Christie’s special auction of Sir Elton John’s collection rocketed to success on the opening night in New York, achieving $8 million (£6.3 million). The megastar, known for his visionary music and fabulous fashion, has sold a treasure trove of one-of-a-kind pieces from his luxury Atlanta home on Peachtree Road.
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A painting by the Dutch seventeenth-century artist Rembrandt van Rijn is heading to auction this December and could make in the region of £15 million. The Adoration of the Kings was the subject of an extensive research project at Sotheby’s over the past 18 months after it was sold at Christie’s Amsterdam in 2021 as ‘Circle of Rembrandt’, where it carried a substantially lower estimate of only €10,000-15,000. This new research has led specialists to conclude that the painting was in fact by the artist himself and therefore worth considerably more money.
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A bidding war between reality-star Kim Kardashian and retired American football player Tom Brady broke out at a charity auction over a $2 million (£1.6 million) painting by George Condo. The high-stakes auction and celebrity blackjack tournament raised a total of $24 million (£19.8 million) for Reform Alliance, an organisation that advocates for criminal-justice reform in the US.
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An exceptionally rare painting by Pieter Brueghel the Younger (1564-1638), which had been hanging in a French home since 1900, has sold for €780,000 (£680,000) in Paris. It is one of the 17th-century Flemish artist’s largest known works, measuring 112cm high and 184cm wide.
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The sale of a rare copy of the US Constitution has been halted by Sotheby’s just hours before it was due in auction. Sotheby’s have cited “strong institutional interest” as their motivation for postponing the sale, saying that they wish to “provide interested institutional parties with additional time to pursue fundraising efforts”.
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Paul Allen’s (1953-2018) spectacular collection has achieved an unprecedented $1.6 billion (£1.34 million) over two sales at Christie’s, becoming the most valuable private collection of all time. The first sale alone of 60 works fetched £1.5 billion (£1.26 billion) – the highest total ever recorded at a single auction. Allen’s estate will donate all proceeds from the landmark sales to philanthropic causes.
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The upcoming sale of a painting by Titian and his workshop has been described as a “once in a generation opportunity” for potential buyers. Scheduled to come under the hammer at Sotheby’s in December, Venus and Adonis is part of the poesie series of paintings by the artist which all depict mythological scenes from Ovid’s Metamorphoses and other classical works.
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Three paintings from the collection of the family of Willem de Kooning will appear at auction for the first time and are expected to sell for a total of $50 million. Produced between 1969 and 1987, Sotheby’s have described the upcoming selection of paintings as “one of the most exceptional groups of paintings by Willem de Kooning to ever appear on the market”.
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Christie’s have announced that they will sell 150 masterpieces from the estate of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, who died at the age of 65 in 2018. The anticipated sale is set to be one of the highest valued single-owner sales ever to come to auction.
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Later this month, Sotheby’s New York will auction an extremely rare Gorgosaurus skeleton, which is estimated to fetch as much as $8 million (£6.7 million). It marks the first time in history this vicious prehistoric species has come to auction.
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