Real Clear Arts

Judith H. Dobrzynski on Culture

The Market Pays Tribute To Ernst Beyeler — Again

Master dealer Ernst Beyeler died more than two years ago, but he’s still receiving tributes — not least in the auction results achieved at Christie’s last Thursday. 

Beyeler is known as “Europe’s pre-eminent dealer in modern art,” as his obituary in The New York Times put it in February, 2010, but he was more than that; he was a true connoisseur, with a “discerning eye [and] refined taste” in many categories. 

That was amply demonstrated again at Christie’s sale of the Arts of Africa, Oceana and the Americas (sometimes known as tribal art), which was announced in mid-April. That announcement, in part, read:

The genesis of Beyeler’s tribal art odyssey occurred in the late 1950’s. He held his first exhibition of African art in 1958, during a time when ‘tribal’ works of art were reaching an international stage in the post-War art world.  He maintained his interest in tribal art over the years as someone who clearly understood it as key to the language of Modern art.  The African, Oceanic and Pre-Columbian works of art from Beyeler’s collection demonstrates [sic] the continued relevance of tribal art within the contemporary art world today.  Many of the sculptures offered in the sale, such as the Pre-Columbian works of art, lined Beyeler’s wall since the early 1960’s.

What caught my eye was the results. In a sale that totaled $1.6 million, 98% of the lots sold, and 100% of the lots Beyeler owned sold — at prices far above their estimates. Of the Top Ten lots, nine were owned by, sold by or exhibited by Beyeler. Let’s look more closely at them (in order of sale, not value brought), with their presale estimate first, followed by the sale price including the buyer’s premium in bold:

  • Lot 1*: $3,000 to $5,000; $116,500 (pictured above right)
  • Lot 6: $80,000 to $120,000; $314,500
  • Lot 8: $20,000 to $30,000; $60,000 (pictured below right)
  • Lot 15*: $8,000 to $12,000; $266,500 (pictured above left)
  • Lot 20: $10,000 to $13,000; $47,500
  • Lot 22: $5,000 to $8,000; $47,500
  • Lot 23: $30,000 to $50,000; $62,500
  • Lot 24: $30,000 to $40,000; $60,000
  • Lot 36: $6,000 to $9,000: $47,500

In the Top Ten, only Lot 31, estimated at $20,000 to $40,000 and fetching $80,500, didn’t have Beyeler’s fingerprints on it – 90% of the Top Ten. In a sale of 51 lots, I counted 36 with a Beyeler connection (using Christie’s search function) — that’s just over 70%. But look at those prices, too — multiples of the estimates.  Two of the pieces, a Bidjogo mask (lot 15) and Aboriginal shield (lot 1), marked above with an asterisk, set new world records. All of the results are here.

When you consider that the best of Beyeler’s collection still resides at his Fondation Beyeler in Basel, these results speak volumes about Beyerler’s discernment.

Sam Keller, now the Beyeler director, has got to find the challenge of maintaining such quality daunting.

 Photo Credits: Courtesy of Christie’s

 

Is The FBI Onto Something In the Gardner Heist?

Yesterday, news reports say, FBI agents spent all day at the home of alleged mobster Robert Gentile, 75, who was arrested earlier this year on a federal drug charge and remains in prison, held without bail.

But while the agents used ground-penetrating radar device, two dogs and a ferret in their search, which they said was for weapons, Gentile’s attorney has been quoted as saying they’re really looking for the paintings stolen in March 1990 from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. “…we all know what they are actually looking for — and they are looking for the paintings,” A Ryan McGuigan, Gentile’s lawyer was quoted as saying in the Boston Globe.  

The Gentile home in question is located in Manchester, Conn., and the U.S. Attorney’s office there declined to comment to the Globe.

A Reuters article said agent dug up Gentile’s yard:

The search did not unearth the renowned paintings and other artwork nabbed from Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum on March 18, 1990, a source familiar with the activities said. But FBI agents carried away boxes, apparently of possible evidence, from the house.

Gentile’s lawyer maintains that he has no connection with the Gardner theft, but his possible connection to the crime became public earlier this year, when a prosecutor disclosed in federal court in Connecticut that the government thinks he has information about it.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of the AP

 

It’s 2012: Do You Know Where Your Paintings Are?

We have another night of big auctions tonight, but I’m going to change the subject.

This is a sad story of a lost, or misplaced, artistic legacy. Over the years, the Coca Cola Co. commissioned many artists to make ads and trays for the company, and in the late 1920s and through 1935, Norman Rockwell was one of them. Rockwell made six paintings for Coke’s billboard and calendar ads. But somehow Coke was able to hang onto none of them. All six went missing.

Then in August 2001, it “found” Out Fishin’. Dated 1935, it portrays a young boy, resembling Tom Sawyer, sitting on a tree stump fishing, accompanied by his dog and a bottle of Coke. Coke has not disclosed where the painting was or how it came home, except to say it was located in the Atlanta area, where the company is headquartered.

