The star works in the upcoming NY May sales

[09.04.2013]

 

Veritable pulse of the Western art market, New York, accounting for 95% of total U.S. art auction revenue, is preparing its major May 2013 sales with a great deal of media attention. And considering the challenge facing Christie’s and Sotheby’s after their exceptional results in May 2012, it is easy to understand why.
Last year, Sotheby’s was very proud to announce a new world auction record at $107 million generated by one of Edvard MUNCH’s The Scream (2 May).

Indeed, that result will most likely remain the world’s best-ever auction result for at least a few months to come since none of the small number of masterpieces announced by the two giants of the art market look like toppling Munch from his number one position. Sotheby’s is planning to offer two major works: Paul CÉZANNE’s Les Pommes, considered tempting enough to fetch between $25 and $35 million (which would already be one of Cézanne Top 3 results) and a surprising portrait of L’Amazone by Amedeo MODIGLIANI. The latter is an early work from 1909 portraying the Baroness Margaret Hasse de Villers, in austere colours. Its main quality is its style, which acted as a precursor for the following ten years of artistic creation.
The following day (8 May 2013), Christie’s will be offering another portrait, this time with fauvist colours painted in 1905 by André DERAIN. Entitled Madame Matisse au kimono and estimated at between $15 and $20 million, the work is sufficiently beautiful and rare to beat the artist’s current record of £14.5 million ($21.5 million) for Arbre à Collioure (Sotheby’s London, 22 June 2010) not to mention his entire annual turnover for 2012 ($11.3 million). This is the first time such an important Derain work with so much “Fauvist” and “Matissian” character will be offered to the public, and its low estimate should be achieved without difficulty.

The subsequent sales of Contemporary Art will of course be watched with tremendous interest after last year’s combined turnover record (Christie’s and Sotheby’s) of $578.3 million for Post-War and Contemporary Art from 102 lots. Christie’s sales included $77.5 million for Mark ROTHKO’s Orange, Red and Yellow (1961) setting a new record for the artist’s and contributing to a new record for a Post-War and Contemporary Art sale ($343.29 million, excluding buyers’ premium, from 56 lots and only three works unsold). Although this year’s catalogue does not contain any major work by Rothko, top-flight collectors will no doubt be eager to compete for another great American artist, Jackson Pollock, whose popularity has exploded in recent years. In fact, in November 2012 Pollock’s Number 4 (76.5 cm x 63.5 cm) beat his previous auction record of approximately $15 million when it fetched no less than $36 million! And this time it is not a “dripping” that will be on offer, but a pivotal work from 1946, created just a few months before the first drippings. Kept in the same collection for over 50 years, this early work of respectable size (213.4 cm x 142.1 cm) entitled The Blue Unconscious will be presented on May 14 by Sotheby’s with an estimated price range of $20 to $30 million.

A month before these prestigious May sales, Artprice’s Art Market Confidence Index stands at over 34 points – well above last year’s level! The works offered in May 2013 are less likely to fuel the spiral of records we saw in 2012; but they are being presented in a more optimistic context, with Western collectors and investors expressing a generally better appetite for purchasing art.