LONDON—Although late June Impressionist and modern evening sales at Christie’s and Sotheby’s yielded modest results, both sessions fell within their estimates — a sign that the houses are aligning their expectations with the ongoing price correction. This hard-earned realism is evident in Thomas Seydoux’s assessment of the June 23 auction at Christie’s, which took in £37,095,100 ($60.4 million). "Was it a fantastic sale?" the house’s newly appointed head of Impressionist and modern art asks, answering his own question, "No. We have to be careful with the middle market. We’ve adjusted some reserves and the demand is there, but we still need to do more work."

The evening’s big earner was Monet’s Au Parc Monceau, 1878, which attracted a flurry of interest in the room and beyond before going to a phone bidder for £6,313,250 ($10.4 million). The sum may have been a far cry from the record £40.9 million ($80 million) one of the artist’s water lily paintings brought at the house last June, but it was well above the park scene’s very modest estimate of £3.5 million to £4.5 million ($5.8-7.4 million).

"It was a rare picture," says Jonathan Binstock, senior vice president of Citigroup’s Private Bank Art Advisory Service and one of the work’s numerous underbidders. "We had a price we wanted to pay, and ultimately a very big price won the painting."

Pablo Picasso’s Homme à l’épée, 1969 (est. £5-7 million; $8.2-11.5 million), also vaulted over the £5 million mark, selling to Ezra Nahmad for £5,753,250 ($9.5 million). Later in the sale, the London-based dealer engaged in a heated battle for Joan Miró’s Peinture (Femme se poudrant), 1949 (£2.2-2.8 million; $3.6-4.6 million), which drew bids from at least four parties, including the New York gallerist Eleanor Acquavella, before going to Nahmad for £3,961,250 ($6.5 million). His clan also snagged Miró’s Mont-roig, le pont, 1917 (est. £400-600,000; $657-986,000), a Fauve Catalonian landscape from the artist’s early years, for £541,250 ($889,000).

Despite the Mirós’ success and the impressive £457,250 ($751,000) the New York art adviser Mary Hoeveler paid for Matta’s Prince of Blood (Tragiptych), 1943, midlevel modern fare suffered overall. Both Emil Nolde’s radiantly colored floral composition Sonnenblumen mit Fuchsschwanz, 1937 (est. £500-700,000; $822,000-1.2 million), and Chaim Soutine’s rare 1917 Autoportrait à la barbe (est. £400-600,000; $657-986,000) failed to find buyers, the former expiring at £400,000 ($657,000).

With its sale, on the 24th, Sotheby’s realized a smaller gross, £33,531,150 ($55.3 million), than Christie’s but otherwise surpassed its rival. Only four of the 27 lots were bought in, and 61 percent exceeded estimates.

The auction got off to a rousing start with works on paper, as bidders chased Kandinsky’s Wachsen, 1923 (est. £150-200,000; $247-329,000), to £433,250 ($712,000) and Matisse’s striking Étude pour "Le chant," 1938 (est. £180-250,000; $296-411,000), to £457,250 ($751,000). Sculpture was also in great demand. Alan Hobart, of London’s Pyms Gallery, shelled out £780,450 ($1.3 million) for the Roman stone carving Three Standing Forms, 1965 (est. £700,000-1 million; $1.2-1.6 million), by the British modernist Barbara Hepworth, and a trio of Giacomettis brought a combined £7.4 million ($12.2 million). The least expensive of the three, the 1962 bronze Buste d’Annette vii (est. £1.2-1.8 million; $2-3 million), from a petite edition of two, fetched £1,273,250 ($2.1 million) from the New York art adviser Kim Heirston.

"It was a great price," says Heirston. "I was looking at a few Giacomettis in Basel, but they were posthumous casts. This one is a lifetime cast."

Choice images from René Magritte continued to attract bidders. His painting within a painting La lumière des coïncidences, depicting a nude torso on an easel illuminated by a candle, sold to a phone bidder for £646,050 ($1.1 million), more than double its high estimate and a significant jump over the £150,000 ($249,000) it fetched on its last showing, about 30 years ago at Sotheby’s. In another demonstration of the difference decades can make, Paul Signac’s Pointillist depiction of the Süleymaniye Mosque rising over the Bosporus, La Corne d’or. La Suleimanie, 1907 (est. £1.2-1.8 million; $2-3 million), dwarfed the $563,500 it earned at Christie’s in 1998 by fetching £1,385,250 ($2.3 million).