alexander calder

Alexander Calder Mobile Is Second Highest Antiques Roadshow Appraisal

Filed under: Art

Last year's "Antiques Roadshow" opened with its first $1 million-dollar appraisal for some pieces of carved Chinese jade. This year's season, which started earlier this week, began with the second highest valuation in the popular TV show's 15-year history, for an Alexander Calder mobile was appraised at $400,000 to $1 million. In the episode which premiered on Monday, decorative arts appraiser Christopher Kennedy examined a colorful metal mobile made by Alexander Calder made around 1950.

The owner, identified as Ruth, said that Calder gave the mobile to her aunt at a cocktail party in 1958. The aunt had done a needlepoint pillow of one of Calder's works. She gave it to him, and a couple of days later he had this mobile sent to her as a thank-you for the pillow. The mobile had a slight restoration in 1986. Appraiser Chris Kennedy deemed that for fair auction value, the range is somewhere between $400,000 and $600,000 but because Calder is a hot auction property these days it could conceivably break $1 million. Check out the video and an interview with the owner at the PBS website.

[via ArtFix Daily]

Tags: alexander calder, antiques roadshow, calder mobile

Alexander Calder Fetching High Prices At Auction

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

It looks very simple but the simple mobile by Alexander Calder shown above sold for a sky-high 2.3 million euros in Paris on May 31 at Artcurial's evening sale of contemporary art. The piece is named Pour Vilar and dates from the early 1950s. Calder made the piece for the French actor Jean Vilar, showing up at his home with the mobile wrapped in newspaper. He proceeded to set up the mobile in the actor's home. The piece was sold to a Swiss collector and had a pre-sale estimate of €500,000-€800,000. It set a record for the artist in France. Calder is a hot property lately. The Art Newspaper reports that a similar mobile Untitled (Autumn Leaves), sold earlier this May at Sotheby's New York for $3.7 million. Calder's spare style appears to resonate with younger collectors whose tastes are more minimalist.

Tags: alexander calder, art, art market, mobile

Christie's Delivers ($94 million) at Art Auction, Trounces Sotheby's

by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

Christie's fought the trend and walked away with close to $94 million. Naysayers stand shocked (I'll admit it; I'm among them). This is still far from the record-setting years leading up to the current financial crisis, but only the truly stubborn would not recognize the accomplishment of coming close to the upper end of the auction house's estimate, particularly a day after competitor Sotheby's turned in such a dismal performance.

The initial estimate for Christie's Post-War and Contemporary Evening Sale was $71.5 million to $104.5 million. Forty-nine of the 54 available lots were sold – a sales rate of 91 percent by lot and 94 percent by value. This easily tops the 81 percent by lot that Sotheby's hit (en route to a paltry $47 million). Thirty of the lots sold for more than $1 million each, and nine raked in more than $3 million a piece.

If you want to be negative, though, you still have plenty of ammo. Back in November, Christie's achieved a $113.6 million take with a sale rate of only 68 percent (by lot). A year ago, the auction house pulled in $331.4 million at a sale rate of 95 percent.

But, last May doesn't count. That was a last hurrah, of sorts, and most in the art community realized it, even if they wouldn't concede the obvious.

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