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Arts & Leisure: London Art Market Woos ‘Uber-Collectors’ to Buoy Summer Sales

Admin — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 09:47:21 +0000

Auctioneers are pinning their hopes on “uber-collectors” to help London summer art sales top last year’s US$1 billion total when the series kicks off later this month.

Estimates from Christie’s, Sotheby’s and smaller rivals such as Phillips and Bonhams for sales over the next few weeks in the British capital show that the paintings, sculptures and furniture under the hammer are on course to defy a sluggish global economy again this year.

The top two houses have put more than US$300 million worth of their most expensive works up for sale on public show until June 11 at their London galleries in Mayfair, hoping pre-sale exhibitions might inspire a bit of impulse-buying from serious collectors making the London stop on the art trail.

“What we hope is that the rather more transitory uber-collectors who are in London, Basel and Venice will come in and see things that they wouldn’t normally look at,” deputy chairman of Christie’s Europe, Orlando Rock, told Reuters.

Christie’s, the world’s biggest auctioneers, has a star lot that is a price-on-request (around US$23 million) diptych by 20th century American painter Jean-Michel Basquiat, and a painting from Russian Expressionist Wassily Kandinsky, which could set a lifetime record for the artist if it sells north of US$23 million. Its top estimate is US$24.86 million.

Nearest rival Sotheby’s has French Impressionist Claude Monet’s “Le Palais Contarini” with a top estimate of US$31 million and paintings by 18th century Frenchman Claude-Joseph Vernet (US$7.7 million) and British contemporary artist David Hockney (US$4.6 million).

Continued weakness in a battered eurozone and slowing Chinese economic growth have made investors wary in the last two years, but high-end art sales have continued to break records.

New York has long been considered the global capital of the auction world – most recent records have been set there.

This year’s spring auctions were no different, ending on a record-shattering high as Christie’s May 15 post-war & contemporary art sale achieved the highest total – US$495 million – in the history of art auctions.

None of the star London lots currently come near the US$58.4 million paid at the Christie’s sale in New York for US artist Jackson Pollock’s “Number 19, 1948″.

A closer look at the estimates from Christie’s and Sotheby’s give a mixed picture of a London season that looks healthy but may not blast the record books.

Estimates from Christie’s of about US$388 million for this year are lower than sales of just under US$600 million last year, although the top estimate from Sotheby’s for US$562 million easily eclipses last year’s nearly US$385 million.

Alongside the Old Masters, modern and fine art, auction houses have mixed in precious objects such as a Georgian coffee pot expected to become the most expensive piece of English silver ever sold and a 15th century Virgil manuscript, as well as collectibles like a watch worn by James Bond in “Thunderball” and unreleased lyrics from singer Bob Dylan.

London, a natural fit for Russian tycoons who have homes in the city and Middle Eastern buyers just a mid-haul flight away, will offer sought-after sculptures from antiquities to Alberto Giacometti, Henry Moore and Elisabeth Frink, as well as fine Louis XIV furniture.

A jewelled automaton silkworm lurks near a pair of Louis XVI vases among the 80 works chosen by Sotheby’s for public display, along with a 17th century El Greco painting and a 1927 piece from Dutch painter Piet Mondrian.

“This will be an exhibition that speaks to the catholic taste of today’s collectors as well as to everyone who loves great works of art and enjoys the thrill of the unexpected,” said Mario Tavella, Sotheby’s deputy chairman for Europe.

Soaring prices for art at a time of global economic uncertainty have long prompted warnings of a sharp correction and even collapse, but time and again in the last four years the market has defied the gloomiest predictions.

Chinese demand has weakened and tastes can be fickle, but the very best works of art have generally risen in value since a sharp but brief drop in auction turnover in 2009.

The only copy of Edvard Munch’s seminal image “The Scream” still in private hands came up for sale at Sotheby’s in New York last year.

