Art News. Vasari Codex

trending_up market schedule Apr 30, 2026 visibility 50 link 15 artists, 1 gallery

Picasso Painting That Cost S. I. Newhouse a MoMA Board Position Heads to Christie’s for $55 M.

Christie’s New York will auction 16 masterpieces from the collection of late Condé Nast magnate S. I. Newhouse on May 18, with an estimated total of $450 million. The highlight is Pablo Picasso’s Cubist painting *Homme à la guitare* (1913), estimated at $35–55 million, which Newhouse acquired in 2000 for $10 million after MoMA sold it from its collection. Newhouse, then a MoMA board member, violated museum policy by buying the work and subsequently resigned from the board.

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trending_up market schedule May 9, 2025 visibility 25 link 10 artists, 3 galleries

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New York appraiser and art dealer Glenn Spellman discovered an abstract painting signed "E.H." on the Goodwill thrift store website last fall. Suspecting it might be by Eva Hesse, he enlisted his sister Kara Spellman, director of estates and acquisitions at Hollis Taggart gallery, who confirmed the painting's authenticity by consulting the artist's catalogue raisonné at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's library. The painting, titled *Landscape Forms* (1959), was acquired for $40,000 and will be auctioned at Christie's New York on May 15 with an estimate of $60,000–$80,000. A second Hesse work, *No title* (1964–65), will be offered at Phillips New York the previous day.

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trending_up market schedule Apr 22, 2025 visibility 19 link 11 artists, 2 galleries

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Christie’s will sell nine works from the Bass House, a Fort Worth, Texas home designed by architect Paul Rudolph for collectors Sid and Anne Bass, in its 20th century evening sale this May in New York. The group, with estimates totaling over $60 million, includes pieces by Mark Rothko, Alexander Calder, Ellsworth Kelly, Frank Stella, Agnes Martin, Gino Severini, and Morris Louis, with the top lot being Rothko’s *No. 4 (Two Dominants) [Orange, Plum, Black]* (1950–51) estimated at around $35 million. The works were carefully placed throughout the house, which was custom-built to prioritize art display, and most remained in their original positions after installation.

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trending_up market schedule Jun 24, 2025 visibility 11 link 5 artists

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Christie’s London is auctioning Tamara de Lempicka’s 1928 painting *Portrait du Docteur Boucard*, which has not been seen on the market in 40 years. The work, depicting doctor and bacteriologist Pierre Boucard, is expected to sell for between £5 million and £8 million ($6.18 million and $9.89 million). The sale coincides with the close of Lempicka’s historic retrospective at San Francisco’s de Young Museum—the first U.S. survey of the Art Deco master—and ahead of its opening at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston.

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trending_up market schedule May 16, 2025 visibility 13 link 4 artists

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A 1922 painting by Piet Mondrian, *Composition with Large Red Plane, Bluish Gray, Yellow, Black and Blue*, sold at Christie’s New York for $47.6 million, falling short of its $50 million-plus estimate and the artist’s auction record of $51 million set in 2022. The work was the highlight of the “Leonard & Louise Riggio: Collected Works” sale, a 39-lot trove from the late Barnes & Noble founder and Dia Art Foundation chairman, estimated at up to $326 million. The painting sold to a single phone bidder, likely the guarantor, with no room action.

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trending_up market schedule May 15, 2025 visibility 16 link 5 artists

marlene dumas miss january rubell family christies auction 1234742222

A Marlene Dumas painting, *Miss January* (1997), sold for $13.6 million at a Christie’s auction, making the South African artist the most expensive living female artist at auction. The work, consigned from the Rubell Family collection, had an estimate of $12–18 million and was backed by a third-party guarantee. It was won by an anonymous telephone bidder represented by Sara Friedlander, Christie’s deputy chairman for postwar and contemporary art.

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trending_up market schedule Apr 18, 2025 visibility 11 link 3 artists, 2 galleries

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Christie’s will auction Jean-Michel Basquiat’s 1982 painting *Baby Boom* with an estimate of $20–$30 million during its May 14 sale of 21st-century art in New York. The work, which depicts three figures thought to be the artist and his parents, was first shown in a landmark 1982 exhibition at Fun Gallery and later appeared at Lévy Gorvy gallery in 2017 with a $30 million price tag. Its seller at that time was collector Peter Brant.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 18, 2025 visibility 14 link 5 artists

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Christie’s will auction an 1804 oil portrait of George Washington by Gilbert Stuart, estimated at $500,000 to $1 million, during its “We the People: America at 250” sale in early 2025. The painting was commissioned by President James Madison and served as a model for the engraving on the one-dollar bill. It was recently deaccessioned by Clarkson University, a technical school in upstate New York, which decided to sell the work to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the United States, with proceeds supporting the university’s educational mission.

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trending_up market schedule Nov 25, 2025 visibility 15 link 1 artist

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A five-inch-tall red chalk drawing of a foot, attributed to Michelangelo (1475–1564), is set to be auctioned at Christie’s New York in February with an estimate of $1.5–2 million. The work was discovered when Giada Damen, a specialist in Old Master drawings at Christie’s, flagged it from a public online submission; after extensive provenance research, technical analysis, and comparison with known sketches, Christie’s has declared it a preparatory study for the Sistine Chapel ceiling (1508–1512). If authenticated, it would be one of only two such Michelangelo drawings remaining in private hands.

