Lot
10, "Le Parlement, soleil couchant," by Claude Monet, oil on canvas, 32
by 36 1/4 inches, 1900-1903
The May 12, 2022 auction of the
Collection of Anne H. Bass is highlighted by three fine works by Monet
and several by Degas.
The
auction, which comprised 12 lots, totalled $363,087,500.
Lot 10, "Le Parlement, soleil couchant," by Claude Monet
(1840-1926), is an oil on canvas. 32 by 36 1/4 inches, 1900-1903
It has an
estimate on request. It sold
for $79,960,000.
The
catalogue's website provided the following commentary:
“There’s
no land more
extraordinary for a painter” (quoted in G. Seiberling, Monet
in London, exh.
cat.,
High Museum of Art,
Atlanta,
1988). Claude Monet’s emphatic passion for England’s
capital is magnificently
displayed in his monumental, landmark series, the Vues
de Londres. Started in
London
in 1899 and completed in Giverny in
1904, this series remains today among his greatest achievements, as he
transformed the city into magical, elegiac visions at once timeless and
modern.
"Charing
Cross Bridge,
Waterloo Bridge,
and the Houses of
Parliament
served as the principal subjects of this seminal group, each landmark a
pretext
for symphonic, often near abstract combinations of light and color. A
host of
both subtle and dramatic meteorological conditions—from the soft, gray
morning
light, to spectacular, fog-filled evening skies streaked pink, purple,
and
orange by the setting sun—gave rise to a theater of effects that Monet
reveled
in from his vantage point at the Savoy Hotel and St. Thomas’s Hospital.
The
largest series of paintings the artist had yet produced, numbering
almost a
hundred canvases, the Vues
de Londres pushed
Monet to the extremes of his artistic powers, testing the
fundamental Impressionist tenet of capturing the ephemeral, fleeting
atmospheric effects of nature.
"Crowning this series are the nineteen paintings of the Houses of
Parliament, of
which Le
Parlement, soleil couchant is one of the finest
(Wildenstein, nos. 1596-1614). Begun in either 1900 or 1901, on his
second or
final painting campaign in the capital, and completed in 1903, this
painting
shows the golden orb of the sun, having burnt through the impenetrable
cloak of
clouds and fog to cast the scene into an atmospheric array of
jewel-like
violets and lilacs, cobalt and inky blues, and deep pink tones.
Dwarfing the
tugboat that noiselessly crosses the river, the majestic, windowless
silhouette
of the Houses of Parliament appears mystical, the rising and falling
pattern of
towers seemingly both emerging from the sulphurous light and at the
same time,
dissolving into the expansive, still waters of the Thames, London’s
silent
witness of epochs past.
"Among the most rich and deeply colored works of the series, this
painting shows
Monet’s mastery at capturing the velvety darkness that gradually
engulfs the
vista, the 'hair’s breadth' moment between day and night, 'when the
light and
the darkness are so evenly balanced that the constraint of day and the
suspense
of night neutralize each other, leaving absolute mental liberty,' as
Thomas
Hardy once described (Tess
of the d’Urbervilles,
London, 1892...). For Monet, this moment offered him not
only mental, but artistic liberty, as his subject was transformed upon
his
canvas into a transcendent and wholly immersive vision of color, light,
and
pigment, rendered in expressive, passionate brushstrokes.
"Le
Parlement, soleil couchant was one of the thirty-seven works that
Monet chose to include in
his critically acclaimed exhibition, Monet:
Vues de la Tamise à
Londres, held
at the Galerie Durand-Ruel in 1904. Today, it is one of only four of
this
Parliament series to remain in private hands. Other works now reside in
museums
including the Musée d’Orsay, Paris;
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The National Gallery of Art,
Washington, D.C.; and the Kunsthaus, Zürich.
"The idea of an extended series set in London
had been percolating in Monet’s mind for some years prior to his first
painting
campaign there in 1899. In 1880, he had written to the critic Théodore
Duret,
“When you come through Paris you can advise me on what the chances
could be for
me in coming to spend several weeks in London where I could paint some
aspects
of the Thames” (quoted in exh. cat., op.
cit., 1988...).
Yet, it was not
until 1887 that the artist actually traveled to London, spending a
twelve day
sojourn in the city, where he especially admired his friend James
McNeill
Whistler’s famed Nocturnes depicting the Thames and the
thick fogs that surrounded
it. It seems that these works planted the seed for Monet’s own series.
He
described his desire to return 'to paint some effets of fog on the Thames'
(quoted in R. Thomson, Monet
and Architecture, exh.
cat., National Gallery, London,
2018...).
"The artist and his family
installed themselves in the Savoy Hotel, the
fashionable
establishment set on the banks of the Thames just behind the Strand.
They took a suite of rooms on the 6th floor with a balcony overlooking
the
river. From here the heart of London
stretched before them, the panorama bathed in the pale winter sun
diffused
through a dense atmosphere of mist mingled with coal smoke from
domestic fires
and industrial furnaces. Looking to the right, Monet would have seen
the Houses
of Parliament rising impressively beyond the iron structure of Charing
Cross
railway bridge, complete with steam trains running back and forth, and
to the
left, the monumental, looming arches of Waterloo Bridge framed by a
plethora of
factory chimneys complete with bellowing plumes of smoke that lined the
banks
of the river eastwards into the City and beyond. This vantage point
held two of
his three London
motifs, all of which were recent constructions amid the ever-expanding
expanse
of the turn-of-the-century capital. Thrilled with his setup, Monet
quickly
converted one of their rooms into a studio, leaving his family to
sightsee
together, while he explored the artistic potential of his new
surroundings.
"This was not the first time Monet had depicted the rapidly growing
Victorian
metropolis. He had spent what he later described as a “miserable time”
in the
city in 1870-1871, during les
années terribles of
the Franco-Prussian
War. While there, Monet painted five works of London, one of which depicts the
Houses of
Parliament (Wildenstein, no. 166). Yet, after so many years immersed in
the serial depiction of
rural France, his Meules and Peupliers, and even to an extent the gothic
façade of Rouen Cathedral, it
was in many ways a surprising move for the artist to return to the
modern
metropolis, a subject he had more or less abandoned after his great
Gare
Saint-Lazare group of the late 1870s. Even more unusual was his
decision to
cross the Channel for such an endeavor, when he could have found such
modern
vistas in his own country....
"Filled with enthusiasm for his new project, Monet returned to London in
February 1900....Monet was
immediately captivated by the vista of Sir Charles Barry’s
recently
rebuilt neo-Gothic palace....
"Despite sharing near identical subject matter, no two works of this
group are
the same—each one rendered in a distinct palette and evoking a
different mood.
Sometimes Parliament and the river appear enveloped in a soft gray fog,
other
times they remain resolute amid dramatically windswept or storm laden
skies.
Gulls sweep through two of the compositions, their presence adding a
Romantic
drama (Wildenstein, nos. 1612-1613), and in another, the sky threatens
to crack
open, filled with dazzling streaks of golden light (Wildenstein, no.
1603).
"With each day that passed, the “pretty red ball” of the sun, as Monet
had once
described (D. Wildenstein, op.
cit., 1985, letter
1597), moved gradually higher,
meaning that the striking effect of Parliament backlit by the setting
sun would
soon cease to exist for the year. Another work of the group, now in the
Kunstmuseen, Krefeld (Wildenstein, no. 1602), features the same
coin-sized sun,
this time hanging lower and closer to the turrets, a sign that the
present Le
Parlement, soleil couchant was begun later in Monet’s
campaigns, the sun ascendant as spring inched closer. “Time marches on
and the
sun too, so that when the day comes that it decides to appear, it will
no
longer be in the same place” (ibid., letter 1525).
