Cy Twombly

$11 Million Warhol & More in Christie's Sale

An important Andy Warhol portrait of Liz Taylor painted in 1963 is expected to fetch up to $11 million at Christie's' landmark Post-War & Contemporary Art sale in London on June 30. The iconic Silver Liz (above), painted for Warhol's now famous show at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles in October 1963, could easily go for much more considering last month's world record sale of a Warhol self portrait and the eye-popping results of the Michael Crichton collection. Also on offer in the stunning sale: Jeff Koons' 1999 oil on canvas Loopy, estimated at about $3.5 million - $5 million; Jean-Michel Basquiat's Untitled, painted in in 1982, estimated at about $2.5 million - $3.5 million; Roy Lichtenstein's Woman Reading, painted in 1980, estimated at about $3 million - $4.5 million; Cy Twombly's Untitled (Gaeta), painted in 2004, estimated at $3 million - $4 million; and Gerhard Richter's Abstraktes Bild, painted in 1986, estimated at $2.2 million - $3.5 million.

Gallery: Christie's Contemporary Art June 2010

Tags: Andy Warhol, art market, Contemporary Art, Cy Twombly, Gerhard Richter, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Jeff Koons, Liz Taylor, London, Los Angeles, Roy Lichtenstein

Cy Twombly Hits The Ceiling At The Louvre

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

Artist Cy Twombly has been given a rare honor. He is the third contemporary artist who has designed a permanent work for The Louvre in Paris. His ceiling mural covers more than 3,700 square feet in one of the Louvre's largest galleries, the Salle des Bronzes, in one of the older sections of the museum. Twombly is known for brightly colored abstracted pieces but for the Louvre he went a little classical. The mural is sky blue with simple spheres and insets that bear the names ancient Greek sculptors like Lysippus, Myron, Phidias, Polyclitus and Praxiteles written in Greek lettering. The overall effect is tranquil and elegant and works well with the gallery's existing exhibits.

Tags: art, cy twombly, louvre, mural, museum, paris

Celebrating Cy Twombly's 80th Birthday

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

Famed Abstract Expressionist Cy Twombly's 80th birthday is being celebrated with a major new touring retrospective. It just opened at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, which notes that he is "one of the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century's most influential artists."

To coincide with these events D.A.P. has published a comprehensive overview of Twombly's work titled Cy Twombly: Cycles and Seasons, a must-have for any serious connoisseur of contemporary art. Meanwhile, on Tuesday evening Sotheby's will auction off an important Twombly work, 1986's two-part Untitled, estimated at $4 - $6 million. We expect his work will prove recession-proof.

Tags: Bilbao, Contemporary art, ContemporaryArt, cy twombly, CyTwombly, Guggenheim Museum, GuggenheimMuseum, Sothebys

$70 Million Francis Bacon Stars in Sotheby's Sale

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

A Francis Bacon triptych painted in 1976 is expected to fetch about $70 million in the star sale of Sotheby's Contemporary Art auction in New York on May 14. If the work, billed as the most important privately-held Bacon extant, does max out despite all the hand-wringing going on, the price will eclipse Impressionist claptrap like this $40 million Monet while still falling far short of some puffed-up Picassos. (The middle panel is pictured here; see the image gallery for the complete piece.) Back in February, a Bacon triptych sold for $46.1 million at Christie's in London, slightly below estimate, though the one currently on offer is the better work in our opinion.

Also included in the stunning sale is Mark Rothko's 1956 Orange, Red, Yellow, expected to fetch in excess of $35 million; Jean-Michel Basquiat's beautiful Untitled (Prophet I), est. $9 - $12 million; Robert Rauschenberg's 1963 Overdrive, est. $10 - $15 million; Richard Prince's Millionaire Nurse, est. $3.5 - $4.5 million; a 1986 Andy Warhol self-portrait, est. $2 - $3 million; an untitled Cy Twombly, est. $1.5 - $2 million; and a very naughty manga-inspired sculpture by Louis Vuitton collaborator Takashi Murakami, valued at an astonishing $3 - $4 million.

Gallery: Sotheby's Contemporary Art Auction

Tags: Andy Warhol, AndyWarhol, Christies, Contemporary art, ContemporaryArt, Cy Twombly, CyTwombly, Francis Bacon, FrancisBacon, Louis Vuitton, LouisVuitton, Mark Rothko, MarkRothko, Monet, Richard Prince, RichardPrince, Robert Rauschenberg, RobertRauschenberg, Sothebys, Takashi Murakami, TakashiMurakami

Woman Arrested for Kissing $2.7 Million Dollar Painting

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

Normally a kiss as a sign of affection is a good thing, but when it happens in an art gallery on a $2.7 million dollar painting it's not only not a good thing -- it's a crime. It happened last Thursday in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Avignon, France. The woman, 30-year-old Sam Rindy, had apparently been admiring a 9'x6' bone white painting by Cy Twombly valued at over £1 million and was suddenly overcome and just had to kiss it. She's quoted as saying "The artist left this white for me."

Yeah, well it's not white anymore since there's a lipstick imprint left behind. Ms. Rindy is awaiting trial on August 16 for "damage to a work of art."

How stupid can you be?

Source

Tags: arrested, art, crime, crimes, cy twombly, CyTwombly, kiss, kissed, kissing, painting, twombly