Displaying items by tag: Sotheby's

Sotheby’s is doubling down on Claude Monet.

During a February sale in London, it sold five works by the French painter, raking in $84 million. Now it plans to auction off six more paintings in New York.

The sale, expected to be held on May 5, spans four decades of Monet’s career. Sotheby’s said the six paintings combined could fetch $78 million to $110 million.

They include two of Monet’s water-lily paintings, which depict the pond and gardens at his home in Giverny, France, and have commanded some of the steepest prices at auction for the artist, who died in 1926.

Sotheby's New York announced it will offer the collection of Chicago philanthropist Jerome H. Stone over a series of auctions this spring. Stone assembled the collection over the course of the 1950s and '60s with the help of his wife Evelyn. It consists of blue chip works by artists such as Fernand Leger, Joan Miró, Alberto Giacometti, Juan Gris, and Marc Chagall, that together are expected to bring in more than $40 million.

Stone, who built his family business, Stone Container Corporation, into a national multi-billion dollar corporation, and later founded the International Alzheimer's Association, often bought from leading dealers including Pierre Matisse and Sidney Janis.

Any Andy Warhol fan with money to spare can bid on the official lease of Andy Warhol’s first New York City studio, outside of his own house on 159 East 87th street next week.

The lease, which over the years has seen some wear and tear, is up for auction at Sotheby’s inaugural New York Sale on April 1. It is estimated to sell for anywhere between $8,000 and $12,000.

Signed by Warhol, the document shows that he agreed to lease the obsolete fire house for $150 through the month of January in 1963.

Adrien Legendre, Assistant Vice President and Specialist of Books & Manuscript said the short lease suggests Warhol was most likely trying out the studio space for size.

The major spring auctions in New York are still more than a month away, but clues are starting to emerge about potential heavyweights. Earlier this week, Christie’s said that it plans to ask around $40 million for the 90-work estate of former Goldman Sachs chairman John Whitehead on May 4-5, including Impressionist and modern pieces by Claude Monet and Amedeo Modigliani.

On Friday, Sotheby’s said it plans to seek even more—around $50 million—on May 12.

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art on Friday announced a number of new art acquisitions, including Helen Frankenthaler's "Seven Types of Ambiguity" and Robert Rauschenberg's "The Tower," along with a reinstallation of its contemporary art gallery.

The acquisitions, which The New York Times valued at $20 million, join Georgia O'Keeffe's "Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1," which sold for a record-setting $44.4 million at Sotheby's in November, more than three times the previous record for a work by a woman artist. The Bentonville museum revealed that it had bought Jimson Weed in an announcement last week.

Picasso’s dream that anyone could own one of his works was further cemented at Sotheby’s London yesterday at the sale of Important Ceramics by Pablo Picasso (March 18). The auction almost tripled its pre-sale low estimate to bring £1,726,625 ($2,548,153), with a 95% sell-through rate by lot and 68% of the works sold achieving prices above their high estimates. Seven of the top ten prices established records for the subjects. The top lot, "Tripode,"soared above its estimate to bring £233,000 (est. £55,000-65,000), while many pieces reached amounts well above pre-sale expectations, including "Chouette visage de femme," which sold for £37,500, more than 12 times its estimate.

The Goldwyn family, the great Hollywood film dynasty, will sell its art collection following the death of producer Samuel Goldwyn Jr. two months ago. With an estimated worth of $25 million–$30 million, the collection will be parceled out over nine auctions at Sotheby's New York between May and October.

The centerpieces of Goldwyn's holdings are Pablo Picasso's "Femme au Chignon Dans un Fauteuil" (1948), a portrait of the artist's lover Françoise Gilot and, and "Anémones et Grenades" (1946), a Matisse still life. The Picasso is estimated to sell for as much as $18 million, while the Matisse, bought for $13,500 in 1948, is tagged at upwards of $5 million.

The online retail giant eBay today launched a new section of its website dedicated to live auctions at Sotheby’s. Modern and contemporary photographs by Man Ray, Paul Strand and László Moholy-Nagy are among the works for sale in the first auction, which will be streamed live on April 1. The second sale of New York memorabilia, which includes a ten-foot-tall sign from Yankee Stadium from the collection of the basketball player Reggie Jackson (est $300,000-$600,000), takes place on April 2.

After a tumultuous year, Sotheby's,  announced that its Board of Directors has concluded its CEO search and appointed Tad Smith, as president and chief executive officer, effective 31 March 2015.  Smith will also join the Sotheby's board of directors.

Smith, 49, was formely president and CEO of the Madison Square Garden Company (since February 2014). He oversaw the overall strategy and day-to-day operations of MSG Sports, MSG Media, and MSG Entertainment.

Manhattan’s federal court has dismissed a lawsuit brought by Elizabeth Bilinski and 19 other collectors against the Keith Haring Foundation over its refusal to authenticate 111 works.

According to the court papers, Bilinski submitted works she owned by Haring, which she and the other plaintiffs had acquired from Angelo Moreno, a friend of the artist, to the foundation in 2007. But the foundation, without giving a reason, rejected the pieces as “not authentic.” When Bilinski submitted what she considered more evidence of authenticity, including a statement from Moreno, the foundation refused to reconsider its decision. The collectors said that a forensic report indicated that the art could have been created during Haring’s lifetime, and that experts at Sotheby’s believed the works to be authentic, but the auction house refused to sell them without the foundation’s approval.