As the high-end auction year gets underway in earnest, interesting lots are coming under the hammer over the next few months, ranging from wines forming the second-largest collection in Europe to American muscle cars, and from images created by one of the world’s most celebrated photographers to the multi-million-dollar paintings collected by a former US ambassador. Here are some select lots.
Sebastião Salgado: A Life’s Voyage; Phillips, New York
April 2-10 (online)
The death of Sebastião Salgado last year deprived the world of one of its most influential photographers. The Brazilian lensman was renowned for his brilliantly framed shots of manual laborers working under harsh conditions in under-developed countries. This sale includes a quintessential example in the form of “Gold Mine, Serra Pelada, Brazil (Figure Eight),” 1986, in which Salgado captures hundreds of people scaling ladders that lead in and out of the vast, opencast mine. A similarly intense composition shows a line of Ecuadorian women trekking to market with the mountains of Chimborazo Province in the background, while a remarkable image taken on Rabida Island in the Galápagos 22 years ago captures only the tail and one rear leg of an iguana lying in a mirror-still pool of water. Perhaps the most extraordinary photograph on offer, however, recalls Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s troops torching the Kuwaiti oil fields before retreating. “Fallen Worker, Kuwait Oil Fields,” 1991, shows a man who has been knocked to the ground and coated head to foot by a vast jet of “black gold.”
Collector cars; Mecum, Houston
April 9-11
Dana Mecum has shaken up the traditionally dry world of the saleroom with giant, televised events that combine selling with theater. Mecum sales typically feature 1,000-plus lots, last for several days and include collectible vehicles of every sort imaginable, from vintage Fords to hot rods, custom trucks, and modern Ferraris. This year’s edition of the annual Houston sale maintains Mecum’s reputation for variety with lots such as a 1968 Dodge Charger dragster finished in searing Sublime Green and fitted with a 526 cubic-inch (8.6 liter) supercharged engine rated at 950 horsepower. In total contrast is a 1978 Volkswagen Super Beetle cabriolet that has covered fewer than 8,000 miles from new. Driven regularly, but for only short distances each year, the car is in near-pristine condition and offers a rare chance to own a classic Beetle that is virtually “as new.” But fans of the all-American Jeep are more likely to be drawn to a superb example of the luxurious Grand Wagoneer that’s tastefully finished in a combination of factory-correct Garnet paint with simulated wood-grain trim.
Modern Native American Art & Jewelry; Bonhams, Los Angeles
April 14
Works from the 19th and early 20th century are what often come to mind when Native American art is mentioned – but there is now a strong and growing market for high-quality pieces made by more contemporary craftspeople. It is to them that this sale is dedicated, with one of the most covetable lots being a neck ring made from gold set with colored stones and hung with a reversible turtle motif inlaid with coral, onyx, turquoise, lapis, and opal. The piece was created by Jesse Monongya, a Navajo who served in Vietnam with the US Marines before joining his jeweler father as an apprentice. The necklace is estimated to sell for $5,000-$8,000, while a silver cuff bracelet made by celebrated potter-jeweler Charles Loloma, a Hopi Native American, could realize $10,000-$15,000. Among the most valuable items, however, could be a naive pastel drawing entitled “Ghost Dance #7,” 1981, by Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, whose works are held in many major permanent collections, including those of MoMA, the Whitney, and the Smithsonian. “Ghost Dance #7” is estimated at $15,000-$25,000.
Design Since 1860; Lyon & Turnbull, Edinburgh, UK
April 15-16
The Art Deco and Art Nouveau eras produced objects ranging from furniture and floor coverings to tableware and ironwork. This sale includes pieces by some of the best-known proponents of the two genres – not least the great William Morris, who is represented by a giant Hammersmith carpet produced by Morris & Co. during the early 1890s. Displaying a typically extravagant Morris pattern and preserved in excellent condition, it is tipped to fetch as much as £50,000. Also on offer is a “high-fired” vase produced by the Ruskin Pottery in 1913, typical of the Staffordshire firm’s brightly colored ceramics that featured sang-de-boeuf (oxblood) glazes created using copper and iron oxides fired at extreme temperatures. The sale will also include top-quality silverware from a hoard of 76 pieces amassed by the same private collector, among which is an 1899 twin-handled stemmed bowl by Gilbert Marks, the Arts and Crafts silversmith whose stellar career was cut short when he died at the age of 43. His works are now highly sought-after, and the bowl could realize up to £7,000.
