The Phillips de Pury auction on Thursday night raked in what once would have come from a single painting. Despite parading out pieces by Andy Warhol, Jeff Koons and Richard Prince, the sale was good for a mere $7 million, with individual lots moving for prices in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Thirty-nine went under the gavel, and eight didn't sell.

The Chelsea auction house lacks the savvy, knowledge and reach of Sotheby's and Christie's, so it had to lean on British art collector Charles Saatchi, who has agreed to complete most of his transactions through Phillips de Pury. In trade, subsidies from the auction house help keep access to Saatchi's gallery free.

Roughly a dozen of the lots came from Saatchi, while the others are said to have been rejected by Sotheby's and Christie's. In general, the pieces were "pretty skimpy," according to Manhattan art dealer Edward Tyler Nahem, who observes that the auction house "did pretty well with what they had."

Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama was the top seller, with her painting "Infinity Nets (T.W.A.)" busting past its high-end presale estimate of $400,000 and settling at $842,500 (including fees). Kusama's performance follows a well-hyped exhibition at the Gagosian Gallery this year.

The Christie's crowd on Tuesday may not have been ready to shell out big bucks for Andy Warhol's "Tunafish Disaster," but the crowd at Sotheby's was more than happy to by a boatload of currency. The top pop artist's "200 One Dollar Bills" found a buyer for a monstrous $43.8 million at the Sotheby's art auction in New York on Wednesday.

Pauline Karpidas, an art collector in London, offered the piece, Bloomberg News reports but wasn't able to verify with the collector herself. It looks like she scored with this one. "200 One Dollar Bills" carried a presale estimate of $8 million to $12 million, which didn't last long.

The piece consists of what its title states: 200 real-sized one dollar bills reproduced in black on grey ... and with a blue replica of the Treasury Department seal. If they were real cash, the sale price was greater by a factor of 219,000.

This wasn't the only success of the evening, and overall, the outcome was fantastic. Only two of the 54 lots failed to find new homes, and the final number, $134.4 million, thrashed the presale estimate of $97.7 million.

Christie's tried in New York with a 1983 piece by Jean-Michel Basquiat and didn't succeed. The auction house may have been too aggressive in estimating the 16-foot piece at $9 million. That's what's tough about the art market right now. There are signs of recovery, and it can be tempting to push for higher prices. Unfortunately, it's easy to get a bit excited. The painting had the highest estimate at the auction. The piece with the second highest presale estimate, a piece by Andy Warhol, met a similar fate.

The Basquiat piece, "Brother Sausage," was offered anonymously by a buyer later revealed by Bloomberg News to be Peter Brant, an art collector based in Connecticut. The piece may be a casualty of his divorce from model Stephanie Seymour. Well, it won't be financing post-marital discord and could remain a contested asset for a while.

Warhol's "Tunafish Disaster" was projected to move for up to $8 million and, like the Basquiat painting, didn't receive any bids. Art dealer Robert Mnuchin of L&M Arts was stuck taking it home.

Yet, some works beat the odds in an auction that raked in $74.2 million, within the presale range of $61.5 million to $88 million. Nonetheless, this was the lowest result we've seen from a Christie's New York contemporary art effort since May 2003 and down 81 percent from the top of the market two and a half years ago.

It looked like to sculptures by Damien Hirst were headed for court. The two pieces, worth an estimated $47.6 million, were part of a broader lawsuit involving Udo Fritz-Hermann Brandhorst, an art collector and heir to the Henkel AG & Co. fortune. Brandhorst's former mistress, Venetia Kapernekas, sued Brandhorst in federal court for the artwork.

Kapernekas, a 49-year-old art dealer, agreed to drop the lawsuit over the weekend in exchange for custody of the daughter she had with Brandhorst, a one-time $100,000 payment, a $500,000 trust for their daughter's education, a loft in Soho (worth around $5 million) to be held in the daughter's name and $640,000 to cover her legal expenses. She'll also get $5,000 a month in child support.

