Displaying items by tag: seller

ARTINFO has learned that the seller of “The Pointing Man,” the great Alberto Giacometti bronze sculpture that will be offered at Christie’s New York on May 11 with an estimate in the stratospheric region of $130 million, is the reclusive New York real estate magnate Sheldon Solow. According to a knowledgeable source, Solow acquired the hand-painted Giacometti bronze from the Sidney Janis Gallery in 1970.

Sidney Janis, a storied collector in his own right and a major benefactor to the Museum of Modern Art, had acquired it privately. The sculpture was exhibited and published in the second installment of the Sidney Janis Gallery 25th Anniversary exhibition and catalogue in October 1973 with the credit line, “Sheldon Solow Collection.”

Frank Gehry’s 1987 Winton Guest House will go up for sale at auction on May 19, according to the seller, the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. The building currently stands on a 180-acre site in Owatonna, Minnesota, that the university sold to a health clinic last summer; the seller has until August 2016 to move the house from the new owner’s land. Chicago auction house Wright is organizing the sale, and is noted for previous sales of historic architecture — in particular for the successful 2006 auction of Pierre Koenig’s 1959 Case Study House #21 in Los Angeles.

Mike and Penny Winton commissioned Gehry to design a guest house on their lakeside property near the Twin Cities in 1982, in close proximity to a 1952 Philip Johnson brick-and-glass house that stood nearby on the same plot of land. Completed in 1987, Gehry’s structure is noted for geometric rooms arranged like individual homes; they project from a central 35-foot-tall pyramidal living room, and the entire house covers 2,300 square feet.

Sotheby’s London Impressionist and Modern Art Sale will feature “Les Peupliers à Giverny,’’ one of Monet’s depictions of poplar trees in the fields at the edge of his property in Giverny. Painted in 1887, it captures the sunset of early autumn. Sotheby’s is auctioning the painting on Feb. 3; it is estimated to sell for $13.8 million to $18.4 million (£9 million to £12.1 million).

The work is in fact one of five Monets included in this Sotheby’s sale, but this particular painting maybe of special interest due to the seller of the work – the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which comes as a surprising twist. The catalogue says it is being sold to “benefit the acquisitions fund.”

A bitter dispute over a painting bought for £140 five decades ago reaches the High Court today – with some of the world’s most prominent Caravaggio experts lining up to take sides.

Sotheby’s is being sued over claims that it misattributed a work – The Cardsharps – to a follower of Caravaggio rather than the Italian painter himself, costing the seller millions of pounds.

Jean-Michel Basquiat’s (1960-1988) neo-expressionist painting Untitled (1982) sold for $29 million at Christie’s in London on June 25, 2013, surpassing its pre-sale estimate of $24.7 million. The work, which was acquired by the seller for $1.7 million in 2002, sold to a telephone bidder. Untitled was painted in the same year as Dustheads, the Basquiat painting that sold for $48.8 million in May 2013, setting the record for the artist at auction.

Other highlights from the Post-War and Contemporary art sale included Roy Lichtenstein’s (1923-1977) Cup of Coffee (1961), which sold for $4.2 million and exceeded its $3 million high estimate; Willem de Kooning’s (1904-1997) uncharacteristically serene Untitled XXVIII, which brought $4.4 million, well past its high estimate of $3.5 million; and Yves Klein’s (1928-1962) SE 181 (1961), a sculpture in the artist’s signature blue hue, which garnered $4.1 million, surpassing its high estimate of $2.7 million. However, not all lots fared so well. Andy Warhol’s (1928-1987) Colored Campbell’s Soup Can (1965) failed to meet its low estimate of $3.4 million due to its unpopular color palette. Steven S. Cohen, the disgraced founder and CEO of SAC Capital Advisors LP, previously owned the work.

Overall, the sale realized a total of $108.4 million and sold 90% by value and 80% by lot. Francis Outred, International Director and Head of Post-War & Contemporary Art, said, “Overall the auction showed an intelligent, solid market and a depth of global bidding, which is a testament to the worldwide interest in Post-War and Contemporary art.”