Sotheby’s mid-season ‘Contemporary Curated’ live sale, which was held in New York on 26 February, yielded $19.88 million (including fees) – a considerable amount, although less than the equivalent sale last year which brought in $25.7 million.
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Justin Sun, the crypto-tycoon who bought Maurizio Cattalan’s infamous banana artwork last year, is suing the billionaire film producer David Geffen over a $78 million (£62 million) Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966) sculpture. Sun claims the piece was stolen from him by a rogue assistant and sold to Geffen without his knowledge.
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“I’ve bought the banana!!!” revelled Justin Sun, the Chinese billionaire and founder of cryptocurrency platform TRON. Maurizio Cattelan’s Comedian (2019) smashed auction records at Sotheby’s New York, selling for a staggering $6.2 million (£4.9 million) including buyer’s premium on 20th November 2024.
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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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Recent Sotheby’s Old Master sale in London failed to sell 35% of lots, reflecting an increasingly lacklustre market for historical art. Despite this, the 49-lot offering achieved a respectable £39.4 million (with fees) – the highest total for an Old Master sale in London since the pandemic.
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After months of speculation over the fate of the Whitney Museum’s former site – the Marcel Breuer building – which they vacated in 2015 to relocate to New York’s then up-and-coming Meatpacking District, it has been announced that Sotheby’s have purchased the building and intend to make it their headquarters in 2025.
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A masterpiece by Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) that was recently restituted to the heirs of a Jewish collecting couple could fetch up to $45 million (£37.4 million) at Sotheby’s. It is one of the most important works by the artist ever to appear at auction as a rare example of his early style.
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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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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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