"
The Houses of Parliament offered Monet a different kind of motif to the
bridges
of his other series. Aside from the obviously contrasting compositional
effects
of the structure and appearance of these subjects, this site was also
imbued
with an alternate symbolic resonance. Trains and vehicles pass in a
cavalcade
across Monet’s visions of Charing Cross and Waterloo Bridge,
while river traffic moves beneath them, all of which charge these
scenes with
an energy, and above all, an unmistakable modernity. By contrast,
as Le
Parlement, soleil
couchant encapsulates,
the Parliament works are endowed with a solemnity and stillness that
lends them
a greater sense of monumentality and timelessness. Appearing, “like
specters,
their towers rising to various heights as if replicating some ancient
hierarchy
or medieval form of competition,” the Palace of Westminster
appears otherworldly in these works, the vivid color and atmospheric
effects
that surround it transforming bricks and mortar into ethereal visions
(P.H.
Tucker, Claude
Monet: Life and Art,
New Haven and London, 1997, p. 169).
"Yet more than solely the edifice they depict, with all its symbolic
resonance,
it is nature itself that is rendered extraordinary in these works.
Monet has
conveyed to the viewer the magical power of light and its ability to
transform
the tangible into the intangible. Color too is lent a new role in the
theater
of painting; no longer solely descriptive, but expressive and mystical.
Rendered on a large scale, with open, impassioned, and visible
brushwork, with
these works, Monet broke new ground in the realm of painting, the
example of
which would come to serve as a vital influence on future generations of
artists.
"While Monet could enforce a clear painting routine for himself during
his days
in London, the weather remained steadfastly out of his control, much to
his
frustration, anguish, and at times, awe, all of which he often conveyed
to
Alice in his copious correspondence. For an artist who had built his
career
upon mastering the depiction of the elusive, fleeting effects of
atmosphere on
the landscape, Monet found the depiction of London one of his greatest challenges
so far.
'This is not a country where you can finish a picture on the spot,” he
wrote
dejectedly to Alice
during his last visit to the city in 1901, a reflection of the fact
that even
after two extended stays, the weather could still outfox him. 'The
effects
never reappear. I should have just made sketches, real impressions'
(quoted in
P.H. Tucker, Monet
in the 20th Century,
exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts, Boston,
1998...).
"While the capricious London
weather was clearly a source of angst for the artist, there was one
aspect in
particular, the fog, that beguiled Monet, as it had for many artists
before
him. 'What I like most of all in London
is the fog,' he told the dealer René Gimpel. 'Without the fog, London would not
be a beautiful city. It’s
the fog that gives it its magnificent breadth' (quoted in exh.
cat., op.
cit., 1989, p.
258). He quickly learnt
the city’s routines: on Sundays, the dense smog would not appear until
later in
the day, when domestic smoke took the place of that which was usually
emitted
from the factories....
"After three campaigns in London,
Monet decided to finish the series in his studio at Giverny rather than
returning to the Savoy Hotel. The series continued to cause Monet great
difficulty, and he worked on it at Giverny for nearly three more years.
In
March 1903, he wrote to his dealer, Paul Durand-Ruel, “No, I’m not in London unless in
thought,
working steadily on my canvases, which give me a lot of trouble. I
cannot send
you a single canvas of London,
because, for the work I am doing, it is indispensable to have all of
them
before my eyes, and to tell the truth not a single one is definitively
finished. I work them out all together or at least a certain number,
and I
don’t yet know how many of them I will be able to show, because what I
do there
is extremely delicate. One day I am satisfied, and the next everything
looks
bad to me, but anyway there are always several good ones” (quoted in
exh.
cat., op.
cit., 1988, p. 80).
Monet finally exhibited thirty-seven paintings of London
at Durand-Ruel’s gallery in May 1904: eight views of Charing Cross Bridge,
eighteen of Waterloo
Bridge, and eleven
of the
Houses of Parliament, including the present canvas. The exhibition was
a
resounding success. Marc Joël of La
Petite Loire called
it “marvelous...one
of the most beautiful demonstrations of pure art,” while Georges
Lecomte
believed that Monet had never “attained such a vaporous subtlety, such
power of
abstraction and synthesis” (quoted in exh. cat., op.
cit., 1989, p. 267).
“In his desire
to paint the most complex effects of light,” another critic wrote,
“Monet seems
to have attained the extreme limits of art. He wanted to explore the
inexplorable, to express the inexpressible, to build, as the popular
expression
has it, on the fogs of the Thames.
And worse
still, he succeeded” (ibid., p. 267).
"Anticipating the success
of the Parliament series, Durand-Ruel
purchased nine
of the finest, including the present work, just before the opening of
the
exhibition in May 1904. Over the course of the following years, many of
these
paintings were acquired by prominent collectors such as Henry O.
Havemeyer,
Isaac de Camondo, and Sergei Shchukin. The present work was acquired
from
Durand-Ruel by the prominent Boston
lawyer, William Lowell Putnam in 1907. He also acquired another of
Monet’s London series, Waterloo
Bridge,
effet de brouillard (sold, Christie’s New York, 13 May 2021, lot 8B), from
his sister, Amy
Lowell. It remained in his family's collection until at least 1962."

Lot 11, Poplars au bord de l'Epte,
automne, by Claude Monet, oil on canvas. 39 3/4 by 25 7/8 inches, 1891
Lot 11,
"Poplars au bord de l'Epte, automne," by Claude Monet, is an oil on
canvas that measures 39 3/4 by 25 7/8 inches. It was painted in
1891. It has an estimate of $30,000,000 to $50,000,000. It sold for $36,457,000.
It was once owned by Stephen C. Clark of New York.
The catalogue
essay provided the following commentary:
"During the spring of 1891,
Claude Monet discovered an intriguing
new subject in a stretch of elegant poplars lining the banks of the
river Epte,
just two kilometers south of his home at Giverny. Inspired by their
towering
forms and the regular rhythm of their placement along the water’s edge,
he
began a concentrated series of paintings which placed the poplar as the
central
protagonist within the composition. Building on the development of his
experiments in the Meules series
(Wildenstein, nos. 1266-1290), which had occupied him over the course
of the
previous winter and were likely completed around the same time as the
poplar
paintings were begun, Monet set out to capture the trees in a variety
of light
conditions, tracking the changes in their shape, form and color as they
transitioned from early spring, through the height of their summer
growth, and
into early autumn. Executed in an array of rich, vigorous brushstrokes,
their
forms overlapping and intertwining across the canvas, Peupliers
au bord de l’Epte,
automne is
among the
most dynamic and richly worked paintings in the series, capturing the
trees as
the season shifts and their leaves turn a golden-red hue.
"...With their strict
linearity and intrinsic decorative elegance, the
poplar held
an obvious aesthetic allure for Monet—indeed, the trees had long been a
recurring feature within his paintings of the landscape, from his views
of Argenteuil
from the
1870s, to more rural pastures and open fields of Giverny through the
1880s and
early 1890s. A common feature within the French countryside during the
nineteenth century, poplars were typically found lining the entrance
routes to
grand châteaux, or used along rural roads as windshields for tilled
fields,
while land owners around the country planted them as a form of fencing
to demarcate
property boundaries. Svelte and elegant, they grew quickly—generally
twenty-five to thirty feet in a little over a decade—making them a
popular
investment for speculators, while their ability to quickly absorb large
amounts
of water made them a perfect addition to river banks as protection
against
flooding. Moreover, following the French Revolution, the poplar had
become a
symbol of liberty, largely due to its name, and ceremonial plantings
were
common on important anniversaries. As such, the tree became an emblem
of the
stability, beauty and fecundity of rural France within the public
imagination....
