Inside a hectic Phillips de Pury & Company auction evening

Crowds jostled to make their way into new Park Avenue salesroom of Phillips de Pury & Company in New York. Some top contemporary masters, like Murakami and Warhol, topped expectations. Others like Cindy Sherman, Rudolf Stingel and Felix Gonzalez-Torres fetched record prices, too. In addition to the dealers and collectors, (artists are rarely seen at auctions) Abdi Farah and Mr. Murakami were also there.

In every sense, it was a rather unusual occasion for Phillips. Apart from inaugurating its uptown space, the auction house was experimenting with a new program termed ‘Carte Blanche’. Just as museums ask an outside curator to host a show, Phillips officials plan to invite someone from the contemporary art world to put together a sale, and this was the first such. Depicting the mood, a news report in The New York Times stated:
“It was a bifurcated evening, beginning with 33 lots orchestrated by Mr. Ségalot and ending with a less impressive group of 26 works assembled by Phillips’s own team. Mr. Ségalot’s part of the evening was a success, totaling $117 million, above its high estimate of $104.8 million. The second part brought just $19.9 million, below its low $23.6 million estimate. Still, the night’s total of $137 million is a huge number, considering that until now Phillips had never sold more than $59 million in one evening sale.”
Here are some highlights of the auction evening:
Warhol’s ‘Men in Her Life’ was the biggest star of all. Mr. Ségalot pried this 1962 painting out of the Mugrabi family’s private collection. An unidentified client bought it for $63.3 million, the second-highest price ever for a Warhol.
A Murakami sculpture ‘Miss Ko2’ was another big star. This six-foot-tall sculpture estimated at $4- $6 million, got $6.8 million.
Thomas Schütte’s cast aluminum sculpture, ‘Grosse Geist No. 15’, was grabbed by a telephone bidder for $3.6 million.
There were a few disappointments, though. Mr. Ségalot later quipped: “There were some really fantastic prices. Still I was disappointed that three works didn’t sell. Auctions are never a perfect science; I guess they are always unpredictable.”