After nearly 15 minutes of intense bidding, made in million-dollar increments, it sold for US$120 million including commission, a new auction record for any work of art.

The two previous records were also recent – Pablo Picasso’s “Nude, Green Leaves and Bust” fetched US$106.5 million in 2010, having sold for US$19,800 in 1951. In the same year Giacometti’s “Walking Man I” made US$104.3 million.

Institutions have played a key role in the recovery, with Qatar emerging as one of the biggest buyers of art in recent years as it fills a growing network of museums.

According to widespread reports, the Gulf state paid US$250 million for Paul Cezanne’s “The Card Players” in a private deal in 2011, which is believed to be the highest price ever paid for a work of art.

Source: Reuters

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Arts & Leisure: Painting Seized by Nazis Fetches More Than US$3.3 Million at Auction

Admin — Fri, 07 Jun 2013 09:11:55 +0000

A 17th century Dutch masterpiece that graced the collections of Catherine the Great’s art adviser and Russia’s Hermitage Museum before being seized by the Nazis sold for nearly US$3.4 million at auction, a record for the artist Gerrit van Honthorst.

“The Duet,” which was confiscated by the Nazis from Jewish art collector Bruno Spiro and sold in 1969 to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, fetched US$3,371,750 including commission at Christie’s Old Master auction on Wednesday.

The painting, which the Montreal museum returned to Spiro’s heirs in April, has been estimated to sell for between US$2 million and US$3 million.

Nicholas Hall, Christie’s co-chairman of Old Masters and 19th century art, called the 1624 work “a superlative painting on all levels, with its composition, condition and provenance.”

Hall said the painting attracted multiple bidders, with four competing above the US$2 million mark. The buyer was Johnny van Haefton Ltd., a London dealer specializing in Dutch and Flemish Old Master art.

Executed at the height of Honthorst’s career, the painting is among the finest examples of the kind of nocturnal revelry for which the Dutch artist is celebrated, Christie’s said.

It depicts a theatrically clad man and woman standing together over an open book, singing by candlelight. The woman’s exposed breast and revealing garb, as well as the Utrecht setting, suggest that she is a courtesan and the man her client.

“The Duet” belonged to the collection of Count Alexander Stroganov of St Petersburg, Catherine the Great’s art adviser, during the 19th century. It was eventually housed at the Hermitage Museum before being nationalized after the Russian Revolution. The Soviet regime auctioned it in 1931 in Berlin and Spiro bought it soon after.

After World War Two it passed through several German private collections before being acquired by the Montreal museum.

Source Reuters

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Brazil’s Portinari Tops Christie’s Latin American Art Sale

Admin — Fri, 31 May 2013 10:49:13 +0000

A dream-like painting of children releasing kites by Brazil’s Candido Portinari sold for US$1.4 million at Christie’s Latin American art sale and set a world auction record for the artist.

Portinari’s 1941 “Meninos Soltando Pipas” was the top seller at the Wednesday evening sale, which totalled US$16.0 million and set benchmarks for other Latin American artists.

“The strength of the Brazilian market reigned supreme,” said Virgilio Garza, Christie’s Latin American art chief.

Portinari, who died in 1962, left a prolific legacy including monumental murals for the US Library of Congress and the United Nations headquarters in New York.

Colombian Fernando Botero’s 2000 bronze “Dancers,” which fetched US$1.14 million, was another top seller. The work, coated in brown patina, shows a heavily muscled nude man and a woman, her left hand on his right shoulder.

Mexican Alfredo Ramos Martinez’s “Mujeres con Frutas (Women with Fruit),” a portrait of two young Mexican Indian women, sold for US$1.07 million.

Ramos Martinez created the piece shortly after relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1920s to obtain expert medical care for his daughter. Hollywood luminaries of the time collected his work.

Art experts had high hopes going into the Latin American art sales amid a buoyant market, sparked by a record-breaking sale of contemporary art earlier this month. Christie’s contemporary art sale hauled in US$495.0 million – the highest of any art auction ever.