"The twenty-four
paintings in the Peupliers series
(Wildenstein, nos. 1291-1313) were all created from almost the exact
same
vantage point, near a spot where the Epte bends back on itself twice to
create
a distinctive S-shape. Whereas the Meules series
had focused on isolated grainstacks, an effect which endowed them with
a
greater sense of weight and monumentality, it is in their sheer numbers
and
their relationship to one another that the poplars achieve their
greatest
effect. Most of the series focuses on a screen of tall, slender poplars
in the
foreground, while behind, looping away along the river bank, the rest
of the
trees make up a beautiful arabesque pattern. In the present
composition, the
sweep begins behind the bushy tree in the background on the left,
moving first
to the right and then to the left to touch each side of the scene,
before
finally culminating in the upper right corner, with the poplars
gradually
growing in size as they approach the viewer. Rather than looking
directly
across the river at the poplars, Monet turned slightly to the left to
accentuate the rise and fall of the trees as they followed the curving
bank,
generating a dynamic sense of movement and depth within the
composition....
"For many contemporary commentators, the Peupliers paintings
owed a great debt to Monet’s interest in Japanese art, which was at its
height
in the 1890s. The artist had begun to collect Japanese woodcut prints
as early
as 1871, and by the time that he painted the present series, the walls of his house at
Giverny were
covered with them. The Japanese were widely seen by French observers as
masters
at extracting decorative patterns from nature, and Théodore Duret went
so far
as to claim that the Peupliers had
been inspired by the sweeping curves of trees in Utagawa
Hiroshige’s Numazu:
Twilight (Numazu,
tasogare zu), from
the
series Fifty-three
Stations of the Tokaido Road (Tokaido gojusan tsugi no uchi) (circa 1833-1834). But as is true with all of
Monet’s work,
these paintings were not a direct response to any such singular source,
nor
Japanese prints in general—their surfaces are more manipulated, their
colors
more varied, as he artfully invoked Eastern sensibilities while
remaining true
to his native French roots and individual creative sensibilities.
Indeed,
in Peupliers
au bord de l’Epte, automne, the
entire canvas is filled with overlapping, darting brushstrokes, in a
dynamic
display of Monet’s skills with a paintbrush. Though at first glance
they may
suggest a certain spontaneity of execution, these richly worked
surfaces were
carefully constructed, underpinned by striking color harmonies that
enhanced
the decorative effect of the finished composition."

Lot
12, "Nymphias," by Claude Monet, oil on canvas, 37 by 35 inches,
1907
Lot
12, "Nymphiasm:," by Claude Monet, is a good oil on canvas that
measures 37 by 35 inches. It was painted in 1907.
It
has an estimate of $35,000,000 to $55,000,000. It sold for $56,495,000.
The
website provides the following commentary:
"During
the final two decades of
his long career, Monet devoted himself with single-minded focus to
painting the
hauntingly beautiful water garden that he had designed and cultivated
at his
home in rural Giverny. In some two hundred canvases, he captured the
shifting
relationships among water, reflections, and light that continually
transformed
the surface of his lily pond, the infinity of nature matched only by
the
prodigious breadth of his own creativity. 'His repeated treatment of
the
reflective surfaces of his pond,' Benedict Leca has written, 'and the
kaleidoscopic color variations of its flora visible above and beneath
mirrored
water served as an interminable canvas, where both motif and metaphor
of
reflection combined directly in the service of self-definition' (Monet
in Giverny: Landscapes of
Reflection,
exh. cat., Cincinnati Art Museum, 2012, p. 41). While these valedictory
paintings affirm Monet’s life-long belief in the primacy of vision and
experience, they are at once more abstract and more profound than
anything he
had previously painted—a prescient and visionary art for the new,
modern
century.
"Monet had moved to Giverny with his future wife Alice Hoschedé and
their
combined eight children during the last days of April 1883. Situated at
the
confluence of the Seine and the Epte, about forty miles northwest of Paris, Giverny
at the
time was a tranquil farming community of just three hundred residents.
Monet
found a sprawling, pink stucco house to rent on two acres of land, just
a few
hundred meters from the Seine. When
the
property came up for sale in 1890, he bought it at the asking price,
'certain
of never finding a better situation or more beautiful countryside,' as
he wrote
to his dealer Durand-Ruel (quoted in P.H. Tucker, Monet:
Life and Art, New
Haven, 1995, p. 175).
"A dedicated gardener all his life, Monet’s first priority upon
purchasing the
estate was to replace the vegetable plots in front of the house with
flower
beds, sparing neither time nor expense to transform /the acreage
into a
paradise
of vivid color and heady fragrance. Three years later, he acquired an
adjacent
piece of land beside the river Ru and successfully applied to the local
government
for permission to divert the tributary and dig a pond for aquatic
plants. By
autumn, he had converted nearly a thousand square meters into an
eastern-inspired water garden—hushed, mysterious, and
contemplative—with a lily
pond spanned by a wooden footbridge and encircled with an artful
arrangement of
flowers, bushes, and trees....
"Between 1893 and 1899, Monet made only ten images of the lily pond,
possibly
because he was waiting for the plantings to mature. He may also have
wanted to
cement his national stature by concentrating on subjects that were more
distinctly French—Rouen Cathedral, the Norman coast, and the
Seine—before
embracing his own horticultural fantasia. After the searing and
divisive events
of the Dreyfus Affair, though, Monet turned away from the glories of France
and
sought sustenance, both aesthetic and moral, in the personal landscape
of his
gardens. 'By tending to his own garden so meticulously and so
diligently and by
producing paintings of such startling beauty,” Tucker has explained,
“Monet was
affirming one of the most important principles of eighteenth-century
thinkers,
most specifically Voltaire—namely, that nature was the source of all
goodness and
wisdom and that each person should cultivate his own garden' (exh.
cat., op.
cit., 1998, p.
26).
"In 1899-1900, Monet painted eighteen views of the water garden, his
first
extended treatment of the theme (Wildenstein, nos. 1509-1520,
1628-1633). These
focus on the motif of the Japanese bridge, lending the composition a
stable
geometric structure and traditional linear perspective. It was not
until 1904,
following the completion of his London series, that Monet shifted his
gaze
downward to the surface of the pond, yielding a radically destabilized
vision
of shifting, disintegrating forms. The plane of the water now tilts
toward the
vertical, and the world beyond exists only in mirror-image. 'The
reflections of
the sky and the surrounding landscape, the surface of the water and
plants in
the depth of the pond, the reflected and the real landscape'” Karin
Sagner-Düchting has written, 'are combined into a new, virtual, even
simultaneously expanded, landscape space that refers far beyond reality
and
that is complex, ambivalent, and indefinable' (Monet
and Modernism, exh.
cat., Kunsthalle der
Hypo-Kulturstiftung, Munich, 2001, p. 68).
"Having established the essential compositional scheme for his water
lily
series, Monet began to work with unbroken intensity. Between 1905 and
1908, he
painted more than sixty Nymphéas. Within
the limitations he had set for himself, he
devised a dazzling array of variations, altering the arrangement of the
lily
blossoms, increasing or reducing the amount of reflected material, and
exploring
a wide range of lighting effects....
