MORTEZA POURHOSSEINI IN AN INTERVIEW WITH CANVAS MAGAZINE
January 26, 2018Friday the 13th superstitions aside, Christie’s London still brought in £78.7m (£96.5m with fees) on Friday (13 October) across two evening sales, though bidding felt noticeably more controlled compared to auctions just within the past two years. The night kicked off with the house’s marquee auction of 20th century and 21st century art, which brought in a total of £36.4m (£44.6m with fees), well within the auction house’s £39.4m and £56.3m estimate range.
The liveliest lot of the sale was undoubtedly mononymous Italian painter Salvo’s ll giorno fu pieno di lampi la sera verranno le stelle (1991). Christie’s president Jussi Pylkkänen, who manned the rostrum for the first half of the sale, said 22 clients had registered to bid on the painting by telephone, the most he’d seen in his decades-long career. As bids came in every few seconds, Pylkkänen joked, “Who needs an auctioneer?” The painting sold for £550,000 (£693,000 with fees) against an £80,000 to £120,000 estimate, setting a new auction record for the artist.
The room buzzed when a 1986 self-portrait of Lucian Freud came up for sale. The painting, which Christie’s said had never been publicly displayed before the sale, sold for £550,000 (£693,000 with fees) against a £300,000 to £500,000 estimate. Andy Warhol’s early Golden Nude (1957) fetched £245,000 (£308,700 with fees), significantly more than its £150,000 high estimate. The sale of Paula Rego’s Dancing Ostriches from Walt Disney's 'Fantasia’ (1995) for £2.5(£3m with fees) marked an auction record for the late artist.
Participation also picked up for Ewa Juszkiewicz’s Pukle (Locks) (2012), which sold for £280,00 (£352,800 with fees) against a £180,000 to £250,000 estimate. Another sought-after lot was the painting Hannah’s bathroom (2018) by Louis Frantino, which sold for £220,000 (£277,200 with fees) nearly five times the high end of its estimate. A second work by Fratino in the sale, the terracotta sculpture Couple (2019), exceeded expectations when it fetched £44,100 with fees.