Last week’s sale at Sotheby’s shows that the high-end prints and multiples market is continuing to expand. Over half of the works sold achieved prices above their high estimates, with the sale making £4.1m overall.
WIth works including Dürer and Warhol this was a wide-ranging sale. Top lot was one of the Edvard Munch prints – Two Human Beings sold for £290,500, showing the demand for powerful pieces by modern masters. Catching the eye before the sale were A Great American Nude Cut-Out by Wesselmann and a Giacometti lithograph. The Wesselman was well-purchased at lower estimate for £4000 with the Giacommetti pushing towards its higher estimate and selling for £3750.
A Goya Disasters of War from c1810 combining etching, aquatint and drypoint remained unsold, but Dürer’s Rhinoceros more than doubled its high estimate at £43750. A record auction price was paid for a Lichtenstein Nude with Blue Hair, the 1994 relief print reaching £266,500.
The only Morandi in the sale, an elegant 1921 still-life etching sold at bottom estimate for £5000.
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