paintings

A Rembrandt portrait that has been hidden in a private collection and not seen by the public for nearly 40 years will be sold at Christie's in London on December 8, reported The New York Times on September 18. "Portrait of a Man, Half-Length, With His Arms Akimbo," from 1658, depicts an unknown sitter, and experts at Christie's say it could garner $29.7 million to $41.2 million, the highest estimate ever for an old master painting coming to auction.

Although Christie's will say only that the painting is from a "distinguished private collection," the seller is known to be Barbara Piasecka Johnson, a Polish-born collector who once lived in Princeton, N.J., and now resides in Assisi, Italy. Johnson inherited about $300 million from her husband, J. Seward Johnson, son of the founder of the Johnson & Johnson pharmaceutical company, after he died in 1983.

The portrait was first shown publicly in 1847, when it was included in an exhibition at the British Institution in London, on loan from George Folliott, a notable British collector. His grandson sold it in 1930 at Sotheby's, where it brought £18,500, then a huge price. Soon after that it was acquired by George Huntington Hartford II, a supermarket heir who was in his 20s at the time. He donated it to Columbia University in 1958, and it hung in the president's office until 1968, when, because of student demonstrations, it was removed for safekeeping and put in storage.

In 1970 Columbia lent it to "Rembrandt After 300 Years," an exhibition at the Detroit Institute of Arts. That was the last time it was seen in public. Four years later Harold Diamond, a New York dealer, sold it to the Johnsons on behalf of the university, which used the proceeds to benefit an endowment fund.

The Art Price Global Index suggests that the art market started to turn at the middle of the year, but it's going to take the autumn art season to confirm whether this is a false positive or the start of a new trend. Maybe the slight improvements in economic conditions are leading to more art market confidence (and spending), or perhaps they're just sick to death of being in a slump.

Art prices increased by 4.97 percent at the end of the second quarter, according to the Art Price Global Index. This comes after the index fell a total of 30 percent from the start of 2008. The collective will of art collectors, dealers and auctioneers probably won't be enough to change the art world, but it could happen at the same time. The Art Market Confidence Index gained 20 points during the second quarter, supporting the notion that we're all ready for this to be over.

It was still a tough quarter for Post-War and Contemporary artwork, which saw prices drop nine percent and four percent, respectively. But, the rest of the art market has fared better, thanks in large part to the increase in the number of affordable works brought under the gavel. So far this year, 79 percent of pieces sold for less than €5,000, up from 73 percent in 2008. Paintings and multiples declined, as well, by 31 percent and 41 percent, respectively, since 2008. With 4 percent and 5 percent price drops in the second quarter of 2009, their prices have returned to 2004 levels.

But, the summer's pretty quiet for the art market. We won't be able to confirm a recovery until the fall auction season begins. Then, we'll know if wallets are ready to be opened and stay that way for a while.

The latest London market art auction was good for $32.7 million last night, as Christie's International moved lots from its Old Masters & 19th Century art category. The works ranged from late 14th century to late 19th century, with this newly created broad category intended to push "crossover" buying (from different periods) among collectors. Christie's is already celebrating the effectiveness of this plain, even though sales continue to be well below 2008 levels.

Sixty-three lots came under the gavel at the Christie's auction, and the house did hit its low estimate of $25 million. Only 24 percent of the lots were not purchased. Last year at this time, the same auction generated close to $50 million on 48 lots. And, the July 2007 Christie's Old Masters auction was good for around $80 million on 91 paintings. The two top paintings this year sold for below their estimates.

Despite Christie's self-proclaimed success for the Old Masters & 19th Century Art category, dealers aren't sold on it. A few claimed that the later work detracted from the pieces created earlier in this broad period.

The next sale comes today, as Sotheby's moves 200 pieces that currently belong to Johnson & Johnson heiress Barbara Piasecka Johnson. The auction is expected to yield $9.2 million in sales.

A row of cars waiting for a green light was concealed by four large canvases proceeding across New York's busy Fifth Ave., creating the appearance of emptiness from W. 51st St to Central Park and beyond. Artist Nelson Diaz chose Palm Sunday to reveal his latest project, "The Isolated Christ," to the people of New York. The response to this unique mix of street art, performance art and oil on canvas was nothing short of astounding.

