An auction at Christie’s in New York of the art collection of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, who died in 2018, brought in a record $1.62 billion on Wednesday and Thursday, with five works fetching more than 100 million dollars each.
A sign that the art market continues to grow insolently despite geopolitical and economic uncertainties, these five paintings were all sold on Wednesday evening during a memorable evening at Rockefeller Center in Manhattan.
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This is Georges Seurat “Les Poseuses Ensemble – Small version” sold for $149.2 million, Paul Cézanne “Sainte-Victoire Mountain” 137.7 million, Vincent Van Gogh “Orchard with cypresses” 117.1 million, Paul Gauguin “Maternity II” 105.7 million and Gustav Klimt Birch Forest sold for $104.5 million.
The absolute record figure for an auction of works of art was established Wednesday evening at more than 1.5 billion dollars. Thursday evening, the second part of the sale only reached ” that “ $116 million. In total over the two days, Christie’s announced an astronomical amount of more than 1.62 billion dollars.
155 masterpieces
“The Paul G. Allen collection has attracted tens of thousands of visitors to Christie’s art galleries around the world and has gone down in history setting a record for the most expensive auction ever” carried out, rejoiced in a press release the CEO of the New York house, Guillaume Cerutti.
In total, the collection included “155 masterpieces spanning 500 years of art history (and) 100% have sold”. On customers all over the world, “28% of the works in value were purchased Wednesday evening by Asian customers”according to Christie’s.
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The company controlled by the Artémis holding company of French billionaire François Pinault had announced that the entire amount of sales would be donated to charity. Despite his falling out with Bill Gates, his partner in the birth of Microsoft in 1975, the American billionaire Paul Allen, had signed in 2009 his “Giving Pledge”pledging to donate the majority of his fortune.
The value of this collection blasted the previous record for the Macklowe collection, named after a wealthy New York couple, which reached $922 million at competitor Sotheby’s in the spring.
With these sales and that of a portrait of Marilyn Monroe “Shot Sage Blue Marilyn” by Andy Warhol who left in May for 195 million dollars, the year 2022 should remain as one of the most lucrative in the history of the art market.
