$85.7m Rothko Leads First Night of New York Sales

Mark Rothko 1903-1970, Latvia Follow +

New York’s May auction season kicked off at Sotheby’s last night with a sale of works from the collection of Robert Mnuchin, led by Mark Rothko’s Brown and Blacks in Reds, which sold for $85,780,000 USD (£64,325,000) with fees—the second-most expensive Rothko to ever change hands at a public sale.

The 7ft (2m) work fell just short of breaking the artist’s auction record, which was set at Christie’s in 2012 when Orange, Red, Yellow (1961) sold for $86.8 million USD with fees (£64.8 million). Having gone to auction with an estimate of $70–$100 million USD (£52.5–£75 million), the towering canvas hammered at $74 million USD (£55.5 million), just exceeding its low estimate. 

The painting is one of 15 monumental works created by Rothko in 1957, the majority of which reside in museum collections including the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC and The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. It was held by Mnuchin—an advisor, dealer and collector who died last December—for more than two decades. It last sold at Christie’s in 2003 for $6 million USD (£4.5 million), making last night’s figure a more than 12-fold increase.

Hosted at Sotheby’s Madison Avenue headquarters against a backdrop of Frieze, TEFAF and a host of other New York art fairs, the white-glove sale continued with a further 10 works from Mnuchin’s collection. The group went under the hammer with a combined estimate of between $124.9–$183.2 million USD (£93.6–£137.4 million), achieving a total of $166.3 million USD (£124.7 million) with fees.

The sale’s other works included another Rothko, 1949’s No 1, which sold for $20,805,000 USD (£15,600,000) and Willem de Kooning’s Untitled XL III (1983), which sold for $12,410,000 USD (£9,303,000), both with fees. The paintings beat their high estimates by $805,000 USD and $410,000 USD (£604,000 and £307,400) respectively.

Meanwhile, Pablo Picasso’s Deux femmes nues assises (1921), Joan Miró’s Dormeurs réveillés par un oiseau (1939) and Willem de Kooning’s Two Women (1953) also exceeded their high estimates, selling for $1,536,000 USD, $6,464,000 USD and $4,024,000 USD with fees respectively (£1,151,000, £4,845,000 and £3,016,000).

Following the Mnuchin sale, the auction house’s Now and Contemporary Evening was led by Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Museum Security (Broadway Meltdown) (1983), which sold for $52,717,500 USD (£39,500,000) with fees.

The nearly seven-foot (more than two metre) canvas, which went under the hammer with an estimate in excess of $45 million USD (£33.3 million), debuted at Basquiat’s landmark solo show at Gagosian Los Angeles in 1983 and has since featured in nearly every major institutional survey of his work.

Willem de Kooning’s Untitled III (1975) made its market debut with an estimate of $25–35 million USD (£18.5–25.9 million). The canvas, which belongs to the East Hampton period, when de Kooning returned to painting with larger formats and new paint mixtures, just cleared its low estimate, selling for $26,000,000 USD (£19,500,000) with fees.

A 1974 Andy Warhol painting of Brigitte Bardot, one of a series of eight portraits of the movie star, came to auction for the first time, having been held in the Gunter Sachs Collection for more than 50 years. The work achieved $24,830,000 USD (£18,600,000) with fees, against an estimate of $14,000,000–$18,000,000 USD (£10,500,000–£13,500,000).

New York’s spring auctions continue next week at Christie’s and Phillips. The former will offer another Rothko, 1964’s No 15 (Two Greens and Red Stripe), alongside Roy Lichtenstein’s Anxious Girl (1964), which has never before been seen in public and is estimated to sell for between $40–$60 million (£30–£45 million).