Picasso Baby or almost Olympic Records in the Art Market

Yesterday, November 12 2013, Christie's New York auction in Rockefeller Plaza has broken more than one record: the auction itself gathered unprecedented $691,5 mln in total sales of which  $142,4 mln. were paid for Francis Bacon's triptych, Three Studies of Lucian Freud (1969). This sale smashed previous record of the most expensive painting ever sold in public auction - Edvard Munch's The Scream (1985) which went for $119.9 mln. on May 2, 2012 on the competitor's auction. 

According to Former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher Bacon was the “(that) man who paints 

those dreadful pictures”. This triptych depicts Bacon's friend and rival Freud and was sold almost twice as much as it was estimated by Christie's 

Edvard Munch's The Scream has several variations. 

This one is tempera and pastel on board (1893)

but very few of you probably know this painting 

called Despair, oil on canvas (1893-94) 

Meet Jeff Koons' 12 ft "Balloon Dog (Orange)" - the most expensive piece of art by a living artist sold on a public auction at a record $58,4 mnl. Jeff Koons made five variations of colored sculptures (red, orange, magenta, blue and yellow) aiming at reflecting "<..> joy of celebrating a birthday or a party." This theme has been well-marked appearing in many topnotch cultural and art sites such as  Grand Canal in Venice to the roof terrace of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Jeff Koon's 12 ft "Balloon Dog (Orange)" from 1994 "Celebration" series 

Gerhard Richter's Cathedral Square, Milan until 

yesterday was the most expensive painting of a living artist

Still, the unbeatable record is Paul Cézanne's The Card Players (1894-95) sold on April 2011 for $259 mln in private sales to the Royal Family of Qatar which earned Sheikha Al Mayassa the title of the most influential art persona of 2013 by the Art Newspaper because of her agency’s “vast purchasing power”. George Embiricos, a Greek shipping magnate and former owner of the painting, made a good business by selling the only privately held piece in the same year of few big retrospective exhibitions of Paul Cézanne, including the one in Paris and Milan. 

The Card Players 1892–93. Oil on canvas, 97 × 130 cm

Cézanne have made numerous studies and five paintings of the theme which is very significant for art history and is a cornerstone in the artist's artistic career, a prelude to his most acclaimed works. 

The Card Players, 1892-95,Courtauld Institute, London 

The Card Players 1894–1895, Musée d'Orsay, Paris

The Card Players, 1890–92, Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The Card Players, 1890–92, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

The Olympic Games' motto Citius - Altius - Fortius, the three words in Latin that mean Faster - Higher - Stronger, can be attributed to art world as well. Maybe the reason of sky-rocking prices can be explained by Nicolai Iljine's, an art consultant for the Guggenheim, phrase: “There is not much great art left on the market and there is a lot of competition to get it.”

If you are curious, the list of the most expensive art pieces ever sold (ca.50 items) in auctions include nine Picasso's and five Vincent van Gogh works, buyers apart from mostly American museums include Arab royals, quite a few hedge fund founders and businessmen, and ex-prime minister of Georgia, also a successful businessman. IMHO, Picasso is a Louis Vuitton of art world - or you crave it and adore (especially, the real luxury models), or you find it too mainstream like some of LV's model that made one of my consultant colleagues specializing in luxury say that LV is an "aspirational brand for secretaries" (no offense, plus, this colleague has so many leather goods  with LV monogram). Myself, I like a more figurative blue and pink periods of Piccaso and the time of his collaboration with Braque. 

Coming back to aspirational point of art, I want to finish the post with famous rapper Jay-Z's recent song Picasso Baby. 

"I just want a Picasso in my casa, no, my castle

I'm a hassa, no, I'm an asshole

I'm never satisfied, can't knock my hustle

I wanna Rothko, no, I want a brothel

No, I want a wife that fuck me like a prostitute

Let's make love on a million

In a dirty hotel with the fan on the ceiling

All for the love of drug dealing

Marble floors, gold ceilings

Oh, what a feeling, fuck it, I want a billion

Jeff Koons balloons, I just wanna blow up

Condos in my condos, I wanna row of

Christie's with my missy, live at the MoMA

Bacons and turkey bacons, smell the aroma"

If you want to read more about this, I suggest to check out SF MOMA's blog post.

