Rich Offerings, Some Doubts, at New York May Sales

Overvalued
Edvard Munch, "Girls on a Bridge" (1902)
Est. $24–28 million
Lot 25, Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern Evening Sale, May 7

This superb work by Norway’s greatest artist shows young girls in colorful frocks, clustered in the middle of the bridge made famous by "The Scream" of 1893. It’s a theme Munch returned to at least a dozen times.

This version takes place on a moonlit summer night and is steeped in mystery. The coven of young women, consumed by conversation, have their backs to the viewer, and the resort town of Asgardstrand looms eerily deserted in the background.

The stunning painting, which was once owned by supercollector Norton Simon, has made several trips to the auction block, starting at Christie’s New York in October 1980, when it sold to Wendell Cherry for $3,080,000. In November 1996 the Cherry family sold it at Sotheby’s to the British retail furniture mogul Graham Kirkham for a then-record $7,702,500. Now Kirkham has decided to part with the painting at what looks a propitious time, with oil-rich Norway awash in billionaires and Munch a coveted national treasure.

Still, the estimate feels decidedly ambitious, far above the artist’s auction record of £6.1 million ($10.8 million) set by “Summer Day” (1904–08) at Sotheby’s London in February 2006.

Courtesy Sotheby's