"The
latter paintings are dramatic in their contrasts and brooding in
their
mood—so much so that Durand-Ruel worried when he eventually saw them
about
their marketability. In the present canvas and the related Nymphéas, by
contrast, Monet mitigated
the value differences between the horizontally striated islands of
lilies and
the vertical reflections, producing an effect of integration and
harmony.
Conventional spatial recession, indicated by the diminishing scale of
the
blossoms and lily pads, is played against the flat surface of the
canvas, which
Monet emphasizes through his vigorous, textural brushwork. The flowers
themselves are rendered with the most impasto to give them a sculptural
presence, affirming their position on the top of the pond, while in the
watery
areas, thin layers of color are laid on top of one another to suggest
the
refractions of light and the changing hues in the pond’s depths.
"Monet and Durand-Ruel had originally agreed on a date of 1907 for the
inaugural
exhibition of the Nymphéas series.
The artist, though, repeatedly postponed the show,
“full of fire and confidence,” he told the dealer, and determined to
keep
working (quoted in exh. cat., op.
cit., 1998, p.
47). When the exhibition finally opened
in May 1909, it was stunning success—well worth the wait. Forty-eight
views of
the lily pond were featured, more than Monet had ever exhibited from a
single
series; the present painting was no. 28 in the group. Critics marveled
at how
transcendent and nearly abstract the pictures appeared, even by
comparison with
Picasso and Braque’s latest Cubist experiments....
"Monet could not have hoped for a better response. After the close of
the
exhibition, though, there followed nearly five years in which the
artist—exhausted from the intense work leading up to the show, and then
suffering from a sequence of personal tragedies—barely picked up his
brushes.
It was not until spring 1914 that he returned to the water garden in
earnest....
"Although Monet completed well over a hundred new paintings of the lily
pond
between 1914 and his death in 1926, he kept the vast majority of these
late
views in his studio, neither exhibiting them nor offering them for
sale. The
culmination of the series was the Grandes
Décorations,
twenty-two mural-sized
canvases totaling more than ninety meters in length, which Monet
completed just
months before his passing and donated to the French State.
The Musée de l’Orangerie, newly remodeled to house this magnificent
bequest,
opened to great fanfare the following year."

Lot
4, "Untitled (Shades of Red)," by Mark Rothko, oil on canvas. 69 by 56
inches, 1961, left; Lot 5, "No. 1," by Rothko, oil on canvas, 69 by 60
inches 1962, right
Lots 4 and 5 are a pair of large abstract oils on canvas by Mark
Rothko (1903-1970).
Lot 4 is "Untitled (Shades of Red" and it measures 69 by 56 inches and
was painted in 1961, It has an estimate of $60,000,000 to
$80,000,000. It sold for
$66,800,000.
It was onced owned by Mary Lasker of New York.
The website provides the following commentary:
"Painted
in 1961, Mark Rothko’s Untitled (Shades of
Red) forcefully captures the
mysterious and emotional intensity that lies at the very heart of the
artist’s
work. Haunted by the eternal drama that he believed was an inherent
part of the
human psyche, Rothko spent his life trying to convey these emotions on
canvas,
and his floating fields of color became the central elements in many of
his
most accomplished paintings. One of the most important and influential
artists
of the twentieth-century, Rothko maintained that his canvases weren’t
paintings
of an experience, they were the
experience, and standing before paintings such as the present example
he sought
to induce in the viewer a deep emotional—almost
spiritual—connection. Untitled (Shades of
Red) is a manifest example of
the triumph of Rothko’s oeuvre,
and painted
the same year as the artist’s seminal mid-career retrospective at The
Museum of
Modern Art, New York, it displays the self-assurance of an artist at
the height
of his painterly powers.
"Across
this expanse of canvas, Rothko lays
down clouds of crimson, red, ruby, scarlet, and deep orange pigment,
one on top
of one another, resulting in bottomless pools of rich color that appear
to
reverberate with chromatic energy as the eye passes over them. These
shifting
planes, constantly churning and roiling, produce a sense of dynamism
that
continues to play out long after the artist’s brush has left the
surface of the
canvas. Pushing against each other, this trifecta appears to be in a
constant
state of expansion, pushing out over the surface like an ever expanding
galaxy
of celestial gases. Surrounding each of the fields of color are paler
areas,
sheer veils of pigment that surround the central rectangles of deep red
and
saturated orange, revealing what is regarded by many as one of his
greatest
accomplishments: his ability to contain a vast array of colors of
differing
hues in differing proportions all on the same plane.
It
is here, around the edges of each of these
bodies of color, that Rothko’s tempestuous painterly energy is readily
exposed;
individual layers of paint bleed into each other revealing the rawness
and
vitality of the artist’s unmistakable process. Unlike the center of the
blocks
of color where a more harmonious co-existence results in rich fields of
color,
around the edges the tussle between order and chaos is played out to
its
ultimate conclusion. Throughout much of his career, Rothko struggled
with his
own inner demons, caught between the competing forces of order and
chaos, and
it is here, on the surface of the canvas, and in these contrary planes
of color
that he sought to confront and tame these forces once and for all....
"Untitled
(Shades of Red) emanates
the same sense of ethereal light that
radiates from Rothko’s best works. The artist always maintained that
his
paintings possessed their own inner source of light that illuminated
any room
in which they were placed, an effect achieved by an intensive process
of laying
down numerous translucent washes of pigment. Rothko would rub down each
of
these using a soft brush—or sometimes even a rag—before using a dry
brush to
'scrub in' the primary wash. The resulting 'disembodied' colors stem
from the
optical mixture between the usually strong tincture of the pigment and
the
lightness of the scoured fabric support, 'the hues become aftermaths—as
when
the flaming orange-reds are no more than ‘breathed’ onto the surface so
that
they vacillate between ardency and pale, vaporous transience' (D.
Anfam, Mark
Rothko: The Works on Canvas. Catalogue Raisonné,
2001, London,
p. 93).
"The
effect of this process produces the
luminosity that Rothko so admired in the works of two of his favorite
artists,
namely Rembrandt and Henri Matisse. In Rembrandt, Rothko admired the
inner
radiance that illuminated his subjects, be they portraits, mythological
scenes,
or landscapes, and from Matisse, he was enraptured by the depth and
intensities
of the French artist’s colors, particularly his reds. Rothko was
particularly
enamored with Matisse’s 1911 painting The Red Studio and
he visited the painting at the Museum of Modern
Art every day
for months, often overcome by the intensity of Matisse’s planes of
red....
"Rothko’s
process reached its peak during the
period in which the present work was painted. The late 1950s and early
1960s
proved to be a particularly significant period for the artist having
come off
the back of his commission to paint the Seagram Murals in 1958. The
story of
Rothko's murals is one of the central legends of his career and has
become the
kind of fable that impregnates and often threatens to dominate the
history of
any great artist's life. It is however nonetheless a remarkable and
particularly pertinent story because the Seagram commission and the
unfolding
drama that surrounded Rothko's eventual rejection of it—after having
worked on
the project for nearly two years—encapsulates and reveals two important
parameters of Rothko's character and artistic temperament. The Seagram
commission threw Rothko's long held personal keenness to create a
complete
painterly environment into direct conflict with his deep-rooted
principles.
Ultimately, the overt luxury of the Four Seasons restaurant proved too
much for
Rothko's conscience and this, alongside the fact that he feared that
the solemn
paintings that had devised for it would come to be seen as mere
decoration, led
to his pulling out of the project in 1960.