Since then, two more works have found their way back to Coke, more about which below, and Coke recently launched a campaign to get the missing three back –  Office Boy – 4 p.m. – The Pause That Refreshes from 1930 (at left), The Old Oaken Bucket, 1932 (below), and Wholesome Refreshment, 1928. I first learned about this initiative from Bloomberg Business Week.

As Coke tells the story of its early 20th century interactions with artists, who included N.C. Wyeth as well as Rockwell, most of those the company engaged did not sign their work. Maybe that’s why, clearly, the company didn’t take enough care with the works — though paintings weren’t worth all that much in those days. Further, though Rockwell and Wyeth were well-known artists, these paintings were seen as commercial illustrations.

Barefoot Boy had apparently been left at the printers. It was recovered after a Coke executive received a call from the grandson of the president of a calendar printing company who reported that the company had the painting. Coke bought it back, and BW says the price was in the neighborhood of $400,000 to $600,000.

Coke found Carry Me Back to Old Virginny, from 1934, in the Atlanta area; it had been taken home by a Coke executive and his grandchildren sold it back to the company, price undisclosed.

I’m glad Coke wants the paintings for its archives. Other companies that also commissioned work by artists might follow suit. (Nabisco once published a wonderful of its advertising art; there must be others.)

Meantime, has anyone see the missing pictures?

Photo Credits: Courtesy of Coca-Cola

Are New Motivations Driving The Contemporary Art Market? — UPDATED

Is the contemporary art auction world moving to a new plateau, perhaps even new foothills of a higher peak of excess? It is starting to look that way to many people. Last night’s sale at Christie’s, which totalled $388.488 million, may be looked back at as a marker of some sort — with a slightly different dynamic than the past.

It seems to me that some buyers have gone past the notion of paying a lot to buy a masterwork, or just a good painting or sculpture, because they want the piece.

Now they want a work of art because they are paying the record price— in a way that looks discreet but, to their peers, who will see the work sometime soon, is quite ostentatious. “The air is no longer thin at the top,” Allan Schwartzman, a private New York dealer, told The New York Times, and Marc Porter, chairman of Christie’s, added, “this is the most popular collecting category we have globally, with the richest and deepest number of buyers.”

Collecting has always been a competitive sport, now these buyers want bragging rights that include paying a record price.

Christie’s press release, meanwhile, was headlined “MOST VALUABLE POST-WAR AND CONTEMPORARY ART AUCTION EVER” (the Rothko at right) and it announced that “14 New World Auction Records Set” and “41 Works Sell Above $1 million; 9 Works Above $10 Million.” The text said: “Record after record fell throughout the night, as bidders from around the world convened in the saleroom to compete for the sale’s exceptional roster of works by the top artists of the category, including Mark Rothko, Gerhard Richter, Jackson Pollock, Alexander Calder, Yves Klein, Richard Diebenkorn, Barnett Newman, and Willem de Kooning, among others….”

That’s smart marketing. In many luxury markets, the experts say, you make more sales by raising the price than by lowering it.

At a different art event this morning, I noodled over the sale with a few colleagues — all of whom were aghast at the excess in the room last night. These are people who love art; you have to wonder what people who don’t think.

As I write, the DJ Industrial average is down more than 100 points.

Read the results here.

UPDATE, 5/10: Last night’s Sotheby’s sale adds more evidence — little excitement in the room, only two real records (Lichtenstein and Twombly; the others were for artists that don’t make headlines because the sums are so small (Ligon, Bradford, etc.). No bragging rights with those purchase.

Art Basel Journeys to Hong Kong — UPDATED

We knew this was coming, but now it’s official: Art Basel will have a fair in Hong Kong, starting next May (the 23rd to 26th, 2013). “Just what we need,” you may be thinking, “another art fair.” The truly addicted collector can be on the road, traveling from one to the next fair, pretty much all year now. Why does Art Basel want to start something in Hong Kong?

Proximity to Chinese money is the obvious answer — and Art Basel is doing things the smart way. Instead of starting a brand-new fair, AB co-directors Annette Schönholzer and Marc Spiegler (right) have hired Magnus Renfrew, who previously headed ART HK,  which will have its fifth interation this May 17 through May 20, as Art Basel’s Director Asia. So ART HK will cease to exist. None of this is a surprise because last July, MCH Swiss Exhibition (Basel) Ltd. , which is the parent company of Art Basel, acquired 60 percent of Asian Art Fairs Limited, which presented ART HK. (It has the option of acquiring the remaining 40 percent in 2014.)

The venue, the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, stays the same. And the new show will include more than 250 galleries around the world, chosen by a new selection committee. More than half of them are expected to be based in Asia or somewhere else in the Eastern hemisphere. UPDATE: That comment — that promise — may be in response to what Art in America, in its May issue, said was local “grumbling” about the favor shown to high-profile Western galleries in the fair’s layout, and worry that Art Basel Hong Kong won’t have enough Asian content.

Meantime, Art Basel in Basel gets underway on June 14 (till June 17). It will offer exhibits by more than 300 galleries from 36 countries.