject has enjoyed over the past century, it’s not too surprising that there would be several interested buyers. Bidding continued until the hammer came down at £80K / $106.3K (or £102K / $135.6K w/p), over six-and-a-half times the presale high estimate.
Portrait of a Young Noble Woman from the circle of Pier Francesco Cittadini
With that, the Mona Lisa copy more or less set the tone of the sale. The entire auction was held afloat by a group of paintings selling for exponentially greater prices than predicted. All three of the top lots had this in common. On top of that, all were portraits. The second place lot was a seventeenth-century portrait of a woman. It captures the embroidery of the subject’s dress in great detail, with a coat of arms in the upper right indicating her rank as a noblewoman. Specialists attribute the portrait to an artist in the “circle of”, or having been inspired by, the Baroque Italian painter Pierfrancesco Cittadini. The painting has been in the same family since it was bought at auction in 2003 for £7.4K. Due to the decline of the Old Masters market in recent years, Bonhams predicted the portrait would sell for a similar amount this time around. So it may have been a great surprise when bidding continued for longer than expected. The painting eventually sold for £40K / $53.2K (or £51.2K / $68.1K w/p), over five-and-a-half times the high estimate.
Portrait of a Young Man attributed to Robert Home
And finally, there was the third place slot, the biggest surprise of that day’s sale: a portrait of a young man attributed to Robert Home. The subject wears a classic bright red British uniform and is possibly a member of the artist’s family. Another portrait attributed to Robert Home sold earlier in the sale, assigned a £2K to £3K estimate range and selling for slightly under at £1.9K. The subject was also similar, a British officer in a red uniform. For whatever reason, though, buyers that day seemed drawn to this other painting to the point that the hammer price ended up far beyond the £5K high estimate. Bidders fought over the portrait until it sold for seven and a half times what was expected at £38K / $50.5K (or £48.6K / $64.7K w/p).
It was a surprising sale, to say the least. Of the two hundred twenty-one lots available at Bonhams that day, sixteen sold for more than double their presale high estimate. Only thirty-four lots sold within their estimates, giving Bonhams specialists a 15% accuracy rate. An additional fifty-three lots (24%) sold below estimate, while forty-two (19%) sold above. The remaining ninety-two lots (42%) went unsold. While the sell-through rate was somewhat of a failure, the handful of surprises helped generate an interesting result; the sale would not have reached the minimum estimate without them. But these sixteen lots, plus the twenty-six others that sold over estimate, brought the sale to within its presale estimate range of £537.2K – £812.8K, achieving £697K / $926.4K.