A
significant influence on Rothko’s oeuvre is
the work of Friedrich Nietzsche, and it
is said that in his paintings he tried to bring together the two
opposing
forces of the universe—order and dynamism—that the German philosopher
identified. It was with the aim of establishing a similar state of
harmonious
détente between these two central organizing principles of existence
that
Rothko painted, hoping to generate within the reductive format of his
abstract
forms a profound expression of these dual elements compacted into a
single
unity. Conflicting the romanticism and heightened emotionalism of the
rich and
expansive horizon-like landscape vistas of his color-drenched
rectangles with a
strict rational vertical grid-like progression of form compressed onto
a
rectangular canvas, the dynamism of confrontation is all important in
Rothko’s
work. Such dynamism is often defined and characterized by the nature of
the
shimmering edges of his colored forms and the "personality" that they
give to the work as a whole. “In a way my paintings are very exact,”
Rothko
explained in his lecture to students at the Pratt Institute in New York
in
1958, “but in that exactitude there is a shimmer, a play…in weighing
the edges
to introduce a less rigorous, play element…The tragic notion of the
image is
always present in my mind when I paint and I know when it is achieved,
but I
couldn’t point it out—show where it is illustrated. There are no skull
and
bones. I am an abstract painter” (quoted
in
J.E.B. Breslin, Mark Rothko: A
Biography, Chicago
1993, p. 395).
Lot 5, "No. 1," has an estimate of $45,000,000 to $65,000,000. It sold for $49,625,000.
"No. 1 is
listed as the first
canvas that Mark Rothko painted in 1962, a pivotal year in which the
artist
produced some of his most vital and vivacious works. Dominated by a
central
field of intense orange, this large-scale painting displays the full
force of
Rothko’s creativity, from the floating passages of penetrating color to
the
animated brushwork that results in its iridescent surface. The rich,
warm red
and orange hues that are so prevalent in No. 1 are
also
emblematic of the experiential nature of Rothko’s art—a physical
manifestation
of what one critic called the 'immediate radiance' of these paintings.
Famously, Rothko is quoted as saying that he wanted his paintings to
have
'presence' so that when you turned your back on such a work, you 'feel
that presence the
way you feel the sun on your back'
(M. Israel, quoted in J.E.B. Breslin, Mark Rothko: A
Biography,
New York, 1993, p. 275). No. 1 exhibits
this quality to spectacular effect....
"To achieve the radiance that Rothko
required, he
would lay down numerous washes of thin, almost translucent, pigment
that he
would burnish with a soft cloth or brush. Finally he would apply the
final,
primary layer of pigment with a stiff, dry brush, scouring the surface
to leave
a richly burnished effect. In No. 1 in
particular, the traces of these different layers can be seen in the
undulating
layers of underpainting that constantly roil up towards the surface.
There is a
constant shifting of color, as differing areas of pigment give way to
saturated
passages of high-keyed intensity....
"Rothko’s ultimate aim was to break down the traditional and long
established
barriers that existed in art, and he wanted the viewers of his
paintings to
undergo an almost religious experience when stood before them. In
evolving this
idea, the artist was profoundly influenced by Friedrich Nietzsche's
text The
Birth of Tragedy. Rothko's abstract paintings play
on the dualism inherent in human nature that Nietzsche had identified
as
composed of Apollonian and Dionysian forces. The Apollonian represents
the
force of becoming, of precise definition, of the sculptural arts and of
universal order while the Dionysian represents an unstable and wild
force, the
musical arts, disintegration and chaos. The duality of light and darker
areas
in the present work echoes these hostilities. In painting No. 1’s main
passages of color in competing
colors, they vie with one another for dominance, seeming to both emerge
from
and recede into the painting's more neutral background, evoking this
perpetual
struggle. As the eye responds to this shifting play of undefined form
and
color, the viewer's mind enacts an emotive drama, yet Rothko holds the
whole
together in a fragile balance using the calm serenity of the pale
ground. In
this way, he counterpoints Apollonian order and refinement with the
more
unstable Dionysian energy of the shimmering oblongs, creating an
overwhelming
sense of the sublime...."

Lot 2, "Petite danseuse de quatorze ans,"
by Edgard Degas, 30 1/2 inches high, original wax model execurted
1879-1881, this nronze version cast in 1927.
Lot 2, "Petite danseuse de quatorze ans," a bronze sculpture
by Edgar Degas 1834-1917) based an original wax version executed i
1879-1881. This bronze was owmed by Mrs. Sandra Payson of New
York. It has an estimate of $20.000,00 to $30,000,000. It sold for $41,610,000.
The website provided the following commentary:
"Edgar
Degas’s Petite
danseuse de quatorze ans is one of the most
recognizable sculptures of modern art. It is the largest work in this
medium
that the artist ever produced, and the only one that he chose to
exhibit in his
lifetime. Formally innovative, as well as iconographically daring, this
two-thirds life-size depiction of a young ballet dancer caused a
sensation when
the original wax version was first exhibited in 1881 at the Sixth
Impressionist
Exhibition in Paris, and continues to compel audiences to this day.
Evoking a
curious combination of compassion and intrigue, this iconic sculpture
is a
synthesis of Degas’s extensive work on his beloved theme of the dance,
a visual
encapsulation of the conflicting concepts of artifice and reality that
define
so much of his art. Just as the dancer stands in a pose of insistent
defiance,
so too this work can be regarded as a bold visual manifesto: an
embodiment of
the artist’s own, resolute avant-garde independence, and a
demonstration of his
unceasing fascination with the human form.
"Petite
danseuse de quatorze ans was
originally made in wax, which the artist
carefully modeled, adding meticulous detail—even the folds of the
dancer’s
tights gathered behind her knees were sensitively rendered—before
coloring the
wax so as to simulate real flesh. Degas finally dressed this figure in
real
life accoutrements: a dancer’s cotton faille bodice, linen ballet
slippers, a
tarlatan tutu comprised of several layers of netting, as well as a wig
of real
hair, which he scooped into a braid tied with a silk ribbon. This
original wax
version was never cast in bronze during the artist’s lifetime (it is
now held
in The National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.). It was only after
his death
that twenty-nine
casts were made, the majority of which
now reside in museums across the world....
"Marie’s
identity was established thanks to a
note that Degas inscribed on one of the preparatory drawings for the
sculpture
(Vente III: 341.2; Musée d’Orsay, Paris).
Since she turned fourteen in June of 1879, it is thought that Marie
likely
worked for Degas over the course of the two or so year period in which
he
conceived and created the Petite danseuse.
While she featured in the host of drawings, as well as a nude sculpture
(National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.), their artistic
relationship went
beyond this body of work, with Marie thought to have also served as the
model
for several other pastels and paintings made around the same time,
including Danseuse au repos (Lemoisne,
no. 573; Private collection) and La leçon de danse (Lemoisne,
no. 479; Philadelphia Museum of Art)....
"That
Degas chose a pose for his dancer that is
neither a formal ballet position nor a wholly relaxed posture is not
surprising. In his works on the theme of the dance, Degas reveled in
capturing
these unselfconscious, unplanned movements, spurning the perfection of
the
performance to instead provide glimpses of his models caught off guard.
Marie
is shown in one such moment: her eyes appear half closed, as if she is
lost in
a moment of reverie, or perhaps exhaustion. Nothing Degas did was
spontaneous
or the result of whimsy. After years studying dancers, he most likely
would
have carefully invented this indefinable pose to purposefully defy
expectation
or identification....
