New York Auctions Spring 2022: Records Fall at Phillips, Christie’s and Sotheby’s

Phillips held their most successful auction ever, Christie's made over $1.4 billion in one week of sales, and Sotheby's set a new record for a single-owner collection.

Records fell left and right at New York's spring auctions in defiance of the shuddering global economy.

Phillips held their most lucrative auction ever on Wednesday. Their 20th Century & Contemporary Evening Sale realised US $225 Million, a 90% increase on last year's sale.

The result was accomplished with a bump from Jean-Michel Basquiat's Untitled (1982), which brought in $85 Million, the artist's third highest price at auction. New auction records were set for Yayoi Kusama, Reggie Burrows Hodges, and Robin F. Williams.

Christie's also enjoyed one of its best results ever with their Marquee Week running up a total of over $1.4 billion. During the 20th/21st Century evening sales, new records were set for over 49 artists, including Howardena Pindell, Blinky Palermo, Ann Craven, Francesco Clemente, Martin Disler, Gilbert & George, Shara Hughes, and Tom Sachs.

Over the weekend Christie's The Surrealist World of Rosalind Gersten Jacobs and Melvin Jacobs sale saw Man Ray's Le Violon d'Ingres (1924) sell for $10.5 million, the highest price ever paid for a photograph at auction.

Over at Sotheby's, the divorce court-mandated sale of the Macklowe Collection, the extensive art hoard of Linda and Harry Macklowe, fetched the highest sum ever for a single owner collection.

The second half of the two-part sale brought in US $246 million with 100% of lots sold. Combined with the first part of the sale last November, the final total comes to $922 million. That bested the sale of Peggy and David Rockefeller's collection at Christie's in 2018, which made $835 million.

The Macklowe Collection sales included new record prices at auction for Agnes Martin, Robert Irwin, Michael Heizer, and Jackson Pollock, whose Number 17 (1951) went for $61.2 million, double the estimate.

Second highest prices were also set for Mark Rothko, and Sigmar Polke, while an Untitled painting from Cy Twombly's 2007 series 'A Scattering of Blossoms' fetched the artist's third highest price at $58.9 million.

Notable works on sale during this week's auction included Anna Weyant's Falling Woman, which sold to an online bidder for $1.62 million, ten times its low estimate and a new auction record for the artist, one of Andy Warhol's final Self-Portrait prints from 1986, and Gerhard Richter's monumental Seestück Seascape (1975).

Sotheby's Modern Evening Auction on Tuesday also performed strongly, bringing in $408.5 million, the auction house's third highest auction total ever. It led with works by Pablo Picasso, Claude Monet, and Paul Cezzane, and set new record prices at auction for Leonora Carrington, Maximilien Luce, and Milton Avery, among others. —[O]