Spectacular Results at Christie’s Contemporary Sale

Photo by David Gursky

The auction floor at last night's spectacular Post-War & Contemporary Art Evening Sale

Courtesy Christie's Images Ltd.

Lucian Freud’s “Benefits Supervisor Sleeping” (1995) (est. $25–35 million) sold for $33,641,000, making it the most expensive work ever by a living artist.

Adolph Gottlieb Andy Warhol Sam Francis Mark Rothko Lucian Freud Roy Lichtenstein Francis Bacon Jeff Koons

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But there was some consolation to sooth the disappointment. Ball of Twine remains a great picture, and Lichtenstein’s market reputation was buoyed when his late and luscious Reflection on a Prom from 1990 (est. $3–5 million) sold to a telephone bidder for $8,777,000. Private dealer Daniella Luxembourg was the underbidder.

Works from New York artists of the 1980s also triumphed, led by Jeff Koons’s fluorescent-lit and immaculately entombed double-decker sculpture, New Hoover Convertibles, New Shelton Wet/Drys 5-gallon, Double-Decker from 1981–86 (estimate on request; in the region of $10 million), which sold to a telephone bidder for $11,801,000. The work's consignor, Michael Schwartz, acquired the work brand new some two decades ago from the now long-shuttered East Village avant-garde gallery International with Monument for a mere $15,000.

Another Koons, the stainless-steel-and-Bourbon-enclosed Jim Beam-Box Car from 1986 (est. $1–1.5 million), sold to Harry Blaine of New York/London gallery Haunch of Venison, a wholly owned subsidiary of Christie’s, for $1,945,000.

Richard Prince’s wildly successful nursing career continued to sizzle with Man-Crazy Nurse #2 from 2002, which sold for a record $7,433,000 (est. $6–8 million) to New York dealer Christophe van de Weghe, who was bidding on behalf of an American client. “He was willing to go much higher,” van de Weghe said of his client moments after the sale. Jose Mugrabi was one of the underbidders. The work came from the collection of former television mogul Douglas Cramer.

The biggest lot of the evening, at least in terms of square footage, was a modernist piece of architecture, Richard Neutra’s iconic "The Kaufmann House, Palm Springs," designed in 1945 and built in 1946–47 (est. $15–25 million). The five-bedroom, five-and-a-half-bath objet sold to a telephone bidder for $16,841,000.

“All the collectors I know, and advisers and dealers, are all very active,” said Robert Manley, Christie’s Post-War & Contemporary department head, moments after the sale ended. “This sale was a reflection of that. If we have great pictures, they’ll do very well.”

The action resumes tonight at Sotheby’s.

Judd Tully is Editor at Large for Art+Auction magazine. For more on the May sales, read his A+A Sales Preview and his pre-sale Overvalued/Undervalued column.