Christie's sale update (2) - Postwar & Contemporary

Christie's window display reproduction of the 1982 Basquiat which achieved top price
at the Post-war and Contemporary Art Auction

The Peter Doig I saw at the Christie's exhibition came up at their Post-War and Contemporary Art auction held on 26 June. The painting, Jetty, sold above its estimate at £6.5m, and two other Doigs sold above estimate, so this painter's popularity with the market seems to be continuing. But the highest price was for a Basquiat: it was an oil stick on panel work in Basquiat's signature cartoon-cum-graffiti style, done in 1982 when he was 21 and just becoming a New York art superstar. The painting went for a whopping £16.7m, but this is half paid for another Basquiat sold by Christie's a month ago in New York. There were mixed results for works by Damian Hirst, no longer the market darling he was a few years ago, but a well known work by Roy Lichtenstein, Cup of Coffee,  sold for £2.8m, more than a third above estimate. Thirteen of the 64 pieces on sale did not sell (including a Warhol Campbell's soup can - the colour was deemed unattractive), but the auction overall yielded a record-breaking £70m. The Sotheby's Contemporary Art sale two days later also did well (the two Francis Bacon works which sold for £11.3m and £10.4 even made the national news, partly because one was originally sold across the road for £150), so it seems the high end art market continues to hold up.