During Wednesday’s auction, records were set for Peruvian Tilsa Tsuchiya with the US$339,750 sale of her 1974 oil on canvas “Mujer Volando,” and for Venezuelan Francisco Narvarez, whose untitled ebony wood sculpture of a kneeling woman fetched US$267,750.

Brazilian artist Milton Dacosta also hit an auction record with the US$171,500 sale of “Figura,” a 1954 oil on canvas, and Mexican surrealist Remedios Varos’ “Vista al Pasado,” a 1957 graphite and pigment on paper, sold for US$291,750, a record high for her work on paper.

Other highlights included three works by Brazilian artist Afredo Volpi including “Fachada (no. 1331),” which sold for US$783,750, “Bandeirinhas horizontais com mastro (No. 1330),” which fetched US$651,750 and “Bandeirinhas com mastro (No. 2133)” which went for US$507,750.

Source: Reuters

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Richter Painting Breaks Record for Living Artist at NY Auction

Admin — Fri, 17 May 2013 09:28:31 +0000

A 1968 oil painting by German artist Gerhard Richter sold for some US$37 million at Sotheby’s contemporary art auction on Tuesday, a new record for a work by a living artist.

The sale took in US$293,587,000, at the low end of the pre-sale estimate of US$284 million to US$383 million, with 83 per cent of the 64 lots on offer finding buyers.

It featured some big numbers with five works selling for more than US$20 million. But results were uneven as offerings by such contemporary stars such as Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Jeff Koons either underperformed or failed to sell.

Barnett Newman’s “Onement VI,” a vibrant blue work from 1953 being sold by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, fetched the top price – US$43,845,000 including commission. It set a record for the artist, beating the high estimate of US$40 million.

But it was the 81-year-old Richter’s “Domplatz, Mailand (Cathedral Square, Milan),” offered by the Hyatt Hotels Corp., which broke the record already held by Richter for a work at auction by a living artist. It sold for US$37,125,000, near the middle of the US$30 million to US$40 million estimate.

Tobias Meyer, head of Sotheby’s contemporary art department who also served as auctioneer, called the price “a major accomplishment.”

The work, which Sotheby’s sold about 15 years ago for about US$3.5 million, was bought by collector Don Bryant, founder of Napa’s Bryant Family Vineyard. He pumped his fist in the air as the hammer came down with his winning bid.

“This just knocks me over,” he said of the work, which depicts a cityscape rendered in a style that suggests a blurred photograph, after the sale.

“I just love it … . I just love art,” Bryant, founder and chairman emeritus of St. Louis employee benefits firm the Bryant Group, told Reuters.

But the auction also had some big hiccups, notably Francis Bacon’s “Study for Portrait of P.L.,” which carried an estimate of US$30 million and US$40 million but failed to attract even a glimmer of interest.

One of Koons’ signature “readymades,” a sculpture featuring four Hoover vacuum cleaners estimated at US$10 million to US$15 million, went down when bidding fell shy of the reserve – the secret minimum price at which a consigner agrees to sell a work.

Other highlights included Yves Klein’s “Sponge Sculpture Blue, SE 168,” which sold for US$22 million, and Clyfford Still’s “PH-21,” which fetched US$20.9 million, both works selling for prices in line with their estimates.

Jackson Pollock’s “Blue Unconscious” went for US$20.9 million, a bargain considering the US$20 million to US$30 million estimate (estimates do not include commission, which runs just over 12 per cent).

The auctions continue on Wednesday with Christie’s sale of post-war and contemporary art.

Source: Reuters

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New Soutine Record Set as Christie’s Meets Impressionist Goal

Admin — Fri, 10 May 2013 09:40:50 +0000

A record was set for French artist Chaim Soutine on Wednesday at Christie’s auction of Impressionist and modern art, which met expectations with a total of just under US$160 million.

