The Post-War To Present auction at Christie’s fetched a lackluster $21.3 million, barring a work by Helen Frankenthaler.
The live auction was held on February 27 in New York. A total of 224 items were planned to go on the auction block, but 67 went unsold while another 12 were withdrawn before the evening began. In the end, the auction fetched $21.3 million in total, with a sell-through rate of 64.7 percent and an average work value of $146,800. While not an exciting night, the auction managed to outperform the spring sale from last season, which was held on March 13. Out of the 248 planned lots, 61 were unsold and 10 withdrawn. However, the 177 works that were sold managed to bring only $21.5 million (an average lot value of $121,400).
The star of the night was definitely Concerto (1982) by Helen Frankenthaler which sold for $2.1 million – much higher than its higher estimate of $700,000 and accounting for about 10 percent of the revenues earned in the auction. Another highlight was Ed Ruscha’s Pressures (1967) which was sold for $2 million compared to its pre-sale high estimate of $1.5 million.
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Frankenthaler and Ruscha are the only two works that fetched seven-figures at the mid-season auction. Other noteworthy sales of the evening were Untitled (Ocean Park) by Richard Diebenkorn which sold for $781,200, and East River (1994) by Richard Estes which sold for $693,000. On the other hand, Mark Grotjahn’s Untitled (Big Red Butterfly with Three Blue Eyes 856) – which carried the highest pre-sale estimate of $700,000 – ended up unsold.
