Untitled by Joan Mitchell
On Wednesday, February 26th, Christie’s and Sotheby’s began three straight days of twentieth-century and contemporary art. While things have been going well thus far, the Contemporary Curated sale at Sotheby’s York Avenue location in New York was the one auction to remember. While the sale did feature many works by today’s great living artists like Maurizio Cattelan, KAWS, and Kehinde Wiley, it also included some slightly older twentieth-century works of modern art by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, Robert Motherwell, Yves Klein, and Elaine de Kooning.
The work used by Sotheby’s to promote the sale was also the painting clearly expected by the auction house to come out as the top lot. Sotheby’s specialists gave an untitled 1985 oil painting by Joan Mitchell an estimate range of $3 million to $5 million. Following her death in 1992, Mitchell bequeathed the painting to the seller, in whose possession it has remained since. The blues, greens, and a hint of red and orange are reminiscent of some of Monet’s water lily paintings, a dialogue highlighted by an exhibition at the Fondation Louis Vuitton in 2023. The Mitchell received a bit of attention, just enough to put it over its minimum estimate, hammering at $3.2 million (or $3.95 million w/p).
Artist and Muse by George Condo
Following up the Mitchell was another one of the sale’s high-value lots. This one was a 2015 painting by George Condo called Artist and Muse. Sotheby’s specialists wrote that in the painting, Condo synthesizes “the vigor of Abstract Expressionism, the rigor of Old Master portraiture, the wry humor of Pop art, all while being grounded in Picasso’s revolutionary principles of Cubism.” The Sotheby’s specialists stressed Condo’s relationship with Picasso and its influence on this painting. In particular, the connection between an artist and their muse was always an important component of Picasso’s work. Artist and Muse eventually sold at its high estimate of $1.5 million (or $1.88 million w/p). And finally, there was a work by Jean Dubuffet. Echec à l’être is an acrylic painting on a piece of klegecell, a sort of PVC foam that became available to artists shortly after the end of the Second World War. Dubuffet created this work in October 1971, and it is typical of his later career’s Hourloupe series, which he continued until 1974. It’s part painting, part sculpture. Sotheby’s specialists predicted it would sell for between $800K and $1.2 million. Several bidders seem to have had their eye on the work, with one final bid taking it over the top and snagging it for $1.22 million (or $1.54 million w/p).
Echec à l’être by Jean Dubuffet
The Contemporary Curated sale had a few surprises, with six of the ninety-five available lots selling for more than double their high estimates. The biggest of them, however, came in the form of a 2014 multimedia work on paper by Mel Bochner. It is made from a combination of collage, engraving, and embossment, and is based on the artist’s Blah Blah Blah series of paintings, which she originally created between 2008 and 2012. Initially estimated to sell for no more than $15K, the Bochner hammered at $45K (or $57.2K w/p), exactly three times the high estimate. Unfortunately, some of the more highly-valued lots failed to garner enough interest to meet their reserves. These include the Josef Albers painting Gay Desert (est. $280K to $350K), the Damien Hirst work Propionic Anhydride (est. $200K to $300K), and the Diane Arbus photograph A Family on Their Lawn One Sunday in Westchester, N.Y. (est. $300K to $500K). However, these unsold lots were not enough to make the sale tank.
An impressive thirty-five of the ninety-five lots sold within their estimates, giving Sotheby’s specialists a 37% accuracy rate. With another fifteen lots (16%) selling below and twenty-three (24%) selling above, this left twenty-two lots unsold. This gave Sotheby’s a 77% sell-through rate. Against a $14.75 million total low estimate, the Contemporary Curated auction at Sotheby’s New York brought in a total hammer of $15.77 million (or $19.88 million w/p).