"Degas
had initially intended to show the
sculpture in the Fifth Impressionist exhibition held in March 1880. He
announced its inclusion in the catalogue, but at the last minute, and
for reasons
unknown, decided to withdraw it from the show, instead deciding, in a
radical
move that remains as daring today as it was in 1880, to leave only the
work’s
glass vitrine on display. One critic, Gustave Goetschy, lamented on 6
April
1880: “Everything M. Degas produces interests me so keenly that I
delayed by
one day the publication of this article to tell you about a wax
statuette that
I hear is marvelous and represents a fourteen-year-old dancer, modeled
from
life, wearing real dance slippers and a bouffant skirt composed of real
fabric.
But Degas isn’t an ‘Indépendant’ for nothing! He is an artist who
produces
slowly, as he pleases, and at his own pace, without concerning himself
about
exhibitions. All the worse for us!” (quoted in exh. cat., op. cit.,
1988, p. 343).
"Anticipation
therefore grew around the Sixth
Impressionist exhibition held the following spring. Titled simply Petite danseuse de
quatorze ans (statuette en cire),
Degas added the work two weeks after the exhibition opened, its late
inclusion
serving only to heighten the wave of consternation, adoration, and
condemnation
with which the work was met by viewers. 'Paris
could scarcely maintain its equilibrium,' Louisine Havemeyer recalled.
'His
name was on all lips, his statue discussed by all the art world'
(quoted in T.
Reff, Degas:
The Artist’s Mind, New
York, 1976, p. 239). James McNeill
Whistler reportedly 'uttered sharp cries and gesticulated in front of
the case
which enclosed the wax figurine,' while Pierre-Auguste Renoir said to
Mary Cassatt
that this work proved Degas was 'a sculptor capable of rivalling the
ancients'
(quoted in C.W. Millard, The Sculpture of
Edgar Degas,
Princeton, 1976, p. 28).
"Petite
danseuse earned
a host of vociferous supporters and
detractors. The unprecedented verisimilitude led the critic J.-K.
Huysmans to
declare it was, “the only truly modern attempt I know in sculpture,”
proclaiming, 'The fact is that at one fell swoop, M. Degas has
overthrown the
traditions of sculpture, as he has for a long time been shaking up the
conventions of painting' (quoted in G.T.M. Shackelford, Degas, The Dancers,
exh. cat., National Gallery of Art,
Washington, D.C., 1984, p. 676)....
"Many
also condemned this level of realism.
Although the life-like quality of the sculpture’s tinted wax surface
provoked
some comment, the most innovative and audacious feature of the work was
its
incorporation of actual articles of clothing, which made it seem at
once
illusory and real. These sartorial elements—which anticipate the use of
found
materials in Cubism and Dada—constituted an overt challenge to the
accepted
criteria of sculpture in the late nineteenth century. Contemporary
viewers were
affronted. Some critics compared the dressed wax figure to a doll, a
puppet, or
a shop mannequin.
"Following
the 1881 Impressionist Exhibition,
the wax version of the Petite danseuse remained
in Degas’s studio until his death in 1917. It was never again exhibited
during
his lifetime, nor reproduced in any form. The possibility of casting
the
sculpture arose in 1903 when the celebrated Impressionist collector
Louisine
Havemeyer attempted to purchase the wax original....
Degas was concerned
about
parting with it on account of its condition and proposed producing a
bronze or
plaster cast instead. Although the sale did not come to fruition,
several
references in Degas’s correspondence—in particular, a letter to the
sculptor
Albert Bartholomé that begins: “My dear friend, and perhaps
caster...”—indicate
that the artist seriously considered casting the sculpture at this time.
"In
the end, however, the casting of the Petite danseuse was
not begun until 1918, when
Degas’s heirs contracted the founder Adrien Hébrard to produce limited
bronze
editions of all seventy-four wax sculptures found during the posthumous
inventory of the artist’s studio. The first complete set of bronzes,
including
the Petite
danseuse, was finished in 1921 and purchased by
Louisine Havemeyer."

Lot 1, "Danseuse attachant son chausson,"
by Edgar Degas. pastel on buff paper, 18 1/2 by 16 7/8 inches, 1887
Lot
1, "Danseuse attachant son chausson," by Edgar Degas. is a pastel on
buff paper, 18 1/2 by 16 7/8 inches, 1887. It was once owned by Mr. and
Mrs. Henry O. Havemeyer of New York. It has an estimate of $4,000,000
to $6,000,000.
It sold for $8,977,000.
The
website provides the following commentary:
"Alive with color, light, and vivid texture, Edgar
Degas’s Danseuse
attachant son chausson of 1887 captures
a dancer in a moment of repose, as she
bends down to tie the ribbon on her ballet slipper. With her feet
turned out,
and tutu and sash thrown upwards in spectacular relief to create a
dazzling
halo around her, the dancer pictured in this pose was one of Degas’s
favorite
and most famous views, not only challenging him to display his artistic
virtuosity through the depiction of a foreshortened figure, but
allowing him to
indulge in splendid contrasts of light and form. Relishing the
expressive
effects of pastel, his favored medium at the time that he created this
magnificent dancer in the late 1880s, Degas has portrayed the dancer
with long,
strident strokes of color and frenetic line, enlisting the paper ground
as an
active formal component of the tightly cropped composition. As a
result, this
work, formerly in the legendary Havemeyer family collection, is infused
with an
incredible sense of life; she is momentarily stationary, yet brims with
suspenseful
energy, poised at any moment to ascend upright once more and leap back
into her
performance."
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recap of "Looking Forward to the Past" auction curated by Loic Gouzer
at Christie's New York May 11, 2015 with major works by Pablo Picasso,
Alberto Giacommeti, Claude Monet and Robert Delaunay (5/10/15,
updated 6/24/15)
- Preview and recap
of Impressionist and Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's New York
May 5, 2015 with major works by Van Gogh, Monet and Léger (5/5/15,
updated 5/8/15)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art day sale at Sotheby's New York May 6, 2015
with major works by Gabriele Munter, Léon Pourtau, Gustave Loiseau, Max
Ernst, Kurt Schwitters and Claude Monet (5/5/15,
updated 7/25/15)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art evening auction at Christie's New York May
14, 2015 with major works by Piet Mondrian, Berthe Morisot, Amedee
Modigliani and Brancusi (5/14/15, updated 7/3/15)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art Works on Paper & Day Sale including
property from the John C. Whitehead Collection and fine works by Paul
Serusier, Henri Matisse, Frantisek Kupka and Gustave Loiseau (5/15/15,
updated 7/17/15)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art evening auction at Christie's New York
November 5, 2014 with wonderful portrait of a woman by Manet (11/4/14,
updated 12/1/14 to indicate it sold for $65 million) (5/5/15,
updated 5/8/15)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's New York
November 4, 2014 with major sculptures by Alberto Giacometti, Amedeo
Modigliani and fine paintings by Claude Monet, Paul Gauguin, Paul
Sisley, Pablo Picasso and Max Ernst (11/4/14,
updated 11/8/14)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art Day Sale at Sotheby's New York November
5, 2014 (11/4/14, updated 9/4/16)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Christie's New York
May 6, 2014 with important works by Pablo Picasso, Pierre-Auguste
Renoir and Constantin Brancusi (5/2/14, updated
5/7/14)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's New York
May 7, 2014 with many fine works by Picasso, Miró, Renoir, Matisse,
Degas and Kirchner (5/6/14, updated 5/12/14)
- Preview and recap of
the Jan Krugier auction November 4, 2013 at Christie's New York with
fabulous works by Kandinsky, Picasso, O'Keeffe, Rauschenberg, Ingres
and Francis (11/4/13, updated 11/4/13 to report
that auction total was only $92.5 million as opposed to its low
pre-sale estimate of about $157 million, but the day portion was very
successful)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Christie's New York
November 5, 2013 with major works by Modigliani, Giacometti and a great
Van Gogh drawing (11/4/13, updated 11/5/13 to
report that the sale total of $144.3 million was considerably short of
the low pre-sale estimate of $188.8 million)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's November 6,
2013 with major works by Giacometti, Picasso, Monet, Sisley, Picabia,
Léger, and Courbet (11/6/13, updated 11/10/13)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Christie's New York
May 8, 2013 with a great Soutine pastry chef, a wonderful large pastel
by Pablo Picasso, an excellent Braque still life, an important large
work by Egon Schiele, and two very lovely landscapes by Alfred Sisley (5/8/13,
updated 5/9/13)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's New York
May 7, 2013 with many fine works from the collection of Alex and
Elizabeth Lewyt including a fine Cézanne and a good Modigliani (5/7/13,
updated 5/8/13)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction November 7, 2012 at
Christie's New York (11/7/12, updated 11/12/12)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's New York
November 8, 2012 (11/7/12, updated 11/13/12)
- Preview and recap of
the Impressionist & Modern Art day auction at Sotheby's November 7,
2012 with great works by Andre Derain and Rudolf Bauer (11/6/12,
updated 11/11/12)
- Preview and recap of
the Impressionist & Modern Art Works on Paper and Day auction at
Christie's November 8, 2012 with great works by Paul Klee and Laszlo
Moholy Nagy (11/7/12, updated 12/1/12)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction May 2, 2012 at Sotheby's
New York with "The Scream" by Edvard Munch and a
superb group of paintings from the estate of Theodore J. Forstmann.