Five years in the making, The Isolated Christ is a four-part rendering of the most famous figure in one of Leonardo Da Vinci's most recognized works. Diaz "isolated" the image of Jesus Christ from the apostles in DaV inci's "The Last Supper" and plotted thousands of points on the image by hand. Then, using advanced calculus techniques, he fed the point into an equation that exposes "hidden" four dimensional space in the original image and used the results as the foundation for his signature perspective.

The result is four faces of DaVinci's Jesus, reflecting various situations. The final canvas – transcendence – offers an obscure, almost headless presentation, signifying the departure from the norm. The meaning is left to the viewer, with the religious assuming resurrection and the atheist likely to posit obsolescence. Diaz remains coy with his intention, believing that interpretation (like faith) is a personal affair.

With half a decade spent on the vision and production of The Isolated Christ (all four paintings were completed by hand – sans brushes, literally with his fingers), Diaz spent the last few months struggling with venue. He decided last summer to skip the traditional alternatives (such as art galleries) during his protest against the treatment of art as a commodity, during which he auctioned 10 paintings on eBay for the princely starting bid of $1 each.

"The old way of doing things is dead," he explained during several of our meetings. Deep-pocketed buyers writing checks for pieces they don't understand, he believed, would not be able to sustain itself ... a lesson to which the art market was treated last September. Diaz wanted a public setting. As with his eBay experiment, he wanted to return the aesthetic to everybody, not a self-proclaimed elite.

That left only one "gallery" from which to choose: the streets of Manhattan.

Last night was Christie's London's turn to try out the 2009 art market. Unlike the previous night when a Sotheby's auction brought in £32.6 million versus a low estimate of £40.6 million, the Christie's auction went over the low estimate. The Christie's Impressionist and modern art auction brought in £63.4 million against a revised low total forecast of 58.8 million pounds. The 47-lot auction of Impressionist and modern art included Monet's painting "Dans la Prairie" which had a single bid £11.2 million, it had an estimate of £15 million. In 1988, at the height of the last art-market boom, when Japanese bidders were bulk-buying classic Impressionist works, the painting sold at Sotheby's in London for 14.3 million pounds with fees. The painting had last appeared on the auction market in November 1999 at Sotheby's New York, where it sold for $15.4 million. As Bloomberg reports it was part of a set of four Impressionist-period pieces from the same collection which had been bought between May 1998 and May 2000. Another, a Henri Toulouse-Lautrec's 1895 oil-on-board picture of two girls lying on a bed in a brothel, "L'abandon (Les deux amies)," had a low estimate of £5 million and sold for £6.2 million. In 2000, it sold at Sotheby's New York for $9.4 million. The two other pieces from the collection up for auction, a Monet landscape and a Renoir painting, failed to sell. The auction was 60 percent lower than the £105.4 million pounds Christie's got at the February sale in London last year when 83 percent of the lots found buyers. The February results seems a bit brighter than November's tally when just 56 percent of the lots sold.

Two masterpiece paintings of Venice by artist Canaletto will soon find themselves up for sale as Christie's has announced they'll be part of the Important Old Master and British Pictures auction scheduled for December 2nd. The paintings are believed to have been commissioned back in 1738 and have been passed down through family generations ever since, so this is the first time in their centuries of existence that they'll be up for sale.

Canaletto is one of the most celebrated artists of the 18th century, with his works involving Venice being especially popular. The paintings will be on display at Christie's of London from Nov 29th thru Dec 2nd.

Big empty walls getting you down? If you haven't found the perfect tapestry or can't get your Monet back from the Art Institute of Chicago, you've still got to put something on your wall to make it feel like home.

Get down to the local thrift store. Look through the art they have there. It's not likely to be any good, but you might get lucky; in any case, what you're looking for is the frames. In fact, the more horrendous the art, the better, because it's likely to be cheaper!

Get a couple vintage-looking frames and toss the prints of angels and hippie landscapes. If the frames are looking shoddy, spray paint them! A nice glossy black is very chic on a carved frame, or you can just do a touch up with gold paint or a nice stain. What to put inside? We don't recommend you try your own hand at painting--not for your wall. Why not get some cool paper from Papyrus or your local paperie, or frame an interesting piece of fabric?