The tightly edited sale of 47 works exceeded Christie’s auction a year ago by more than US$40 million, but the earlier evening featured only 31 lots. Still, an impressive 94 per cent of the works on offer found buyers which officials said was its best sell-through rate since 2006.

“We saw high demand for blue-chip names such as Picasso and Monet,” said Brooke Lampley, Christie’s New York head of Impressionist and modern art.

“But we also saw an educated marketplace for rarities like the Soutine and Chagall,” she added, referring to the evening’s two top-priced works.

Officials also pointed to global presence, saying more than 30 countries participated in the auction which totalled US$158.5 million, near the middle of expectations of about US$130 million to US$190 million.

Soutine’s circa 1927 oil “Le petit patissier” as expected achieved the sale’s highest price of US$18,043,750 including commission, breaking the artist’s auction record. But the price was near the low end of the US$16 million to US$22 million pre-sale estimate.

Another highly touted work, Andre Derain’s avant-garde portrait “Madame Matisse au kimono,” was the sale’s one major casualty. Estimated to sell for US$15 million to US$20 million, it went unsold when officials said initial strong interest in the work fell off at the 11th hour.

Other highlights included Chagall’s “Les trois acrobats,” which soared past its estimate of US$6 million to US$9 million to fetch US$13 million, and Egon Schiele’s “Selbstbildnis mit Modell (Fragment),” which nearly doubled its estimate and sold for US$11.3 million.

Modigliani’s “La Juive” was only estimated at US$2 million to US$3 million but sold for more than US$6.8 million. Miro’s “Peinture” fell short of its US$10 million to US$15 million estimate (estimates do not include commission of about 12 per cent), selling for just under US$11 million.

The auctions continue next week when both Christie’s and rival Sotheby’s hold their sales of post-war and contemporary art.

Source: Reuters

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Russia’s New Mariinsky Theatre Woos the Doubters

Admin — Fri, 03 May 2013 08:44:30 +0000

Enlisting the drama of Prokofiev and the elegance of Tchaikovsky, St Petersburg’s new Mariinsky theatre staged a gala opening on Thursday designed to silence critics of the starkly modernist building erected in the heart of Russia’s imperial capital.

The US$700-million glass and limestone building, which critics have dubbed the “Mariinsky mall”, glowed in the night sky, its glass and metal walkways humming with excited voices as the select crowd of 2,000 found their seats.

Just opposite, across a canal, the 19th century original opera house, one of the great showcases of Russian culture which became home to the Kirov opera and ballet companies in Soviet times, stood silent for the evening.

“We need breathe life into the theatre. We want it to live, so that people are attracted and can feel the charm of modern technology. Then it will shine in all its glory,” President Vladimir Putin told the guests, who included leading Russian businessmen.

Calling the Mariinsky by its affectionate short name Mariinka, Putin said the theatre had always preserved the best traditions of the Russian arts, never losing “its shine”.

“Seven hundred and sixty performances a year! And each one is world class. No artistic team in the world does that.”

Putin praised Valery Gergiev, director of the Mariinsky and regarded by many as the greatest living orchestral conductor, for pursuing a project that had been conceived just before Russia’s financial crash of 1998.

“In 2003, Gergiev raised the issue again and a new project arose,” Putin said, referring to a decision made after he became president in 2000.

The Mariinsky II is one of several grand projects sponsored by Putin intended to show what Russia can achieve, most notably the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.

Gergiev, whose 60th birthday coincided with the gala, had been criticized for commissioning a sleek, modern building which some say sits awkwardly among its pastel coloured 19th-century neighbours.

But in the end only two people protested outside. One of them, a woman, held a banner mocking Gergiev’s recent “Hero of Labour” award received from Putin on Wednesday, suggesting the conductor should either pull down the building or hand back the medal.

The conductor, a loyal ally of Putin, had shrugged off the criticism, saying the Mariinsky needed a new stage and state-of-the-art technology to produce the kind of theatre people expected to see today.

