$15M Brings Home the Bacon at Sotheby’s Contemporary Sale

Sotheby’s Contemporary Sale

Photo courtesy Sotheby's

Francis Bacon, "Version No. 2 of Lying Figure with Hypodermic Syringe" (1968)

Photo courtesy Sotheby's

Roy Lichtenstein, "Black and White Sunrise" (1964)

Andy Warhol Willem de Kooning Dan Flavin Roy Lichtenstein Francis Bacon Jeff Koons Space. The Final (Art) Frontier / Florida Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Acquires Harry Shunk Archive

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The first 27 lots in the auction were drawn from a single, Belgian owner, the Vanthournout Collection (which made over $42 million and was 100 percent sold both by lot and value), while the remaining lots came by way of the usual various owners.

Among those artists who set auction records were Francis Bacon, Isamu Noguchi, Dan Flavin, Barnaby Furnas, Jenny Saville, Glenn Brown, Martin Eder and Jonathan Meese. Records also fell for a Willem de Kooning sculpture; works on paper by Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol; and for a Yositomo Nara sculpture.

The sale pulled in a total of $125 million, which Sotheby’s has only bettered once at a contemporary sale.

TOP FIVE PRICES:

Lot 5—Francis Bacon, Version No. 2 of Lying Figure with Hypodermic Syringe; Sold for $15,024,000—Auction record for the artist (est. $9-$12 million)

Probably the choice lot from the Vanthournout collection—and as far as bidders were concerned, the highlight of the evening—this 1968 Bacon masterpiece embodies every reason why the artist is often thought of as Britain's greatest Post-War painter. The psychological and physical forces conveyed by his unique handling of paint and by his expressionistic treatment of the human figure place him clearly in what has been called “The Great Tradition.”

After slow and steady bidding, it went to an anonymous buyer for well over its estimate and almost 50 percent higher than Bacon’s previous auction record.

Lot 37—Willem de Kooning, Untitled XXX; Sold for $10,656,000 (est. $7.5-$9.5 million)

This gorgeous blue 1977 de Kooning is prized for capturing the essence of the sea, the sand and the surf and is thought to be among his most dynamically expressive representations of nature and the Long Island landscape he loved. Still, de Kooning was relatively prolific during the ’70s, and this example went to an anonymous buyer for only about half of his auction record.

Lot 59—Andy Warhol, Flowers; Sold for $6,848,000 (est. $4-$6 million)

Though it was one of eight Warhols included last night—all of varying sizes and degrees of art-historical interest—this classic 1964 Flowers was the best seller of all of them, going eventually to an anonymous buyer.

The Flowers series saw Warhol perfecting his silkscreen methods, and this image, drawn from a photograph of hibiscus blossoms published in Modern Photography in the summer of 1964, became one of his best-known icons.

Lot 49—Roy Lichtenstein, Black and White Sunrise; Sold for $6,624,000 (est. $6-$8 million)

Made in the same year as the Warhol Flowers, Black and White Sunrise represents the epitome of Lichtenstein’s early hand-painted process that removed all expressive detail with schematized flat lines and regularized Benday dots. It went to an anonymous bidder at the lower end of its estimate.

Lichtenstein was well represented last night, with five examples of his work on the auction block. But the fact that this painting topped the list was something of a surprise, as another work, Head—Yellow and Black (est. $8-10 million), had been expected to perform the best for the artist. Instead, it was bought in.

Lot 43—Jeff Koons, Ushering in Banality; Sold for $4,048,000 (est. $3.2-$3.8 million)

Koons continues to delight collectors, and this classic from his 1988 Banality series went to a private American purchaser for rather more than its estimate.