It's just another easy way to make life more lux for cheap or free.

Artnet recently launched an online art auction (still in beta mode), featuring photography, prints, works on paper, sculpture, and paintings. At a glance there were several hundred works posted, and there's info on the home page for art dealers on how to become an authorized Artnet seller. The site is straightforward and seems to work much like any online auction -- place a bid (U.S. dollars or euros) or just add to your watch list. There are starting bids, estimates, and end times. While the site is just getting started, I bet that with people shopping more and more from home (saving gas), even shopping online for art will become commonplace.

When someone says "tortilla" to you, what pops to mind? Lunch, right? A nice big burrito with extra sour cream. But Mr. Joe Bravo isn't like most of us, when he thinks "tortilla" he starts thinking of his next artistic inspiration. To him tortillas are canvases on which he paints amazingly detailed and deep creations with acrylics. Of course, the tortillas must be prepped and treated beforehand, and for each painting Bravo searches through several tortillas until he finds the one with just the right appearance and texture. This month Bravo will be heading to Hong Kong to showcase his floury creations while painting a celebrity live and in person. I'd love to see him paint -- must be an interesting process!

Via Book of Joe

A painting by artist Mark Rothko broke the record for postwar art by more than a little at an auction at Sotheby's in New York when it sold for $72.8 million dollars on Tuesday. Although "White Center (Yellow, Pink, and Lavender on Rose)," was expected to go for high dollars (presale estimates had put it around $40 million), the over-the-top boost can most likely be attributed to the big name of owner and seller David Rockefeller Sr. -- who says he plans to donate the proceeds of the sale to charity.

It was a big night for record breaking sales, as earlier that night Francis Bacon's "Study From Innocent X" broke all previous records selling for $52.7 million, only to be outdone by the Rockefeller's Rothko moments later.

Artist Stella Vine has a bit of a thing for Kate Moss. No fewer than three of her paintings feature the famous model and she actually describes it as an "obsession" on her blog. She's done paintings of celebrities like Princess Di, the Rolling Stones and even Frieda Kahlo, as well as many others, in addition to Moss and Pete Doherty. Her style represents a sort of post-pop nouveau British that some people really dislike. Quite a few of her pieces are available on ArtNet. This Kate Moss painting, titled "I only make love to Jesus" is acrylic on canvas and available via ArtNet, though you'll have to call for the price.

Sotheby's William Blake auction on May 2 in New York has an interesting story behind it. The Art Newspaper gives the extensive background on Blake's watercolor illustrations which accompany Robert Blair’s poem “The Grave” and actually form one complete set. The 19 individual works  are selling for up to  $1.5 to 2 million each. The works have been together for over 200 years (they were painted in 1805).  Sotheby's says that they are still open to offer from museums interested in keeping the set together. The Yale Center for British Art in New Have has the only other watercolor from the set.  The folio of works spent five generations in the family of watercolor artist John Stannard. They were sold in 2000 as part of a collection of ordinary books. The paintings were assumed to be prints until 2001 when two Yorkshire dealers took them to a specialist. The paintings were originally offered to the Tate and a prolonged dispute erupted. London dealer Libby Howie bought the Blakes for around £5 million on behalf of a  small group of investors. After more failed negotiations with the Tate the paintings finally came to Sotheby's. Hopefully someone will step forward to keep this beautiful set together.

Artexpo New York, the place to find both fine popular art will hold its 28th annual exposition, March 2-6, 2006 at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.  This year the  theme is “Big Apple. Big Art.”  The show is a chance to see all styles of work and art that fits budgets ranging from $500 to $50,000.  Events include the unveiling of the art of the US Olympic team on Saturday, March 4, the launch of the Art of Sir Winston Churchill with his grand daughter present and famed photographer Annie Leibovitz’s curated exhibition for ICP at The Point to benefit the school children of the South Bronx. The Pavilion is a new part of the Artexpo, it is a high-end retail gallery experience and will feature the artist Eric Waugh painting live on Saturday, March 4 to create a $50,000 piece to be auctioned off for the Starlight Starbright Children’s Foundation. Tickets are $15 per day.