As part of the deal, Kapernekas will be able to sell an Andy Warhol painting she received from Brandhorst. It's a heart-shaped blue and red piece called "Candy Box Open" from 1983. She has chosen Sotheby's in London to handle the sale, and it could go for $40,000. She won't be able to sell another Warhol, "Heart," because it belongs to her daughter.

On Nov. 10 Christie's in New York will auction off an epic 15-ft. wide Jean-Michel Basquiat painting as part of its Post-War and Contemporary Art sale. The painting is expected to fetch up to $12 million. Brother Sausage (detail above), painted in 1983 and featured on the cover of Basquiat's catalogue raisonné, is a cartoon strip-like composition of six panels hinged together to form a narrative frieze of multiple drawings and Xeroxed overlays, each laden with themes of racial inequality and prejudice, wealth and corporate greed in a fame and consumer-obsessed American. Christie's notes the work is "steeped in Basquiat's signature style, raw energy and ingenious, loaded layering," exemplifying the artist at the pinnacle of his career. Also included in the auction are Andy Warhol's Tunafish Disaster, painted in 1963 and estimated at $6 - $8 million; and Jeff Koons' Large Vase of Flowers from 1991, estimated at $4 - $6 million.

[via JustLuxe]

November 2008 was pure living hell for the art auction houses. The bottom had just fallen out of the market ... and they were still saddled with pieces for which they'd offer guaranteed minimums. This is exactly what happened with Roy Lichtenstein's "Half Face with Collar."

The 48 square inch painting went under the gavel at Sotheby's almost a year ago, with the seller, Italian art dealer and collector Gian Enzo Sperone, protected by a $15 million minimum by the house. Now, it's on display at FIAC, right next to Andy Warhol's "Green Disaster," in the Projet Moderne section.

For many, the question of who owns the Lichtenstein painting has been raised. Is the fact that it's hanging as an entry from the Gagosian Gallery meaningful? A source at FIAC tells Bloomberg News that it is: "Larry owns it and it's definitely for sale."

It would be poetic, of course, for the piece to fetch the $15 million it failed to reach last November, but for now, all we can do is wait for the result (if any).

For 30 years Mr Chow (above) on East 57th Street in New York has been one of the city's most enduring hotspots, frequented over the decades by the likes of Andy Warhol, Jean Michel Basquiat, Calvin Klein, Madonna, Robert DeNiro, Tom Cruise, Uma Thurman and many others. To celebrate the anniversary and show their appreciation to its devoted clientele, the restaurant will present a complimentary bottle of Laurent Perrier Rosé champagne to each table from November 4th - December 15th. The 30th anniversary comes on the heels of the opening of Mr Chow's fifth location in Miami at the W South Beach. The New York branch opened in 1979 following the success of Michael Chow's restaurants in London and Beverly Hills.

[via JustLuxe]

While many of the art auction houses are dreading the fall season, Sotheby's has a few lots to celebrate. Art advisors can't keep their mouths shut, it seems, and following a luncheon for them, word got out that the house has picked up pieces by Alberto Giacometti and Andy Warhol next month.

Most collectors have been hanging onto their art, unwilling to sell their pieces in an unfavorable economic climate. Instead, they're hoping for a recovery and will likely unload the good stuff when they can get top dollar – or at least something better than fire-sale prices. So, it's pretty astounding that Sotheby's was able to nab such high-powered pieces when the rest of the world is scraping for decent. If it was looking for a differentiator this season, it got one.

The sculpture by Giacometti, "L'homme qui chavire," will go under the gavel on November 4, 2009 and is estimated at $8 million to $12 million. A similar piece by the same artist sold at Christie's New York in May 2007 for $18.5 million, after having been estimated at $6.5 million to $8.5 million. But, that was 2007 ... a different time, for sure.

The seller is publishing business stud S.I. Newhouse, Jr., who is thought to have acquired the piece in a private transaction. Maybe the Conde Nast superstar should have unloaded it sooner and sunk the cash into the magazines he had to close.

