The Excitement Around Paris Art Week Led to Strong Sales at Christie’s and Sotheby’s

Sales at both auction houses set new high prices for Surrealist masters and contemporary artists featured in the exhibitions that coincided with Art Basel Paris.

Coinciding with Parisian Art Week, Sotheby's and Christie's hosted their Modern and Contemporary art auctions in the French capital, continuing a strategy they’ve developed in recent years. This approach links the London and Paris sales to their respective art weeks, with each auction house’s selections reflecting, in many cases, the unique art scenes and institutional programming of each city.

Fueled by this momentum, Sotheby’s new luxurious venue in Saint-Honorè added to the excitement, and its Modernités and “Surrealism and its Legacy auctions exceeded combined pre-sale estimates, totaling €60 million ($65 million). The white-glove Surrealism and its Legacy sale on October 18 was particularly notable, as it celebrated the movement’s anniversary with a standout selection of masterpieces by the movement’s important names. The timing also coincided with a major survey at the Centre Pompidou. Notably, the sale set several new Paris auction records for many Surrealist artists; Salvador Dalí’s Meditative Rose sold for €3.9 million ($4.2 million), nearly four times its high estimate of €700,000-1 million.

Recent auctions have shown continued interest in the oneiric and visionary art of René Magritte. His La Le?on de choses, previously owned by Elton John, sold for €3.8 million ($4.2 million) after an estimate of €3.5-4.5 million. Meanwhile, Magritte’s Minotaure fetched €1.2 million, and L’Incendie achieved €3.18 million. Other notable highlights included the sales of Other answers by American Surrealist Kay Sage, which tripled its estimate of €300,000-500,000 to realize €1 million ($1.1 million). Jane Graverol’s La Fr?leuse sold for €576,000 ($625,651), Joan Miró’s Femmes doubled its estimate to reach €2 million ($2.2 million) and Man Ray’s Personnage (Femme assise) eclipsed its estimate of €1-1.5 million to sell for €1.7 million ($1.9 million).

Franti?ek Muzika’s Larva VIII set a new record for the artist in France, selling for four times its top estimate at €240,000 ($260,688). Sotheby’s also confirmed the growing attention on women artists, particularly from the Surrealist movement, with Dorothea Tanning’s My Beautiful Haunted House selling for three times its estimate at €132,000 ($143,378), and Leonor Fini’s La Prima Ballerina assoluta / La le?on de regard (Les le?ons) achieving €360,000 ($391,032) from an estimate of €150,000-200,000.

Sotheby’s inaugural sales at their new location continued on October 21 with Modernités, which set new records and concluded with a total of €36.1 million ($39.2 million) from a pre-sale estimate of €24.8-39.2 million, with a strong 90 percent sold by lot. Among the top lots, the sale saw the second-highest price for a work by Renoir in a Paris auction, with the newly restituted painting Cariatides (1909), which had been held in French national collections for decades before being returned to the descendants of Grégoire Schusterman. The masterpiece fetched €1.92 million ($2 million) against its original estimate of €1-1.5 million.

A rare ceramic work by Lucio Fontana, Maschera, tripled its estimate, selling for €2.2 million ($2.3 million) after an estimate of €500,000-700,000), marking the highest price for a Fontana work in Paris. Another ceramic by Fontana also performed well, fetching €1.9 million. Meanwhile, momentum continued for Alighiero Boetti, one of the most market-successful artists of Arte Povera, currently showing in the Fondation Pinault. His 1983-1984 Mappa, measuring a meter and a half, surpassed its high estimate, selling for €1.9 million ($2.1 million), reflecting a significant rise in his market value compared to just two years ago.

