On 11 May, Christie’s 20th and 21st Century sales in New York commenced with the third chapter of Masterpieces from the S.I. Newhouse Collection. The collection of the late Condé Nast chairman achieved a total of $177,792,000, selling 100 per cent by lot and 105.6 per cent by low estimate. The 20th Century Evening Sale followed, totalling $328,779,600, and selling for 81.5 per cent by lot and 108.6 per cent by low estimate.
Welcoming more than 1,625,000 viewers across Christie’s global platforms, the evening was led by auctioneers Adrien Meyer, Jussi Pylkkänen and Tash Perrin. The sales attracted bidders from 19 countries, in addition to those bidding in person in the James Christie Room.
Altogether, the evening saw numerous masterpieces come under the hammer, ranging from works by Picasso and Rousseau to de Kooning and Ruscha. The first night of Christie’s 20th and 21st Century sale week brought in a total of $506,571,600 with six auctions still to come over the next week.
‘Having sold eight of the top ten collections to ever come to market, including those of Paul G. Allen and Si Newhouse, we at Christie's are proud to be the house of great collections,’ says Alex Rotter, Chairman of the 20th and 21st Century sale. ‘In bringing these to auction, you see that people want history — it grounds you.’
During his lifetime, Newhouse was an avid collector. Having acquired works such as Jeff Koons’s iconic Rabbit and Jasper Johns’s False Start, his taste was informed by his role as the long-time chairman of the media empire that included The New Yorker, Vogue, Vanity Fair, Architectural Digest and many other leading publications.
His selection of masterworks was on full display Thursday night, resulting in a white glove sale.
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The top lot of the sale was Francis Bacon's, Self-Portrait, which realised $34,622,500. The work portrays the artist at the height of his powers in 1969, and its dynamic brushwork and striking pose is highly characteristic of this period of Bacon’s style.
In Newhouse’s home, the work was displayed together with Bacon's Study of Henrietta Moraes Laughing, sold in the first edition of Newhouse’s collection at Christie’s in 2018. The two paintings are iconic images from Bacon’s oeuvre.
Willem de Kooning's Orestes realised $30,885,000. The rare early painting from 1947 signifies the pivotal moment in the artist’s career when he relinquished figuration and gave himself over to abstraction entirely.
Another standout was Pablo Picasso's L'Arlésienne (Lee Miller), which sold for $24,560,000. From 1937, it is one of seven striking portraits that the artist painted of the photojournalist and model Lee Miller — whom Condé Nast famously put on the cover of Vogue in 1927.
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Achieving a total of $177,792,000, the sale’s latest chapter at Christie’s cemented Newhouse’s collection as the sixth highest grossing of all time.
After a short break, the second auction of the night began. The 20th Century Evening Sale featured masterpieces by Picasso and O’Keeffe, as well as rare works by Henri Rousseau and Agnes Pelton that achieved artist records. Totalling $328,779,600, the sale sold 81.5 per cent by lot and 108.6 per cent by low estimate.
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‘We knew that the Rousseau was going to excite people,’ said Vanessa Fusco, Co-Head of the 20th Century Evening Sale. ‘It’s a painting that we’ve been talking about for many weeks, and we’re so happy to conclude this story with a world record price that is ten times the previous record at auction.’
Henti Rousseau's Les Flamants shattered the artist’s previous auction record, realising the highest price of the sale at $43,535,000 after nearly eight minutes of bidding. This rare jungle painting by Rousseau epitomises the wonder of his self-taught practice. His work is considered a precursor to the avant-garde, but his collage-like approach, utilizing journals, novels, postcards and ephemera, makes his imagined scenes entirely unique.
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Picasso's Nature more à la fenêtre followed at $41,810,000. This portrait of his lover Marie-Thérèse Walter is amongst the artist’s most celebrated works, and one of the first canvases he made in a notable series devoted to her.
The Picassos sold in the Collection of S.I. Newhouse and the 20th Century Evening Sale are among an outstanding selection of works by the Spanish master offered in this spring’s 20th and 21st sales, as the art world marks the 50th anniversary of his death.
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The iconic painting by Ed Ruscha, Burning Gas Station, painted from 1966-1969, sold for $22,260,000. Belonging to a series of five Standard Stations that the artist painted in the 1960s, it had not been publicly exhibited since 1976.
Christie’s 20th and 21st Century sale week continues 12 May, with the Post-War and Contemporary Art Day Sale, and through the weekend with two Impressionist and Modern Art sales on 13 May.
Anna Melnykova, "Palace of Labor (palats praci), architector I. Pretro, 1916", shot with analog Canon camera, 35 mm Fuji film in March 2022.
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