The Munch sold for $119,222,500, a record for any work of art
ever sold at auction. Its consignor pledged to open a Munch
museum and said that his art was especially meaningful because of
global warming. Meanwhile, locked-out art handlers picketed the
opening. (5/1/12, updated 5/2/12 and 10/14/12 on report that Leon Black
was purchaser and that the Museum of Modern Art will exhibit the
painting)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art evening auction at Christie's New York,
May 1, 2012 (4/30/12, updated 4/1/12)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art day sale at Sotheby's New York, May 3,
2012 (5/2/12, updated 5/5/12)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art day sale at Christie's New York, May 2,
2012 (5/1/12, updated 5/5/12)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art day sale at Sotheby's New York November 3,
2011 (11/2/11, updated 11/6/11)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art Works on Paper and Day Sale at Christie's
New York November 2, 2011 (10/31/11, updated
11/5/11)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art auction at Christie's New York November 1,
2011 (10/30/11, updated 11/1/11)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist and Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's November 2,
2011 (11/1/11, updated 11/2/11)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Sotheby's May 3, 2011 (5/1/11,
updated 5/3/11)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art day auction at Sotheby's New York May 4,
2011 (5/3/11, updated 5/4/11)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art evening auction at Christie's New York,
May 4, 2011 (5/2/11, updated 5/4/11)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art auction at Christie's November 3, 2010 (10/22/10,
updated 10/31/10 and 11/3/10)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art auction at Sotheby's November 2, 2010 (10/29/20,
updated 10/31/10 and 11/2/10)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art day auction at Sotheby's, November 3,
2010 (10/30/10, updated 10/31/10 and 11/3/10)
- Preview and recap of
Impressionist & Modern Art day auction at Christie's, November 4,
2010 (10/31/10, updated 11/4/10)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
auction at Christie's May 4, 2010 highlighted by great works from the
collection of Mrs. Sidney F. Brody by James Ensor and Pablo Picasso.
Picasso's Nude, Green Leaves and Bust sold for $106,482,500, world
auction record for any artwork sold at auction, and Giacometti's do
very well (4/26/10,
updated 5/4/10)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
auction at Sotheby's May 5, 2010 highlighted by great works by August
Macke, Lyonel Feininger and Isamu Noguchi (4/25/10, updated 5/5/10)
- Preview of Impressionist & Modern Art day auction
at Sotheby's May 6, 2010 (5/1/10)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction November 3, 2009 at Christie's (11/1/09, updated 11/3/09)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction November 4, 2009 at Sotheby's (11/1/09, updated 11/4/09 as auction
significantly exceeds its pre-sale high estimate)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
works on paper auction and day auction November 4 at Christie's (11/3/09, updated 11/05/09)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction at Sotheby's November 5, 2009 (11/4/09,
updated 11/5/09)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
day auction at Sotheby's May 6, 2009 (5/9/09)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction May 5, 2009 at Sotheby's (5/4/09,
updated 5/5/09)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction May 6, 2009 at Christie's (5/3/09, updated 5/6/09)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Christie's November
6, 2008
- Preview and recap of "The Modern Age: Property from the
Hillman Family Collection and the Estate of Alice Lawrence" at
Christie's November 5, 2008 by
Michele Leight
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
day auction at Sotheby's November 5, 2008 (11/5/08)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's November 3, 2008 (11/3/08)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Christie's May 6, 2008 (5/5/08, updated 5/6/08)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's May 7, 2008 (5/4/08,
updated 5/7/08)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
morning auction at Christie's May 7, 2008 (4/6/08, updated 5/7/08)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
afternoon auction of works on paper at Christie's May 7, 2008 (5/6/08, updated 5/8/08)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
morning auction at Sotheby's May 8, 2008 (5/7/08,
updated 5/8/08)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
afternoon auction at Sotheby's May 8, 2008 (5/7/08, updated 5/11/08)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's November 7, 2007 (10/19/07, updated 11/3/07 and
11/07/07)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Christie's November 6, 2007, by Michele Leight (11/06/07, updated 11/08/07)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
afternoon auction at Sotheby's November 8, 2007 (11/3/07, updated 11/9/07)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
Works on Paper auction at Christie's November 7, 2007 (11/07/07, updated 11/11/07)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Christie's May 9, 2007 (5/7/07, updated 5/9/07)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's May 8, 2007 (5/6/07,
updated 5/8/07)
- Preview of major winter sales in London at Christie's by Michele Leight (2/2/07)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's November 7, 2006 (10/21/06, updated 11/7/06)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
morning auction at Sotheby's November 8, 2006 (10/22/06)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
afternoon auction at Sotheby's November 8, 2006 (11/9/06)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Christie's November 8, 2006 (11/5/06, updated 11/8/06)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
works on paper auction at Christie's November 9, 2006 (11/8/06, updated 11/10/06)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
morning auction at Christie's November 9, 2006 (11/8/06, updated 11/12/06)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist and Modern Art
evening auction May 2, 2006 at Christie's (5/02/06, updated 5/04/06)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist and Modern Art
evening auction May 3, 2006 at Sotheby's (5/03/06,
updated 5/05/06)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist and Modern Art
evening auction November 1, 2005 at Christie's (10/19/05, updated 10/29/05 and
11/1/05)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction November 2, 2005 at Sotheby's (10/7/05, updated 10/29/05 and
11/2/05)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction November 3, 2005 at Sotheby's (10/8/05,
updated 10/29/05, updated 11/4/05)
- Recap of Impressionist & Modern Art works on paper
auction at Christie's November 2, 2005 (11/5/05)
- Recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day auction at
Christie's November 2, 2005 (11/5/05)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction May 4, 2005 at Christie's (5/3/05, updated 5/8/05)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction May 3, 2005 at Sotheby's (5/2/05,
updated 5/4/05)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction May 5, 2005 at Christie's (5/02/05,
updated 6/02/05)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction November 3, 2004 at Christie's (11/2/04, updated 11/5/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction November 4, 2004 at Christie's (11/3/04,
