The Wall Street Journalreports that the art market may be on the mend. The fall art sales at Christie's and Sotheby's showed recovery in certain markets. Above is Picasso's "Bust D'Homme," which sold for $10.3 million, although the estimate was $12 million.
The U.S. art market appears to be on the mend. The major fall art auctions may not have sold everything on offer, but collectors showed a renewed willingness to bid up top examples of artists' work. Dealers also said inflation fears and expectations of higher bonuses in the financial markets stoked strong bidding.
New York's two chief auction houses, Sotheby's and Christie's International, brought in about $596 million combined from their semi annual sales of Impressionist, modern and contemporary art in the past two weeks. The total surpassed the houses' $409 million spring sales in May, a gain that could signal a measure of returning confidence in high-end art values.
The mood among collectors grew increasingly upbeat as the two weeks of sales progressed. At Sotheby's contemporary art sale Wednesday night, a Warhol silkscreen sold for $43.7 million, more than triple its high estimate. At a lively sale of modern and Impressionist art the week before at Sotheby's, an Alberto Giacometti sculpture sold for $19.3 million, well over its $12 million high estimate.
At Christie's, the results were more modest. The house fell short of presale estimates at its Impressionist sale and modern art evening sale Nov. 3, but it performed solidly at Tuesday's post-war and contemporary auction, led by a Peter Doig painting that sold for $10.1 million.
The sales were modest compared with the height of the market a few years ago and there were some unsold works, but overall the sales were an encouraging sign that the wealthy are starting to spend again.
Some of the pieces that went unsold because the bids did not meet the minimum were Michel Basquiat's "Brother Sausage" (estimated at $9 million, top bid of $7.5 million and Picasso's "Tete de femme (estimated at $7 million, top bid of $6.4 million). The top price at Christie's was the lovely 1896 painting of two ballerinas entitled "Danseuses," which sold for $10.7 million to a private Asian collector.
At Sotheby's Andy Warhol's "200 One Dollar Bills," sold for $43.7 million to a telephone bidder. The estimate on the well-known piece was $12 million.