The news out of Hong Kong has been solid so far, even if it continues the trend of meeting or beating lowered expectations. After a year of abuse, I think art collectors, gallerists and the artists themselves are eager for any good news they can claim. September was rough, according to ArtPrice, "with no room for over-bidding or risk-taking." There was only one contemporary artist, Andy Warhol, who has met expectations, so far.

But, there's room for hope: Jitish Kallah.

Kallah's only 35 years old. Born in Bombay, his work has been described by ArtPrice as "crisis-immune." The market for contemporary Indian art has been in a hard way, with the Christie's South Asian Modern & Contemporary auction last month bringing in only $5.1 million in sales – where the presale estimate was $5.6 million. Yet, Kallah's work set a new record, with "Dawn Chorus – 7" going for $320,000 and beating its high-end estimate by a factor of three.

Meanwhile, Warhol continues to deliver. A piece from his "Flower" series in 1964 went for $895,000 at Christie's in late September and a "Cambell's Soup Can (Tomato Soup)" fetched $310,000 a day later at Sotheby's.

So, we have fear and hope in October. This week, both Sotheby's and Christie's will hold auctions in the photography segment, with Phillips de Pury following next week. And, there are London sales coinciding with the Frieze Art Fair.

Let's see if art collectors are ready to dress their walls again.

Selling at the top of a bubble is fantastic ... if you can pull it off. You look, feel and live like an absolute genius. Former art dealer Anthony d'Offay did this, unloading 725 postwar and contemporary pieces before the art market collapsed, dragged down by a global financial crisis. Timing is everything, and the collection purchased for a mere £26.5 million was valued at an astounding £125 million. Included were Jeff Koons' "Winter Bears," an Andy Warhol hamburger (evidently more expensive than those at Burger Joint) and an Anselm Kiefer palm tree.

D'Offay didn't make a dime.

Rather than sell the collection at a profit of close to £100 million, he sold them to the United Kingdom at cost: £26.5 million. Instead of taking the money, d'Offay chose to be paid with strings ... namely those attached to the deal. The condition of his sale was that the country had to send the artwork on tour throughout the UK, making it easy for people under age 18 to access the art.

D'Offay explains that financial constraints on British museums – which are free and thus have no money with which to acquire new pieces – are great for the people, but not for keeping the walls full with fresh material. On the list for the future is a special room for Damien Hirst's "Pharmacy" installation and has already purchased Hirst's "Painkillers" piece (pill cabinet) for $877,000. In a deal with Hirst, he also picked up work by Koons, and Hirst's new "Necromancer." Hirst was d'Offay's gallery assistant as he was finishing college.

D'Offay's talent, he says, is buying art, rather than curating or creating. He became inspired as a child in northern England when viewing a collection of Francis Bacon (shocking, right? Bacon connection comes back again ...).

The thief was a sports fan, it seems. Ten pieces by pop art king Andy Warhol – showing famous sports figures – were swiped from a home in West Los Angeles, according to local police. The 40 square inch silkscreens were stolen around September 2 and September 3. The owner, businessman Richard Weisman, is offering a $1 million reward for information leading to the recovery of the multimillion dollar collection.

Times may be tough for the art market, but a large collection of Warhols is still definitely worth a $1 million reward.

The paintings were displayed in Weisman's living room, and the doors to the house were locked. Nobody's sure how the thieves got into the house ... well, nobody knows but the thieves (obviously). The family nanny noticed that the paintings were missing and dashed off to a neighbor's house to call the police.

Among the missing are pieces depicting O.J. Simpson, Pele, Chris Evert and Muhammad Ali. The exact value of the collection is unknown, but Weisman had tried to sell it for $3 million in 2002. In 2007, of course, Warhol became the top seller at auction worldwide, so even in the current art slump, it's hard to imagine the collection hasn't appreciated.

Other artwork in the house was untouched, and the home had not been ransacked, leading the police to believe that the thieves were only interested in Warhol.

So, once again, the LAPD is trying to track down O.J.

In 1984, Michael Jackson and Andy Warhol were at the heights of their respective careers. The two pop artists have since passed, but their one collaboration is about to hit the auction block in a sale expected to figure in the millions.