updated 12/05/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction November 4, 2004 at Sotheby's (10/30/04, updated 11/4/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction November 5, 2004 at Sotheby's (10/31/04,
updated 12/05/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction May 4, 2004 at Christie's (5/2/04, updated 5/4/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction May 5, 2004 at Christie's (5/3/04,
updated 5/6/04)
- Preview and recap of the auction of Property of the
Greentree Foundation from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. John Hay
Whitney at Sotheby's May 5, 2004 (4/22/04,
updated 5/1/04 and 5/5/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's May 6, 2004 (4/22/04,
updated 5/1/04 and 5/6/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction at Sotheby's May 6, 2004 (4/23/04,
updated 5/1/04 and 5/6/04)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Christie's November 4, 2003 (11/01/03, updated 11/04/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction at Christie's November 5, 2003 (11/02/03,
updated 11/05/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's November 5, 2003 (11/01/03, updated 11/05/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction at Sotheby's November 6, 2003 (11/03/03,
updated 11/06/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
Part 2 day auction at Sotheby's May 7, 2003 (4/21/03, updated 5/7/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction May 6, 2003 at Sotheby's (4/19/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction May 7, 2003 at Christie's (4/25/03, updated 5/7/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art day
auction May 8, 2003 at Christie's (5/1/03)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening sale at Phillips de Pury & Luxembourg Nov. 4, 2002 (11/2/02, updated 11/4/02 and
11/11/02)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening sale at Sotheby's Nov. 5, 2002 (11/4/02,
updated 11/5/02)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening sale at Christie's Nov. 6, 2002 (11/4/02,
updated 11/6/02)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening sale at Christie's May 7, 2002 (4/28/02,
updated 5/7/02)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art Day
Sale and Impressionist & Modern Art Works on Paper at Christie's
May 8, 2002 (4/28/02,
updated 5/8/02)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's May 8, 2002 (4/13/02,
updated 5/8/02)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
Part Two day auction at Sotheby's May 9, 2002 (4/13/02, updated 5/9/02)
- Preview and recap of the Smooke Collection evening
auction November 5, 2001 at Phillips de Pury & Luxembourg (11/02/01, updated 11/05/01)
- Preview and recap of the Hoener Collection day auction
November 5, 2001 at Phillips de Pury & Luxembourg (11/3/01, updated 11/05/01)
- Recap of the evening auction at Christie's November 6,
2001 of Impressionist and Modern Art including the Collection of René
Gaffé (11/8/01)
- Recap of the evening auction at Sotheby's November 7,
2001 of Impressionist and Modern Art (11/9/01)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction, May 7, 2001 at Phillips de Pury & Luxembourg's
inaugural auction at 3 West 57th Street (4/29/01,
updated 5/7/01)
- Preview and recap of The Eye of A Collector, Works from
the Collection of Stanley J. Seeger at Sotheby's May 8, 2001 (5/6/01, updated 5/8/01)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist and Modern Art
evening auction May 9, 2001 at Christie's (5/8/01, updated 5/9/01)
- Preview and recap of An Important Collection of the
Works of Yves Tanguy at Christie's, May 10, 2001 (5/09/01)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's May 10, 2001 (4/29/01, updated 5/10/01)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist & Modern Art
Part II auction at Sotheby's May 9, 2001 (5/7/01,
updated 5/10/01)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist and Modern Works On
Paper day auction at Christie's, May 10, 2001 (5/9/01, updated 5/11/01)
- Preview and recap of the Impressionist and Modern Art
day auction at Christie's May 10, 2001 (5/10/01,
updated 5/11/01)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
auction at Sotheby's, May 10, 2001 (5/09/01,
updated 5/11/01)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Sotheby's, Nov. 9, 2000 (11/8/00, updated 11/9/00)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art
evening auction at Christie's, Nov. 8, 2000 (11/7/00, updated 11/8/00)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art at
Phillips the evening of Nov. 7, 2000 and the announcement of its new
premises next to Bergdorf Goodman (11/5/00,
updated 11/6/00)
- Preview and recap of Impressionist & Modern Art At
Phillips Part II, Nov. 8, 2000 (11/7/00,
updated 11/8/00)
- Preview and recap of Phillips auctions of Impressionist
& Modern Art the evening of May 11, 2000 and at noon May 12, 2000,
both at 40 West 53rd Street (5/6/00,
updated 5/8/00, 5/11/00 and 5/12/00)
- Preview and recap of May 8, 2000 evening auction of
Impressionist & Post-Impressionist Art at Christie's (4/29/00, updated 5/8/00)
- Preview and recap of May 9, 2000 evening auction of
Twentieth Century Art at Christie's (4/29/00,
updated 5/9/00)
- Preview and recap of May 9, 2000 auction at Christie's
of Twentieth Century Works of Art (5/7/00,
updated 5/9/00)
- Preview and recap of May 10, 2000 evening auction at
Sotheby's of Impressionist and Modern Art (4/20/00, updated 5/10/00)
- Preview and recap of May 11, 2000 auction of
Impressionist and Modern Art, Part Two, at Sotheby's (4/29/00, updated 5/11/00)
- Preview and recap of the Nov. 8, 1999 evening auction
at Christie's of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Art (10/17/99, updated 11/6/99 and
11/8/99)
- Preview and recap of the morning auction of
Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Art Nov. 9, 1999 at Christie's (10/17/99, updated 11/6/99 and
updated 11/10/99)
- Preview and recap of the afternoon auction of
Impressionist and Twentieth Century Works on Paper Nov. 9, 1999 at
Christie's (10/17/99,
updated 11/6/99 and 11/10/99)
-
- Preview and recap of Twentieth Century Art day auction
at Christie's Nov. 10, 1999 (10/17/99,
updated 11/6/99 and 11/10/99)
- Preview and recap of the Sotheby's Nov. 10 evening
auction of the Collection of Eleanore and David Saidenberg (10/24/99, updated 11/10/99)
- Preview and recap of the November 11, 1999 evening
auction of Impressionist & Modern Art, Part 1, at Sotheby's (11/3/99, updated 11/6/99 and
11/12/99)
- Preview and recap of the November 11, 1999 auction of
Impressionist & Modern Art, Part Two, at Sotheby's (11/4/99, updated 11/6/99 and
11/12/99)
- Preview and recap of the Sotheby's auction May 10, 1999
of the Impressionist and Modern Art collection of Mr. and Mrs. John Hay
Whitney (5/9/99,
updated 5/10/99 )
- Preview and recap of the Sotheby's auction May 11, 1999
of Impressionist and Modern Art, Part 1 (5/9/99,
updated 5/11/99)
- Preview and recap of the Sotheby's auction May 12, 1999
of Impressionist and Modern Art, Part 2 (5/9/99,
updated 5/12/99)
- :Preview and recap of the Christie's auction May 12,
1999 of Impressionist and Nineteenth Century Art (5/11/99, updated 5/12/99)
- Preview and recap of the Christie's 20th Century Art
auction May 13, 1999 with selections from the Maurice and Margo Cohen
Collection (5/12/99, updated
5/13/99)
- Impressionist & Modern Art, Part 1 at Sotheby's,
May 13, 1998 (5/3/98,
updated 5/14/98)
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