If you love rankings, then check out the top 20 most expensive contemporary art auction prices list of 2013 compiled by Blouin Artinfo. 

Happy Lefthanders Day!

Today around 13% of the world population celebrates Lefthanders Day  which might sound a bit awkward to the remaining population. 

On one hand, throughout the centuries lefthanders have suffered not only from ink spread over their handwritten text and left palm or troubles in using any sort of tools/items ergonomically designed for a righthander person but also from accusations of being related to a Satan, thus persecuted.

On the other hand, it is said that lefthanders' brains are structured differently, they are more creative, learn languages easier.. well, I still suffer from learning Italian and remembering tiny bits of French I studied few years back! 

All this said, to celebrate Left-hand Pride I did a little research on who among the artist was actually a lefthander. 

Leonardo Da Vinci and Michelangelo Buonarotti 

Coeval masterminds, according to their biographer Vasari had “an intense dislike for each other”. It is difficult to chase back what was the actual reason as there is only one anonymous reference (mentioned in The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, Oxford University Press, 1952) to an incident happened in front of  Santa Trinità church in Florence when Leonardo was asked to explain a passage of Dante to some assembly of nobles whom he was passing by. At the same time, Michelangelo was walking the street and Leonardo replied back: ‘Michelangelo will be able to tell you what it means'. Maybe Leonardo's tone or behavior was offensive, but Michelangelo, a real fan of Dante, thinking this had been said to entrap him, replied: ‘No, explain it yourself, horse-modeler that you are, who, unable to cast a statue in bronze, were forced to give up the attempt in shame.’ The horse models Michelangelo was referring to were those Leonardo planned to cast for the Duke of Milan, however, never did and the Duke at the end used his bronze to cast some cannons instead. 

I am not sure whether this accident happened before or after Leonardo's comment on sculptors in general (but, probably, targeting an ill-tempered Michelangelo in particular) that painters are more noble than sculptors whose hands are always dirty from clay. Indeed, Leonardo was more of a rock star of his time dressed in fine clothes, living a great life of that time and enjoying everyone's acceptance of his slow approach to work and unreliability while Michelangelo, a hardworking man suffered a lot from misunderstanding with his patrons, critique and time to time financial misery. 

Nevertheless, despite their discontent from each other, Milan's Catello Sforzesco unites the two Renaissance artists' unfinished works under one roof: few rooms decorated by Leonardo, but never finalized as he was more concentrated on working in Florence at that time and the Rondanini Pietà by Michelangelo that he worked on for more than fourteen years before he died at the age of 88. Reworked many times, this sculpture, depending from the angle perspective may seem like Jesus holding Mary vs. Mary cradling Jesus. 

Edward Munch

Norwegian artist whose 150th birthday is celebrated this year in Oslo is probably best known for The Scream painting that went on sale for $120 million in April 2012 becoming world's #9 most expensive painting sold on auctions or private sales. However, my favorites are the two works below:

Madonna, 1894-95

 

One of The Sick Child, 1985-1986 paintings dedicated to his sister's death. Probably, because of  a touching personal story behind this work, the style and techniques as well as the way the painting was lighted up in the museum, I remembered it as the best I have seen in the Munch museum in Oslo

Sir Cecil  Beaton

English photographer and stage designer best knows for the series of photo portraits of Queen Elizabeth II, Hollywood (and not only) celebrities as well as Vogue fashion photography. 

Queen Elizabeth II

Another Queen, but of Hollywood

Artist David Hockney 

Marlene Dietrich, 1935  

 Princess Ira Von Furstenberg, 1955

Maria Callas

C.Beaton for Vogue

C.Beaton for Vogue

 Fashion photography with Jackson Pollock's painting on the background

However, until last August, when an exhibition of Beaton's war theme photos were revealed from the Imperial War Museum archives, very few of us knew about this side of his photographic talent.

Men of a Long Range Desert Group after returning 

to HQ at the end of a desert patrol, Siwa, Libya, 1942 

There are many more lefthanders: Raphael,  Rembrandt, Albrecht Durer, Hans Holbein (the younger), Francesco Borromini, Jan des Bouvrie, Paul Klee, however, I will try to write something interesting on them some other time, maybe next August 13th!