“People asked why do we need new architecture? Why does St Petersburg need a new opera house? I think the best way to answer those questions is simply to let people come in,” he told a news conference.

Many guests were impressed. Light bounced off wall panels made of Italian onyx that stretch several storeys high and the sound was excellent.

“I like the theatre and I liked the concert. It’s a contemporary theatre with great potential,” said former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin. “I love theatres and have been in many great theatres in different corners of the world. I think it is worthy of becoming one of them.”

The simple light wood of the balconies and aisles was a world away from the original Mariinsky Theatre, which was sumptuously decorated in gold and red. Only the VIP box in the Mariinsky II has a slight nod to extravagance – a modern chandelier to make prominent guests feel at home.

The gala opened with a dramatic excerpt from Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet ballet and included the coronation scene from Mussorgsky’s opera Boris Godunov, when the vast stage swarmed with peasants.

Ulyana Lopatkina and Viktor Baranov danced “Pavlova and Cecchetti” to Tchaikovsky and Placido Domingo sang a Wagner aria in front of an audience including Putin allies Alisher Usmanov, Russia’s richest man, and railways chief Vladimir Yakunin.

Source: Reuters

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Shakespeare’s New London Playhouse to Open Without the Bard

Admin — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 09:50:49 +0000

A new playhouse attached to Shakespeare’s Globe theatre in London announced its inaugural season on Monday, but there was no room for a single work by the Bard.

Instead the opening lineup at the candlelit Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, named after the American director who pioneered the main Globe, will feature three Jacobean plays including John Webster’s bloodfest “The Duchess of Malfi”.

Also part of the program in the tiny red brick building adjacent to the Globe will be a new youth company and a collaboration with the Royal Opera House.

“In time we will perform the plays of Shakespeare in there, but we could not be more delighted than to be opening this theatre with three such shining jewels from this time – a macabre tragedy, a riotous comedy and a beautiful philosophical satire,” artistic director Dominic Dromgoole told reporters.

Dromgoole will direct Webster’s Malfi first, followed by the anarchic comedy “The Knight of the Burning Pestle” by Francis Beaumont and a production of John Marston’s “The Malcontent” by the newly created youth company.

The new playhouse will also collaborate with Britain’s Royal Opera to put on 17th century Italian composer Francesco Cavalli’s “L’Ormindo”.

“It’s going to be astonishingly small, incredibly intimate with 360 people packed into a very tiny space,” Dromgoole said at a briefing in the Globe’s sleekly refurbished foyer.

Royal Opera’s director of opera Kasper Holten said he jumped at the chance to bring Cavalli to the new theatre on London’s South Bank, which launches its opening season in January, 2014.

“I just couldn’t keep my hands off this one,” he said.

A company of 12- to 16-year-olds will make up the Globe Young Players, following a countrywide search and training by the Globe’s resident experts in the craft and performance of early modern drama.

Grammy Award-winning guitarist John Williams will curate and perform in a four-concert sequence, working with fellow guitarist Pavel Steidl, kora player Tunde Jegede and guitarist John Etheridge to present concerts on selected dates.

Vocal ensemble I Fagiolini, who specialize in performing Italian and English music of the 16th and 17th centuries, will present two contrasting pieces from early 17th century Venice.

Like the Globe, the new indoor venue has been designed with careful research into the materials, methods, and decorative aesthetics of Jacobean buildings by a team of leading experts.

The original project to rebuild Shakespeare’s Globe, which burned down in 1613 after its thatched roof caught fire, was initiated by Wanamaker after his first visit to London in 1949.

It opened in 1997, four years after his death.

Source: Reuters

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Music and Your School-age Kids: Interview with Prof Gunter Boos of AMADEUS International School Vienna

Admin — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 10:51:53 +0000

Children who are musically-talented or show strong interest in music will now have an avenue to develop their interest in music without sacrificing their academic studies, said Professor Günter Boos, Principal of AMADEUS International School Vienna.