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trending_up market schedule Sep 22, 2025 visibility 15 link 15 artists

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Christie’s has been consigned to sell works from the collection of the Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art, including pieces by Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Marc Chagall, Henri Matisse, and Henry Moore, as part of its fall marquee auctions. A top highlight is Monet’s oil painting *Nymphéas* (1907) with a low estimate of $40 million. The museum, located in Sakura, Japan, and owned by the DIC Corporation, decided last December to downsize and relocate, selling 75 percent of its 384 artworks valued at $77.5 million. The sale includes eight works in Christie’s 20th Century Evening Sale in November, with additional pieces in day sales for Impressionist and Modern Art as well as Post-War and Contemporary Art.

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trending_up market schedule Sep 10, 2025 visibility 11 link 2 artists

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Christie’s will auction a Pascaline, the first calculating machine in history, developed by Blaise Pascal in 1642, at a sale in Paris on November 19. The estimate for the box decorated with ebony sticks is €2 million to €3 million. This particular model, dedicated to survey calculations, is the only one in private hands among nine surviving originals, and it remains fully functional. The auction also includes 15 volumes of Pascal’s writings, including a first copy of *Pensées* (estimate €200,000–€300,000), and works by Descartes, Newton, and others.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 11, 2025 visibility 16 link 3 artists

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Christie’s announced a single-owner sale titled “Visions of the West” featuring artworks from the collection of billionaire Bill Koch, to be held over two sessions on January 20 and January 21. The sale includes dozens of works by artists who depicted the American West and frontier, such as Frederic Remington, Charles Marion Russell, and Albert Bierstadt, with highlights including Remington’s painting *Coming to the Call* (estimated $6–$8 million) and Russell’s *The Sun Worshippers* ($4–$6 million). Koch, 85, is the lesser-known of the four Koch brothers and an avid art collector, who also recently sold part of his wine collection through Christie’s.

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trending_up market schedule Jul 3, 2025 visibility 16 link 7 artists

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Canaletto's painting "Venice, the Return of the Bucintoro on Ascension Day" (1731–32) sold for £31.9 million ($43.9 million) at Christie's Old Masters evening sale in London, setting a new auction record for the Italian painter. The work, which once hung in the offices of Britain's first prime minister Robert Walpole, surpassed its presale estimate of £20 million and is the largest Canaletto composition to appear at market in two decades, noted for its exceptional preservation and execution during the artist's career peak.

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trending_up market schedule Jun 30, 2025 visibility 14 link 7 artists

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A 10.38-carat fancy purple-pink diamond known as the Marie-Thérèse diamond, linked to Marie Antoinette's only surviving child, sold for $14 million at Christie's New York on June 17, far exceeding its $3–5 million estimate. The jewel, reworked by Joel Arthur Rosenthal into a ring with a fleur-de-lis motif, was originally part of a tiara and passed through generations of European royalty before being sold at Sotheby's Geneva in 1996. The auction also featured the Blue Belle, a sapphire necklace estimated at $8–12 million.

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trending_up market schedule May 22, 2025 visibility 13 link 3 artists

Lionel Messi names his favourite ever goal

Lionel Messi has revealed his favorite goal from his 860 career scores—a 2009 UEFA Champions League final goal for Barcelona against Manchester United—as part of a collaboration with media artist Refik Anadol. Anadol will transform the goal into an AI-powered data sculpture, which will be auctioned online at Christie's New York from June 11 to July 25, with proceeds supporting educational charities in Latin America and the Caribbean through the Inter Miami CF Foundation and Unicef.

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trending_up market schedule Nov 7, 2025 visibility 11 link 1 artist

rare dinosaur skeleton christies auction 1234760599

Christie’s will auction a rare 68-million-year-old Caenagnathid dinosaur skeleton nicknamed 'Spike' at its inaugural 'Groundbreakers: Icons of Our Time' sale in London on December 11. Discovered in 2022, the sub-adult specimen is one of the most complete of its kind, with over 100 preserved fossil bones, and may represent a new species. It is estimated to fetch between £3 million and £5 million ($4 million to $6.6 million), marking the first time a Caenagnathid Oviraptorosaur has been offered at auction.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 3, 2025 visibility 9 link 2 artists

russian imperial faberge egg christies auction record 1234764764

A rare Fabergé Winter Egg, made of crystal and adorned with 4,000 diamonds, sold for £22.9 million ($30.2 million) at Christie’s London on Tuesday, setting a new auction record for any Fabergé egg. The sale was part of a 48-lot collection titled “The Winter Egg and Important Works by Fabergé from a Princely Collection,” which achieved a total of £27.8 million ($37.1 million). The egg was created for Russia’s imperial family by Alma Theresia Pihl, one of the few women in Fabergé’s St. Petersburg workshop, and fabricated by her uncle, chief jeweler Albert Holmström. It had previously sold at Christie’s in Geneva in 1994 and in New York in 2002.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 12 link 3 artists

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A rare Fabergé Imperial egg, the Winter Egg, sold for £22.8 million ($30.2 million) at Christie’s London on December 2, 2025, setting a new world auction record for any Fabergé work. The egg was a 1913 Easter gift from Tsar Nicholas II to his mother, Maria Feodorovna, and was designed by Alma Pihl, one of the few women working in Fabergé’s St. Petersburg workshops. It had previously sold at Christie’s in 1994 and 2002, each time setting records.

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