Auction houses go toe to toe: Sotheby's and Christie's match up, yet prove very different in one critical area

Art Business News, Jan, 2005 by Barden Prisant

When boxing pundits size up fighters before a bout, they chart their relative weights, heights, etc., to try and determine who has an edge. This is commonly referred to as "The Tale of the Tape." Coming into this season's print sales, it looked as if the two auction heavyweights, Sotheby's and Christie's, were evenly matched, at least according to "The Tale of the Tape." That is, both houses held two-day affairs during which they offered almost precisely the same number of lots, 649 vs. 651.

Yet, in one crucial area they proved as different as righties are from lefties. The Sotheby's sale was dominated by 19th-century modern works, while the Christie's sale was dominated by post-World War II/contemporary pieces. Did the experts intend for this difference to turn the auctions into "battles for the ages," or was it simply fate? The latter, says Mary Bartow, head of Sotheby's print department. "The sale just pulled together that way," she says. Clearly, though, Bartow had hoped to score a knock out, if only for the reason that one of the most important pieces she had to offer was indeed titled "A Knockout." It was one of 24 early 20th-century boxing lithographs by George Bellows, which had been consigned by the powerful collectors Rita and Daniel Fraad. (On a personal note, all of these lithographs were drawn by the artist in a loft just blocks from where this article is being penned.) Two private collectors duked it out for the right to own the piece, with the winner finally scoring "A Knockout" at $153,600, (estimate: $75,000-$100,000). All in all, the prize purse for the Bellows' consignment totaled approximately $500,000.

The top single lot at the Sotheby's sale depicted a decidedly gentler scene. It was Mary Cassatt's "Mother's Kiss" (1890-1891), and it, too, soared way above estimate to sell to an American buyer for $288,000, (estimate: $80,000-$100,000). Symbolic of the dominance of early prints at Sotheby's is the fact that two of the other pieces in the Top 10 were also by Cassatt, (and also sold to Americans).

As for the other early artists who were featured prominently, "Chagall was just golden," gushes Bartow, "as were Picasso and Miro." Chagall was seen flexing his market muscle when his suite of 38 lithographs entitled "Cirque" sold for $220,800 and snatched the No. 2 spot in the Top 10. This was somewhat surprising, since the set had only been granted a puny one-quarter page picture and was tucked in between two prints selling for less than $10,000. "It came in late," offers Bartow sheepishly, "we had to work it into the layout."

Bartow's inclusion of Miro with Chagall and Picasso in her "Hall of Fame list" seems rather peculiar, as not one of his pieces even earned a berth in the Top 10. The answer to the mystery can be found on page 171 of the catalog, for there appears something that this auction watcher has never seen before--an "ad."

It turns out that Sotheby's had been asked to manage the sale of 1,400 Miro lithographs, sourced directly from the printer/publisher Louis Broder. Bartow realized that it would have been too unwieldy to list each one individually in the auction catalog, and so she simply inserted a one-page "ad" advising the public of their availability. Another reason that they may not have been included in the actual sale was the fact that the 1,400 comprised only 18 different images; that averages out to 78 identical copies of each piece. In an auction scenario, the first of the 78 might bring $1,000, but how little would the last of the 78 fetch?

Finally, another artist whose contribution to the Sotheby's sale cannot be ignored is Toulouse-Lautrec. By sheer dint of numbers--44 works--he helped beef up the sale's total. Interestingly, though, his No. 1 punch--"Idylle Princiere" (estimate: $400,000-$500,000)-did not land until after the sale, when it sold to a European collector for $320,000.

All in all, Ms. Bartow seems pleased with her $8.1 million total. These are "very, very strong results," she enthuses, "the strongest since 1989/90 when it was kids in a candy store. The sales rooms were nicely filled. There were lots of new private bidders. Google and some other stocks have made (somebody) a lot of money."

Indeed they must have, because Christie's had an even better auction than Sotheby's.

"It was our largest sale in dollar terms in 15 years," trumpets Kelly Troester, the head of Christie's prints department. Does she attribute her $10 million victory to a carefully planned emphasis on contemporary prints? Nope.

"Sometimes it's just a fluke that happens," she explains. This season, the fluke was a large consignment by Prudential of a number of late 20th-century pieces. Ultimately, more than 400 of the 651 works on offer were post-World War II or contemporary, and among them were some of the most potent.

Records were set for two 10-piece suites of Warhol prints. "Man" brought $220,300 from an anonymous buyer and "Endangered Species" sold for $153,100 to an American dealer. The "Mao" prints reigned supreme because, Troester opines, "they were in exceptionally good condition; the yellow tends to turn ochre, but not with these" (A point not to be missed by those of you with bright yellow Warhol prints to sell.)