On Second Thought

BRUSSELS—Belgian auctioneer Michel Pinckaers has accused Sotheby’s of making him look like “an imbecile” over an oil-on-panel scene that sold in November for €360,000 ($520,000) in Amsterdam. Just six months earlier, the Sotheby’s Brussels office had advised the heirs of Count de Brouckhoven de Bergeyck to sell the picture at a domestic firm because it was an “anonymous 19th-century scene de cabaret” and not important enough for Sotheby’s to offer in Amsterdam alongside the finer items from the count’s estate. The heirs duly entered the panel at Hotel des Ventes Flagey, headed by Pinckaers, in May, where it sold to Brussels dealer Klaas Muller for €4,600 ($6,600) on an estimate of €250 to €350. Müller then sold it to a Dutch buyer, who promptly entered it at none other than Sotheby’s Amsterdam. There it appeared as a rare work by the 17th-century painter Adriaen Brouwer, with an estimate of €100,000 to €150,000. “Looks like Six slipped up originally,” says Muller, referring to Jan Six, the head of Old Masters at Sotheby’s Amsterdam, who confirmed the Brouwer attribution after consulting with two experts. Six, however, insists he wasn’t consulted when the panel first came to Sotheby’s attention. Pinckaers isn’t consoled, saying he based the Flagey estimate on Sotheby’s original valuation because a quick sale was needed and he had no time to research the picture himself. “It’s not as if we’re idiots here in Brussels and they know everything up in Amsterdam!” he fumes.

"On Second Thought" originally appeared in the February 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's February 2008 Table of Contents.