The school, nestled in the cradle of classical music, provides high-standard classical music training from professional musicians as well as international academic education.

The school’s rigorous academic curriculum includes subjects like Mathematics, Science, Theory of knowledge and Languages. Students will graduate with English and German, of which English is the standard classroom language.

The curriculum is augmented by a music programme at the AMADEUS Music Academy where music lessons will be tailored to each student’s specific needs.

In addition to individual training sessions with world-renowned musicians, there will be competitions, workshops and master classes. These will enable the students to realise their aspirations to become full-fledged musicians.

“We recognise that most parents are concerned that if they allow their children to pursue a pure music education at a young age, they may miss out on having an all-rounded education. They are also unsure whether their children will pursue a music career in their adult life. The objective of AMADEUS International School Vienna is to enable these musically-talented students to be trained by professional musicians and at the same time not neglect their academic studies. In other words, these students will have an option to pursue another professional career later on in life besides being a musician,” Boos said, who has 40 years of experience in the education industry and has trained as a teacher in Literature, History and Philosophy for secondary students.

Biz Daily sat with Professor Günter Boos as he explains further the philosophy behind the curriculum that AMADEUS International School Vienna offers to young musicians hoping to conquer the world’s most prestigious performance stages.

How different is AMADEUS from other institutions offering music education?

Our specialty is the music programme. We are a normal international school but we are quite different from other international schools because we have a special music programme in the afternoon and we call it AMADEUS Music Academy. We are delivering here a very high level music education for talented students.

Your curriculum also gives focus on developing social skills of students. Tell us more about this.

The social skills should be developed in all three parts of our school, in academics, music and in boarding. The social skills are for me the most relevant. Without this learning attitude, without learning (about) taking care of each other, without learning democracy, you are nothing in the future of Vienna, especially on this high level of education. Therefore these skills are most important for our education.

We also try to give students experience in social mingling (and) society in Vienna. We send them out for internship for 10 days in a company or in some music-related organisations.

Since AMADEUS is a boarding school, how would you address parents’ concern on safety?

Maybe you know that Vienna was coined as the most interesting city worldwide*.

Safety concerns, of course, no city is completely safe. We are not a high security prison in Vienna, but we are looking carefully after the students, especially in our surroundings. Our school is situated in a fence in an old building and we have our boarding staff, with guards around for giving students (a) helping hand.

At the moment we have all these students aged between 13 and 15 and they are not allowed to go alone to the city centre. Maybe later, if they’re turning 16, 17…. there’s a lot of time for them to go out, but at the moment it’s not allowed.

Safety is a very high priority for us but safety means our students also have to deal with the surroundings – they have to know what is happening in Vienna. And they have to learn to be careful, but Vienna is, I would say, the safest city in Europe.

*Mercer Quality of Living Survey ranked Vienna first on the list of “Most Livable Cities”

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Christie’s to Enter Mainland China Market

Admin — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 09:48:02 +0000

Christie’s International (CHRS) will hold a sale in Shanghai in the autumn of 2013, making it the first international auction house to hold its own branded events in mainland China.

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The London-based company, which has maintained an office in Shanghai since 1994, has been granted a licence to operate independently in China, it said.

“The art market continues to grow at a tremendous rate due to the burgeoning interest, in art particularly in Asia and China,” Steven P. Murphy, chief executive officer of Christie’s, said in the release.

Sales of art and antiques in China raised EUR10.6 billion (US$13.7 billion) in 2012, making it the world’s second- biggest market, according to a report published last month by the European Fine Art Foundation. The country’s regulatory framework has previously hindered foreign companies from holding events in China, leaving Hong Kong as the centre for international auctions.

Hong Kong was Christie’s third-biggest auction centre in 2012, contributing GBP440.9 million (US$673 million) of sales. The number of clients from mainland China bidding at its international auctions has doubled since 2008, the company said.

