With a svelte 27-lot sale and modest estimates, Sotheby’s managed to achieve its stated goal of a high sales rate tonight, yielding yet another positive indicator that the art market is alive and kicking.

All but two of the lots in the house’s contemporary art evening sale found buyers, for an ultra-slim buy-in rate of 7 percent by lot and 9 percent by value.

Overall the sale earned £17,879,250 ($25,785,454) against a presale estimate of £16.55–23.1 million, with three works fetching more than £1 million and seven over $1 million. Not bad — but a far cry from the equivalent result a year ago when 70 lots made a total of £95 million.

Welcome to the new world.

Still, the average lot price was a respectable £715,170, much higher than, for example, the equivalent sale in February 2005, which earned £15.3 million with 54 lots.

Not surprisingly, given the weakened pound, European buyers dominated, capturing 48 percent of the lots, followed by Americans at 24 percent, 16 percent Asian, and 12 percent from the Middle East.

“In this adjusted environment, the market is actually functional,” said Tobias Meyer, the evening’s auctioneer and Sotheby’s worldwide head of contemporary art. “It’s not frozen.”

But when he was asked in the post-sale press conference about the painfully slow march — in £5,000 bid increments — for the super-hot Rashid Rana photographic print in four parts, Veil IV from 2007, Meyer quipped, “we’re not proud.” The work eventually achieved a very impressive result of £313,250 (est. £100–150,000).

In general, photography performed well, at least with reduced estimates, as evidenced by the large-scale, action-packed Andreas Gursky cibachrome in artist frame, Monaco from 2006 (est. 400–600,000), which sold to Stefan Ratibor of Gagosian Gallery for £517,250. 

Ratibor also snagged the second-highest-priced lot of the evening, Jeff Koonss carved, polychrome wood sculpture Stacked (1988) from the artist’s acclaimed “Banality” series, for £2,841,250 (est. £2.2–3.2 million). The piece last sold at Sotheby’s New York in May 1997 for $250,000, before the Koons juggernaut took off, and tonight’s sale obviously made a handsome return for the seller, seasoned Chicago collector Richard Cooper.

Although it lagged far behind the artist’s £10.3 million record, Lucio Fontanas Concetto Spaziale from 1961 (est. £5–7 million), part of his revered “Venezia” series of some 22 slashed canvases, sold to the telephone for £4,409,250. The underbidder was New York dealer Jose Mugrabi.

Mugrabi took the prize for the evening’s most consistent underbidder, chasing two Warhols, a Keith Haring, and a Damien Hirst (the proceeds of which are going to benefit neonatal centers in Ukraine, as part of a program run by collector Victor Pinchuk). But Mugrabi did manage to walk away with one work, after outgunning telephone competition for Zeng Fanzhis Untitled (Mask Series), which he purchased for £601,250 (est. £300–400,000).

“Art is better than ever,” said the ecstatic dealer moments after the sale. “Is it better to give money to Madoff to disappear or give money to banks that close?”

Throughout the evening, it was clear that bidders in the salesroom were looking for bargains, as was evident when, for example, Bridget Rileys stunning and relatively rare, optically vibrating Gala, in acrylic on canvas from 1974, went to a telephone bidder for £735,650 (est. £600–800,000).

The underbidder was Philip Hoffman, chief executive of the London-based Fine Art Fund, who noted, “We’re trying to buy bargains and thought the Riley was good value and could be a very expensive piece in five years’ time.”

Several market sources said that Sotheby’s had guaranteed the piece at £1 million before the global economic wipeout in September. The house obviously lost money on the painting, but that was the only financial guarantee in the sale.

Apart from dealers buying for clients or inventory, several private collectors were in the room, including a German couple who bought both of the Gerhard Richter entries, a photo-realist oil, Troisdorf from 1985, for £2,113,250 (est. £1.5–2 million); and the smaller-scaled Abstraktes Bild, also in oil from 1992, for £541,250 (est. £500–700,000). The former work last sold at Phillips de Pury & Luxembourg in New York in November 2002 for $3.2 million.

The couple, who declined to reveal their names or precise location, did respond to a question about whether there were other Richters in their collection. “It’s only Richter!” he said.

Like the over-achieving Rana, at least when compared to the reduced estimates of the current market, Anish Kapoors early and authoritative stainless steel sculpture Untitled, from 1996, turned in an impressive result, selling to a buyer in the room for £982,050 (est. £500–700,000).

The same buyer also snared Michelangelo Pistolettos Visitatrice con Catalogo, a painted tissue-paper collage on stainless steel from 1969, for £241,250 (est. £250–350,000). The work last sold at Sotheby’s London in October 2000 for £48,800.

“There were low prices and high quality,” said New York dealer Per Skarstedt. “So I guess you can sell even in this market.”

Judd Tully is Editor at Large of Art+Auction.