Impressionist & Modern Art

Christie's
81 lots offered
£144,440,500 ($283,970,023) sold total
5 percent unsold by value
19 percent unsold by lot

Sotheby's
55 lots offered
£102,246,500 ($201,210,887) sold total
6 percent unsold by value
10 percent unsold by lot

Alberto Giacometti Gino Severini Edgar Degas Claude Monet Pierre Bonnard Paul Gauguin Albert Marquet Paul Signac

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Christie’s not only bested the $277 million it made in this category in New York in May but also achieved its highest-ever tally for a European auction. The 24 guaranteed lots, which had a combined low estimate of £45 million ($88.6 million), together made a hammer price of £71 million ($140 million). Of the 66 works that sold, 34 brought more than £1 million each, and 44 fetched more than $1 million. The firm reports that 62 percent of the lots went to Europeans, a category that includes Russians, followed by Americans, at 34 percent, and Asians, at 3 percent.

The evening got off to a flying start when Pierre Bonnard’s circa 1931 still life Nature morte aux fruits dans le soleil (est. £500–700,000; $990,000–1.4 million) sold to the London dealer Richard Green for £1,665,250 ($3.3 million) and Paul Signac’s Pointilliste seascape Collioure. Les Balancelles, 1887 (est. £1.8–2.5 million; $3.6–4.9 million), was bought by the London private dealer Ivor Braka for £2,953,250 ($5.8 million). Those numbers paled in comparison with the £13,481,250 ($26.5 million) achieved by Edgar Degas’s circa 1880 pastel, gouache and charcoal on paper Danseuses à la barre (est. £4–6 million; $7.9–12 million). A phone bidder beat out the London dealer Daniella Luxembourg to win the work.

Eight artist records were set that night, including one for Claude Monet, whose Le bassin aux nymphéas, 1919 (est. £18–24 million; $36–47 million), one of only four works from his water lilies series released from his studio that year for commercial consumption, sold to the London adviser Tania Buckrell Pos for £40,921,350 ($80.5 million). Her competition was an anonymous American collector on the telephone. Pos declines to identify the person she was bidding for, but there is strong speculation that the buyer is Russian.

The Monet became the sixth-most expensive artwork ever sold at auction and almost doubled the artist’s previous high of $41.5 million, set at Christie’s New York in May by Le pont du chemin de fer à Argenteuil, 1873. In that same session, Pos picked up a smaller Monet water lily composition, Nymphéas, 1908, for $11.7 million.

The last time one of the four salable 1919 works came to auction was November 1992 at Christie’s New York, where it sold for $12.1 million to the Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen, who still owns it. The present version last sold in 1971 at Sotheby Parke Bernet in New York for $320,000 to the family of J. Irwin and Xenia Miller, whose estate consigned it to Christie’s.

The Millers’ trove of 17 guaranteed works brought £67,540,050 ($132.8 million), close to half the evening’s take and well above the combined estimate of £38.1 million to £52.6 million ($75.5–104.3 million). As one of the conditions to the sale, the heirs insisted on the services of the New York–based star auctioneer Christopher Burge, who drew applause when he approached the lectern for the Miller lots.

Sotheby’s was at a decided disadvantage to Christie’s, whose lineup featured four named and private collections. Despite its paucity of standout material, however, the Sotheby’s sale achieved an extraordinary result. Only five of the 55 lots failed to find buyers, and of the 50 that sold, 24 made more than £1 million each, and 45 made more than $1 million. As for guarantees, Sotheby’s had only three, with a combined low estimate of £10.3 million ($20.4 million). The two that sold realized a combined hammer price of £13,950,000 ($27.8 million).

Sotheby’s had its own headlining Monet, La plage à Trouville, 1870 (est. £7–10 million; $13.9– 19.8 million), which made £7,657,250 ($15.1 mil­lion). The last time the consignors put it up for sale, at Sotheby’s New York in November 2006 (est. $16.5–20 million), it did not find a buyer.