UNTITLED (STOFFBILD)
London's February contemporary art sales are a huge success. At Sotheby's 74 of the 77 lots offered sold for £54.07 million, or about $84.5 million. While greater totals have been recorded in the past, a contemporary art sale with a 96 percent success rate is an unheard-of occurrence. For example, there is no common denominator between Chris Ofili’s “Through the Grape Vine,” dated 1998, and Blinky Palermo’s “Untitled (Stoffbild),” executed between 1967 and 1969, except for one — both nearly doubled their high estimate within minutes of each other, each time setting a new world auction record. Ofili’s work, executed in acrylic, oil, resin, glitter, collage and, for good measure, elephant dung, is an attempt at tongue-in-cheek humor with its figural, faux naïve vine branch painted in shades of pink. That earned its creator the Turner Prize in 1998. Bidders deferentially ran up the Ofili to a stupendous £802,250. “Untitled (Stoffbild)” by Palermo, who died in 1977, could not be more different from Ofili’s prize winner. The Palermo work, a large square panel of cotton fabric on burlap, is painted with two bands of solid color of uneven height, respectively dark blue and turquoise. It fetched an equally amazing £1.11 million. Immediately after, an “Abstract Picture” signed in 1988 by Gerhard Richter, rose to $2.5 million. Buyers and sellers have been encouraged by results such as the $43.8 million paid for an Andy Warhol at Sotheby’s, New York, in November. The ArtTactic Confidence Indicator for the U.S. and European contemporary-art markets has risen from 28 to 58, the highest level since November 2007.Last night’s highest price was 4 million pounds, given by a telephone buyer for the 1983 de Kooning abstract “Untitled XIV.” It was being sold by a European collector who acquired it from the painter’s estate. The work had been expected to fetch as much as 3 million pounds. It's obvious people feel confident about buying art again. They’re not getting interest in the bank, the stock market is erratic and investors want to sink money into fine paintings. On Wednesday, neither style nor aesthetic achievement had a bearing on prices. Bidders were prepared to go for anything, as long as the artists had achieved a degree of prominence. Buyers seemed eager to spend their money and obtain something tangible in exchange, however flimsy the aura surrounding the works might appear to be. Never before has contemporary art received such an unreserved financial accolade.
