Rothko & co

On Tuesday May 15, Sotheby's New York has its Contemporary Art Evening Sale. Although works from Lichtenstein, de Kooning, Pollock and Warhol are all expected to fetch high prices, most attention will go to Mark Rothko's White Center (1950). In this video, Tobias Meyer (worldwide head of Sotheby's contemporary art department) says: "What is so extraordinary about this picture: there is nothing we need to explain about it - it is so beautiful". Exceptionally, Sotheby's does not give a public estimate for the painting.

The auction will be interesting in another respect as well. It will be streamed live via the Sotheby's website.

London calling

From June 17 until July 14, I will be in London. I will take part in the summer course Art & Its Markets, organized by Sotheby's Institute of Art.

"This course looks at a number of different art market sectors (such as old masters, contemporary art and wine) and examines how their respective objects are identified and catalogued and how quality and value is assessed. Students also study how auctions are marketed, organised and run."

Good news

"The valuation and appreciation of art. That research area was allocated a grant for Christophe Spaenjers by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research, the NWO. This grant of 180.000 euros is one of the grants in the NWO Toptalent round of 2007. In September, Spaenjers will start his research project under supervision of Prof. Luc Renneboog (dept. Finance) as a PhD student, researching the evolution of returns and risk in art markets over 100 years."

Source: Tilburg FEB News (April 13, 2007)

Drab mediocrity

The January issue of Art + Auction comments on the big November sales of both Sotheby's and Christie's. Although the Sotheby's evening sale of Impressionist and modern art was one of the most successful of all time, "the impression that the viewing left on most connoisseurs was one of drab mediocrity". According to the editor, there is now such a widespread desire to buy art that "there's no longer much of a correlation between price and artistic merit". More than $8.5m for a minor work of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec doesn't raise eyebrows anymore.

One day later, Christie's had its big evening sale, dubbed "a crazed frenzy" by Art + Auction. World auction records were set for Gauguin ($40m), Kirchner ($38m) and Klimt ($88m). Perhaps even more astonishing was, again, the prices paid for some other works. One of the best examples is perhaps this small charcoal-on-paper sketch by Piet Mondriaan (picture). It fetched no less than $3.3m. Art + Auction concludes: "Had aesthetics been the predominant concern that week, certains coups here and there would not have been possible."

Rather a nightmare

In 1932, Picasso made a portrait of his mistress. Nowadays, 'Le Rêve' is seen as one of his top-works. Steve Wynn, the owner of the painting, was to sell it a few weeks ago for $139 million. That was before he poked his elbow through the painting. His first reaction was, understandably, one of unbelief: "I can’t believe I just did that. Oh, shit. Oh, man." He told his guests: "Well, I’m glad I did it and not you."

A few hours later, Wynn was already in a cheerful mood: "My feeling was: It’s a picture, it’s my picture, we’ll fix it. Nobody got sick or died. It’s a picture. It took Picasso five hours to paint it."

(Source: The New Yorker)

Praying for a buyer

On January 25, 'St James the Greater' will go on auction at Sotheby's New York. This Rembrandt masterpiece is estimated to sell for $18m - $25m.

According to the Economist, it will not be easy to find a buyer: "Such an intensely religious picture would appeal to a museum, but few have resources of this kind. One that does, the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, is saying privately that it will not be bidding, as it has a similar picture already. That leaves private buyers. With year-end bonuses at record levels, more individuals than ever are rich enough to buy at this price. But religious subjects are not to many people’s taste, which makes them especially hard to sell. If the picture fails when the hammer falls, it will be a blow to Sotheby’s."

Read the full article here.

The true value of art ?

In may 2004, 'Garçon à la Pipe' by Pablo Picasso was sold at Sotheby's New York for $104.1 million. The morning after the sale, a Picasso expert was quoted in The Washington Post: "I'm stunned, that a pleasant, minor painting could command a price appropriate to a real masterwork by Picasso. This just shows how much the marketplace is divorced from the true values of art."