Radical Genius: Works on Paper from a Distinguished Private Collection; Christie’s, Paris
April 15
Many great creations begin with a sketch – a fact that fascinated the private collector who amassed the pencil drawings, watercolors, pastels, and charcoal studies that make up this sale dedicated to works on paper. Here, you’ll find pieces by some of the greatest artists of the past 200 years, including Paul Cezanne, John Singer Sargent, J.M.W. Turner, and Eugene Delacroix. Look out, too, for works by Pablo Picasso, Paul Klee, and Piet Mondrian – often at more affordable prices than their “finished” pieces. Highlights include a typically linear charcoal drawing by Mondrian entitled “Study 1 for Broadway Boogie Woogie,” the oil on canvas which he completed in 1943, three years after moving to New York. The study may appear basic, but it’s worth noting that it last sold at auction 20 years ago for $2.1m… “A View of Jerusalem” by Turner, meanwhile, shows the city bathed in the artist’s particular interpretation of light, while the pen-and-ink “Femme nue debout aux mains croisée” demonstrates Picasso’s pre-Cubist genius for draftsmanship.
The Spring Stafford Sale; Bonhams, Stafford, UK
April 25-26
When it comes to rare, collectable, and classic motorcycle auctions, Bonhams leads the way. Its biannual sales at the Stafford County Showground have set numerous record prices for marques including Vincent, Brough Superior, and Honda. The most valuable lot this time around is likely to be a 500cc MV Agusta four-cylinder grand prix racing machine from 1965, a model ridden by stars including Mike Hailwood and Giacomo Agostini. It could realize up to £220,000. Elsewhere, the sale will feature a selection of bikes from the Rex Judd collection, a north London dealership whose founder began his motorcycling career racing Nortons at the celebrated Brooklands circuit. The oldest offering from the collection is a Flat Four “Motor Bicycle” built by the Motor Traction Company in 1898, estimated to fetch £40,000-£70,000, while a 1911 Pierce Four could realize up to £80,000. Another collector has consigned an early Harley-Davidson dating from 1910, a 494cc Model 6A, estimated at £38,000-£48,000, which features a single-cylinder engine and bicycle-type pedals.
Modern & Contemporary Art Evening Sale; Phillips, New York
May 13
The leading auction houses reserve their best and most valuable lots of contemporary, modern, and Impressionist art for glitzy evening sales. Among the highlights here are works from the collection of American businessman John L. Loeb Jr., a scion of both the Lehman Brothers and Loeb banking dynasties. As US ambassador to Denmark during the 1980s, Loeb set about amassing the largest privately held collection of Danish art outside of the country’s own museums – some of which is expected to realize millions of dollars at this Phillips sale. Among the most valuable works are the almost monochromatic “Interior with Windsor Chair at Strandgade 25” and “Study of Standing Woman, Seen from Behind,” both by Vilhelm Hammershøi, and a contrastingly colorful self-portrait by Peder Severin Krøyer. During a tour of Europe taken between 1877 and 1881, Krøyer met artists including Monet, Degas, Renoir, and Manet, hints of whose influence can be seen in a 1902 oil that shows the painter by the beach at Skagen, a remote fishing village on Denmark’s northern tip.
The Magnificent Cellars of Willy Michiels; Sotheby’s London, UK
June (date TBC)
Many people love wine, but few were as committed to oenophilia as the late Willy Michiels, who kept a staggering 29,000 bottles carefully cataloged in the three specially constructed cellars of his moated Renaissance château in Belgium. Michiels, who died in 2020 aged 82, was dubbed the country’s “bingo king,” having cornered the market in the manufacture, sale, and operation of bingo tables – the only type of gambling machine permitted in Belgian bars. His business empire also extended to cafés and included hundreds of partnerships with other gaming industry operators, enabling Michiels to amass the second-largest private wine collection in Europe. He maintained one cellar for Burgundies, another for Bordeaux, and the third for wines of other origins – a “liquid encyclopedia” of vintages ranging from 1925 to 2012 and including some rare and sought-after formats. Sotheby’s began to disperse the collection in December last year, with this being the third of a series of four sales that will variously take place in Hong Kong, London, and Paris until the end of 2026.
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