The main motivation behind securing the license is to sell locally-sourced objects to mainland Chinese clients.

“The idea is to source locally like we do in London or Paris or Geneva,” Francois Curiel, Christie’s president of Asia operations, said in a phone interview. “Right now most Chinese are buyers. But in a few years they might be sellers too.”

The 30-year licence allows Christie’s to hold auctions anywhere in China, though it is barred from selling cultural relics inside the country, which can mean anything created before 1949.

The company plans to sell wine, jewellery, watches and contemporary Chinese paintings, as well as modern paintings from abroad. To avoid a thicket of taxes, it may hold some of its sales in duty free zones.

A relationship with Forever Christies, a Beijing-based auction house which licensed the Christie’s name, would end after its final auction in May, he said.

Sotheby’s (BID) has just ended a six-day auction in Hong Kong with a total sale of HK$2.18 billion, led by wines from El Bulli’s cellar and a jewelled Patek Philippe clock that set an auction record for a clock by the Swiss maker.

The publicly traded, New York-based auction house, said in September last year that it had signed an equity joint venture agreement with China’s Beijing GeHua Cultural Development Group, a state-owned media conglomerate. An inaugural sale, comprising a single work by the Chinese contemporary artist, Wang Huaiqing, was held in Beijing on September 27 and raised RMB1.7 million (US$267,307).

Last month, Tefaf, the world’s biggest art and antiques fair, said that it was in talks with Sotheby’s to plan a collaborative event in China.

A group of UK auctioneers is holding a sale of art and antiques valued at GBP8.0 million in mainland China later this month.

The recently formed Association of Accredited Auctioneers (Triple-A), comprising 21 independent firms from around the UK, will sell about 400 lots at the Xiamen Free Port in Fujian province on April 21.

The event will be conducted by the Chinese company Huachen Auctions Co Ltd and will be promoted by EpaiLive Auction Co Ltd, the country’s only online live bidding portal, Triple-A said.

“This event will establish levels of demand and create more of an understanding of how auctions work in the UK,” Chris Ewbank, the consortium’s chairman, said in an interview.

“There have been problems with non-payment. Some buyers from China do expect to negotiate auction prices.”

The sale will test China’s appetite for the European taste in a wide variety of collecting areas. An Andy Warhol “Mickey Mouse” silkscreen, from an edition of 200 published in 1981, is estimated at GBP80,000 to GBP120,000. An experimental sheet of “Penny Red” stamps from 1840 is valued at GBP200,000 and a 5th-century B.C. Syracuse coin is priced at GBP40,000 to GBP60,000.

A Mercedes-Benz Formula 1 racer that Juan Manuel Fangio drove to two Grand Prix victories may sell for as much as US$15.0 million in July.

The silver Mercedes W196 will be auctioned by Bonhams and has yet to have a formal valuation. Dealers with knowledge of the matter estimate it will make GBP6.0 million to GBP10.0 million. They have identified the seller as the Emir of Qatar, who acquired it from the German industrialist Friedhelm Loh about eight years ago. A spokesman in the Emir’s office said he would not comment on personal matters.

The market for historic autos continues to grow, boosted by wealthy individuals’ appetite for alternative investments. The HAGI index of exceptional classic-car prices advanced 16.1 per cent in 2012, said the London-based www.historicautogroup.com, using data from auction, dealer and private transactions. Prices for investment-grade Ferraris from the 1950s and 1960s surged in 2012.

“There is a smaller group of people who want to buy cars like this Mercedes,” Dietrich Hatlapa, founder and managing director of HAGI, said in an interview. “They have complicated engines and are expensive to run. And if you race them, you are always expected to win.”

Bonhams’s 180 MPH Mercedes is in its 20th-anniversary “Festival of Speed” auction at Goodwood, southern England, on July 12.