This portrait of Jackson painted by Warhol, measuring 30 x 26 inches, is valued at half a million pounds sterling (nearly $850k), but is likely to fetch far more than that when it hits the block in the near future in a New York auction. Until then, it will be on display at the British Music Experience in London, where Michael was due to launch his comeback concert immediately prior to his untimely death.

[Source: Luxurylaunches.com]

Several celebrities did attend the art fair, but they brought little excitement, it seems, beyond their appearances. Jon Bon Jovi, personalities from The Real Housewives of New York City, Kelsey Grammer and Russell Simmons were all spotted, but Bloomberg didn't report any purchases.

The biggest name at the ArtHamptons fair, of course, was Michael Jackson – a creation by Andy Warhol. Originally, Vered Gallery had hoped to sell it via silent auction, but the gallery yanked the portrait late last week ... claiming that collectors were looking at the piece but "needed more time to assess the value."

Or, maybe they were just at the beach, like everyone else, apparently.

The mood in the Hamptons has been affected by real estate prices, plunging bonuses and – of course – the ongoing art market slump. But, the collectors gathering at ArtHamptons are trying to keep stiff upper lips. Rick Friedman, its founder and executive director, is saying that now is the best time to enter the art market, with low prices building in an inherently greater upside. And, there's no doubt. If you have the cash to put into the art market – and the inclination to invest in this asset class – now is the time to do it.

The major constraint on the art market isn't the notion that it's a bad time to invest. Any fairly serious art collector can see that this is the time to make a move. Like any other "discount," you can't take advantage of it if you don't have the price of admission. You might be able to pick up the Old Masters for a relative song right now, but if your bonus got slashed this year, the opportunity may not be possible.

So, what's moving at ArtHamptons this year?

Jane Wilson, who one a Lifetime Achievement Award this year, has seen some success, along with Elliott Erwitt, Lillion Bassman and other artists who lean toward decorative pieces. For some, the year's even been positive, with gallery director Joseph Newman calling the first quarter of this year the best he's had. Trompe l'oeil is working well, too. Interested in buying a Madoff joke for $13,500? You can do it with Eric Forstmann's Made Off with the Bail Out Package.

Meanwhile, soft porn is moving ... so, at least someone is making money on the skin business (the hardcore guys sure aren't). Suggestive images have always packed a bit of a thrill, and pieces that ply the flesh are doing well out in the Hamptons this year. Boyarde Messenger's Frilly in Yellow ($3,350) and Changing Rooms III moved for almost three times that amount.

The feel is somewhat upbeat at ArtHamptons this year, but the action is definitely taking place in the emerging artist space. Nonetheless, there are some big ticket items up for sale. At Vered Gallery's booth, you'll find a Picasso, Chagall, de Kooning and Rauschenberg – not to mention a 1984 portrait of Michael Jackson by Andy Warhol. If you're liquid, now's the time to enter the market!

Its mid-May performance was nothing to scream about, so Sotheby's didn't take any chances at last night's contemporary art auction in London. Three works by pop art king Andy Warhol moved for $10.5 million, accounting for 25 percent of the $42 million in sales. In all, 40 lots came under the gavel and came in just under the high estimate of $45 million. A surprisingly high 92.5 percent of works found buyers.

This year's London results for Sotheby's are off 73 percent from the late June 2008 contemporary art auction, indicating that low expectations played a role in last night's success. The average price last year was around $2.2 million, dropping this year by 48 percent as a result of a protracted art market recession. Well, Tobias Meyer, worldwide head of contemporary art for Sotheby's calls it "a performing transitional market," but you know what that means.

If the latest results tell us anything, it's that death is the cure for dying. An ailing art market is now showing signs of life thanks to the dead guys whose art continues to be in demand. Earlier auctions focused on lower cost, less prominent, "cutting edge" artists as an attempt to get collectors to open their wallets in smaller increments. Now, we're looking at a possible flight to quality. Ninety percent of the pieces auctioned had been under the hammer before.

So, is there any meaning in today's art market? Eh, maybe. It's schismatic. It's fun. And, at least it gives bloggers something to write about.