Blue Chip Art Brings $676 Million From Bitter Macklowe Divorce

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The divorced billionaire and his wife fought over it. Auction houses fought for it. And on Monday night, the bidders fought for it.

An impressive piece of the collection collected over fifty years by the real estate developer Harry Macklowe and his ex-wife Linda, honorary board of trustees of the Metropolitan Museum of Artbrought in a total of $676.1 million, a testament to the staying power at the top of the art market. Brooke Lampley, a Sotheby’s executive, described it as “the most valuable single-owner auction ever staged”.

Auction prices have been set for Jackson Pollock.number 17, 1951” was sold for $61 million for a fee and to Agnes Martin.Untitled #44” was sold for $17.7 million.

Among the best of the evening by Alberto Giacometti The craggy 1964 sculpture “Le Nez” (“The Nose”), which sold for $78.4 million over an estimated $70 million, and Mark Rothko’s light painting “No. 7”, from 1951, Sold to an unidentified Asian bidder for $82.5 million with fees. This was the second-highest auction price for a work by an Abstract Expressionist artist, surpassing his low estimate of $70 million.

“It’s a strong market,” he said. Eugenio Lopez Alonso, the picker and the juice heir were leaving the sale on Monday. “The best quality always sells.”

The sale, the first of two parts – the second scheduled for May – has been watched closely as a test of an art market that has slowly emerged from the pandemic. His treasure on Monday night was estimated at $400 million.

Auction sales rose 30 percent to $17.6 billion in 2020 from $25.2 billion in 2019. latest Art Market reportReleased by Art Basel and UBS, it brings the market to a decade low.

NS Macklowe Collection it also meant a shot for a market suffering from a shortage of high-quality inventory where demand exceeded supply.

The 35 works, all sold, from the postwar period to the present day, presented Monday evening, were among the fruits of Macklowes’ bitter divorce case, which was auctioned off by court order.

The offer was particularly strong for many parties, including Philip Guston’s signature pink ($24.4 million) “Strong Light” and Gerhard Richter’s live painting “Strong Light.”Summary($33 million).

Art dealer Andrew Fabricant said the couple’s main collector is Linda Macklowe, and he sold her several of the works at Monday’s sale.

“He had an undying love for abstraction, but also had a big eye for figuration,” Fabricant said. “Each piece of work here is subtle and unique.”

Among the major awards were: Andy Warhol’s unforgettable 1962 “Nine Marilyns” A metallic silkscreen was considered one of the best early serial images. It sold twice—the first time it was a bidding error—and eventually went for $47.3 million. Huge 2007 “Untitled” canvas of dripping red peonies by Cy Twombly It sold for $59 million and had the same estimate.

Market trends have played into the sales room, namely strong purchases from Asia, which accounted for 30 percent of the auction house’s total sales last year.

The Macklowe sale followed a strong display of 21st century works at Christie’s, which has proven the market’s growing interest in female artists and artists of color. A colorful summary in 1999 painting by Stanley Whitney attracted five bidders and held a hefty $1.2 million auction for the artist.

Given the absence of colorful artists and the scarcity of women—only Agnes Martin and Tauba Auerbach—at Monday’s sale, the auction for some seemed to symbolize a chapter from the past. “This is the collection of a passing generation – an old white man’s collection,” said galleryist and collector Adam Lindemann. “Yeah, these things will always be great, but is that what a young tech billionaire wants? I don’t think so.”

Sales person Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn did not agree. “They might be focused on the hot new thing,” he said of young collectors. “But they also want to be a part of history.”

Christie’s sale on Thursday Impressionist art collection Owned by Edwin Cox, a Texas oilman and philanthropist who died last year, it brought in a total of $332 million – above a high estimate of about $268 million – and Getty Museum He purchased Gustave Caillebotte’s “Jeune homme à sa fenêtre (Young Man in His Window)” from 1876 for $53 million. (A Getty after the sale the curator called it a “masterpiece”.)

Credit… Jimi Celeste/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images

The wealthy continue to see art as an attractive asset class, and some buy it in anticipation of President Biden’s proposed tax increases for those making more than $10 million a year.

Thousands flocked to preview the Macklowe collection, traveling to Taipei, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, London and Paris before returning to New York. lost in private hands.

Given the joy that art has brought to Linda Macklowe for more than half a century, Fabricant has court-ordered the auction, calling it a sad outcome.

“It is very sad that the collection had to be distributed in this way,” he said.

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