Christie’s also delivered strong results during the Parisian auction week, achieving a combined total of €90.6 million for Surrealism and 20/21st Century art. The house’s week began on October 17 with the sale of the Danute and Alain Mallart Collection, which totaled €13.6 million ($14.8 million) with an impressive 87 percent sell-through rate and 50 percent of lots exceeding their high pre-sale estimates. Over the past thirty years, the couple built an extraordinary collection of modern and contemporary art and design inspired by the art scenes of Brussels, Paris and Vilnius, where they owned residences. The sale featured notable works by Yayoi Kusama and Niki de Saint Phalle, as well as a standout piece by El Anatsui, whose Baby’s Bedsheet sold for €819,000. The top lot of the sale was Marlene Dumas’s Feathered Stola (2000), part of her “Strippinggirls” series based on photographs of sex workers in Amsterdam, which fetched €1,673,500.

Other strong results included Antony Gormley’s Standing Matter XXXI, which sold for €693,000, Anselm Kiefer’s Noah for €529,200, an Erwin Wurm sculpture for €52,000 and one of Takashi Murakami’s early works, which achieved €189,000. Tom Wesselmann maintained momentum following the success of the “Pop Forever” exhibition at Fondation Louis Vuitton, with The Study For A Smoker #26 and Steel Drawing / Monica Nude with Matisse (Black Variation #2) selling for €138,200 and €201,600, respectively. However, a Peter Doig painting went unsold, despite a pre-sale estimate of €80,000-120,000, while a large-scale silkscreen on copper by Rauschenberg, paying homage to Dalí, sold for $781,000.

Continuing with the 20th and 21st Century art sales held on October 18 and 19, Christie’s brought in a total of €79.2 million ($86 million), with 91 percent of lots sold and 98 percent sold by value. While the results for Impressionism were decent and better than previous auctions in Hong Kong or New York, they did not reach the levels seen in past years, possibly signaling a generational shift in taste. Some lively bidding emerged with Félix Vallotton’s Les Grands Arbres selling for €504,000 and his Portrait de femme drapée de rouge fetching €554,400. Positive outcomes continued with Suzanne Valadon’s La Joie de vivre, which exceeded its pre-sale estimate, realizing €302,400. On the contemporary side, Kazuo Shiraga’s 降魔 (Gouma) led the sale, selling for an impressive €945,000, nearly doubling its high estimate, while Anselm Kiefer’s Melancholia tripled its estimate, selling for €277,200, and Josef Albers doubled his, fetching €378,000.

Christie’s white-glove postwar Italian art sale, Thinking Italian, which has been relocated from London to Paris in recent years, achieved strong results. Lucio Fontana’s Concetto Spaziale, Attese led the sale, fetching €3,670,000, followed by Piero Manzoni’s Achrome at €2,944,000. Arnaldo Pomodoro’s Sfera con sfera sold for €478,800, and Domenico Gnoli’s La Robe Rouge realized €1,068,500. Following the momentum from Pinault’s Arte Povera exhibition, key figures of the movement saw solid results: Giuseppe Penone’s Pelle di grafite (scuro) and Pelle di grafite (chiaro) sold for €163,800 and €119,700 respectively, while Giulio Paolini’s conceptual photograph Sir Lawrence Dundas with His Grandson achieved €100,800, despite his market typically being more regional. Enrico Castellani’s black and silver diptych sold within the estimate at €504,000, and Mario Schifano’s minimal black and white Insegna realized €661,500.

Thinking Italian was this year featured in Avant-Garde(s), a sale dedicated to pioneering artists who set trends in their respective scenes that closed with a strong sell-through rate of 98 percent and 15 works selling for over €1 million. Among the top lots, Zao Wou-Ki’s 24.05.65 achieved $4,772,696, while Joan Mitchell and Nicolas de Sta?l secured impressive results, selling for €4.3 million and €2,581,000, respectively. A notable work by Francis Picabia from 1928, Myrte, fetched €1,734,000. And works by Simone Hanta?, Roberto Matta and Kazuo Shiraga sold within estimates, reflecting the continued strength of their markets.

Overall, the auctions in Paris confirmed that the excitement surrounding Art Basel Paris did indeed spark heightened collector interest, drawing more international buyers to the city’s major fall auctions. Despite the broader market downturn, particularly in Europe, the results were solid and reflected strong engagement from collectors.

<Elisa Carollo - The Observer>