The straight-eight, 2½-liter car is a variant of the streamlined aluminium-bodied “Stromlinienwagen” in which Fangio won the 1954 French Grand Prix.

The Argentinian-born driver used this more manoeuvrable open-wheeled version to win that year’s subsequent German and Swiss Grands Prix, securing the second of five Drivers’ World Championship titles. Mercedes-Benz produced 15 examples of the W196 for the 1954 and 1955 Grand Prix seasons, several of which have been retained by the company.

“This is a fabulous car,” the Geneva-based adviser Simon Kidston said in an interview. “I’ve been contacted by various serious collectors who barely know what it is. The collecting world will be watching.”

Muse highlights include Manuela Hoelterhoff on arts, James Russell on architecture and Scott Reyburn on the art market.

Source: Bloomberg

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New-look Rijksmuseum Puts Dutch Masterpieces into Context

Admin — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 08:02:32 +0000

The Dutch national museum reopens this month after a decade-long overhaul in which nearly everything has been changed except for the setting of its most famous painting.

Rembrandt van Rijn’s “The Night Watch” will be the only work still hanging in the same place when Queen Beatrix officially opens the Rijksmuseum on April 13 after a EUR375 million (US$482.02 million) renovation to a treasure trove of Dutch art.

“We’ve had a complete transformation, everything is new,” General Director Wim Pijbes said at a press preview on Thursday. “The only thing that hasn’t changed is the place of ‘The Night Watch’.”

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Rembrandt’s large masterpiece shows Amsterdam’s civic guard setting off on a march and is approached along a “hall of fame” hung with works such as Johannes Vermeer’s “Woman Reading a Letter”, and “The Merry Drinker” by Frans Hals, as well as opulent displays of fruit and flowers.

The opening will be one of the queen’s last official duties before she abdicates, showing off the country’s art, its rich history as a naval power and society of merchants.

Many of the prize pieces in the collection of 8,000 works are now displayed in broader context, with related paintings, furniture, silver and ceramics arranged in close proximity to each other as part of the museum’s new layout.

Rembrandt’s portraits of a wealthy lady in a delicate lace ruff and a man wearing an exotic turban hang close to a portrait of Rembrandt by his friend, the artist Jan Lievens, with whom he shared a studio.

Nearby are works by another friend the silversmith Johannes Lutma and an oak cupboard inlaid with ebony and mother-of-pearl by Herman Doomer, whose work Rembrandt admired and whose portrait he painted.

“The 10-year renovation project gave us the opportunity to entirely reinvent our collection,” Director of Collections Taco Dibbits said.

“You create the world in which they lived and give a feeling of the times.”

Likewise, a room devoted to the country’s history as a naval power contains an enormous model of the Dutch warship “Willem Rex” and a trophy of war – the stern carving from King Charles II of England’s flagship “Royal Charles” which was captured by Dutch forces in 1667.

The ship was towed to the Netherlands where it was scrapped apart from its carving of a lion and unicorn. Nearby is an ink on canvas picture of The Battle of Terheide by Willem van de Velde. The artist, an early war painter, even includes himself in the work, shown sketching aboard a ship in the foreground.

The building itself has also had an extensive renovation.

Designed by Dutch architect Pierre Cuypers, a Catholic, the museum opened to the public in 1885 but was deemed too showy by Protestant critics. So gradually, many of the interior decorations, from murals to mosaics, were covered up or removed. Those have now been restored.

“Cuypers’s building was not well-received by the Protestants of Amsterdam because it looked like a cathedral, so they slowly covered up part of it,” said Antonio Ortiz, one of the architects who worked on the renovation.

“It was dark, dim, sad, a labyrinth. We have brought the building as close as possible to its original splendour.”

The museum hopes the overhaul will help catapult it up the rankings for visitors, and attract as many as 2 million visitors a year, up from about 1.2 million just before the renovation work started.

That’s a far cry from the 10 million people who visit the Louvre in Paris each year.

Source: Reuters

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