"The sale totaled $691.5 million"

November 25, 2013 5:56 PM

NYTimes: At $142.4 Million, Triptych Is the Most Expensive Artwork Ever Sold at an Auction

It took seven superrich bidders to propel a 1969 Francis Bacon triptych to $142.4 million at Christie’s on Tuesday night, making it the most expensive work of art ever sold at auction. William Acquavella, the New York dealer, is thought to have bought the painting on behalf of an unidentified client, from one of Christie’s skyboxes overlooking the auction.

Can Sotheby's Stay In The Picture?

Just weeks before the sales were to start, Meyer had nothing that could compete with the caliber of art Christie’s was bringing to market. That Warhol was his last shot at a major consignment, and as its owner wavered throughout September, Meyer flew to Switzerland to plead his case. When that didn’t clinch the deal, he invited the collector to spend the weekend at his country house in Connecticut. The pressure on Meyer was enormous and mounting. And it wasn’t just Christie’s colossal sale weighing on him; Sotheby’s largest shareholder, hedge fund manager Dan Loeb, was growing increasingly disgusted by the company’s lagging performance. In an open letter, he castigated the company’s management and demanded that Meyer’s boss, CEO Bill Ruprecht, be fired.

Globalization and the Art Bubble

But "art bubble" fears have been around for a while...
2013 NOV 15: Is There A Bubble In The Art Market?
2013 SEP 20: Monetary policy and the art market; is there a bubble forming?
2013 AUG 01: In the Debate About the Art Bubble, the Dealer Is the Missing Piece
2012 DEC 01: Beware The Bubble
2012 JUN 12: Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble: Journalists Brood on an Art Market Crash

posted by the man of twists and turns (45 comments total)

What Is The Value Of Stolen Art?

How Do You Make Money Off Stolen Art?
posted by the man of twists and turns at 5:58 PM on November 25, 2013 [1 favorite]

I would love to see some kind of graph or chart comparing art auction records to Hollywood box office records over time.

I would especially love to see both of these things graphed to some sort of study of what Americans think of as "A Lot Of Money".
posted by Sara C. at 6:03 PM on November 25, 2013

I'm just glad that obscenely, incontinently rich people still have the opportunity to enjoy a nice day out at the markets, perhaps trying some locally-grown seasonal produce, or a decadent organic chocolate or two, as well as picking up a few pieces of artwork from the community's struggling artists, adding colour to the lounge or spare bedroom at home.
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:18 PM on November 25, 2013 [3 favorites]

It's a fascinating piece of work but for that kind of money I'll settle for two minor Van Gogh's.
posted by TDavis at 6:19 PM on November 25, 2013 [2 favorites]

Also it's good to see that old Bill Shakespeare started diversifying into the visual arts in his later years, writing plays can only sustain one for so long.
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:20 PM on November 25, 2013 [3 favorites]

i wonder if art could be sold with binding contracts, kind of like houses are with home owners associations in that the original contract binds whatever buyer to the terms of the original contract.

because, if you could bind anyone who buys a home to "you must be a member of the home owners association" it seems like you could also bind "if you sell this art you must pay the artist or their estate X% of the price." it seems like that would be a good way for artists to be able to profit from the popularity of their artwork long after they make it.
posted by cupcake1337 at 6:24 PM on November 25, 2013

This post has inspired me to create a new conceptual work. You may already be familiar with my previous failed conceptual works, acquiring and planting Ai Weiwei's sunflower seeds in a remote field and tweeting all my comments without the use of the letter E.

After a suitable number of bidders has assembled I intend to auction off this comment. Once it has sold it will surely be the most expensive Metafilter comment ever sold entitling the new owner to claim that they own the most expensive Metafilter comment ever sold.

Everyone here is Hedge Fund Manager right? Because I am valuing this comment at 20 to 50 million.
posted by Ad hominem at 6:26 PM on November 25, 2013 [2 favorites]

You're on. I will give you these two words I just made up. Snurgle. Blax. Both are worth 25 mil each.
posted by mono blanco at 6:40 PM on November 25, 2013 [3 favorites]

Man, for a tenth of that I could make new art for the rest of my life BUT FRANCIS BACON.
posted by loquacious at 6:47 PM on November 25, 2013

That's 7,110 bottles of Glenfiddich 1937.
posted by vapidave at 6:48 PM on November 25, 2013

That isn't even close to the most expensive artwork ever sold, it's just the highest price of a painting sold at auction. Just off the top of my head, I recall Steve Wynn's private sale of his Picasso, Le Reve, for $155. Oh that's a rich story. Wynn was showing it to the buyer when he slipped and put his elbow through the canvas. It was going for $139M but after restoration, sold for $155M.

After checking the wikipedia page for Most Expensive Paintings, I see that I missed the big one, Cezanne's The Card Players, price unknown but rumored to be between $259M and $300M.

The list is sorted with prices adjusted for inflation, the Lucian Freud triptych is only #7. Small potatoes.
posted by charlie don't surf at 7:25 PM on November 25, 2013 [1 favorite]

...from one of Christie’s skyboxes overlooking the auction.

There "Super Bowl," fuck you think you got now.
posted by From Bklyn at 7:25 PM on November 25, 2013 [1 favorite]

Bringing home the Bacon.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 7:33 PM on November 25, 2013 [2 favorites]

DEALER’S HAND - "Why are so many people paying so much money for art? Ask David Zwirner."
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:40 PM on November 25, 2013 [1 favorite]

All of these anonymous phone bidders remind me a little of all the anonymous super pac donors. They might not be influencing an election, but they know you should be a little ashamed at being so rich.
posted by Halogenhat at 7:50 PM on November 25, 2013 [5 favorites]

The luck of the drawn and painted — what would have poor Vincent Van Gogh, William Blake, and Johannes Vermeer have thought? Even a successful painter of light can have some pretty dark days.
posted by cenoxo at 7:57 PM on November 25, 2013

they know you should be a little ashamed at being so rich.

No, they understand that you should be extremely cautious is you are that rich. And it's not as if there's any value added to their being there in person.

Here's the thing - these are not aesthetic decisions, these are economic decisions. If your fortune is in the billions and you need to diversify, you're going to need something, anything really expensive that will retain some kind of value. Rolexes ain;t gonna do it. So you need entire companies, high-end art, London/NYC real estate, gold bars . WIll they retain their value? At that level of wealth it sort of doesn;t matter. You have to spend it. Period.
posted by IndigoJones at 8:07 PM on November 25, 2013 [3 favorites]

cupcake1337: it seems like you could also bind "if you sell this art you must pay the artist or their estate X% of the price."

Caleb Larsen's A Tool To Deceive and Slaughter has some elements of this, and could be trivially expanded to do so. As far as I can tell though, it's currently broken (and has been for how long?)
posted by curious.jp at 8:18 PM on November 25, 2013

Rich people buying expensive things with their riches is boring, so I'd like to make the following proposal, to liven things up:

1. Sales, gifts, etc. between private parties of art* valued at more than $10 million should be made a serious felony (sales to museums remains fine).
2. Theft of said art in elaborate capers should be encouraged, though still illegal.
3. Legal ownership will transfer to the thieves if their caper results in a successful work of fiction and/or breathless media coverage.

* At least post-war modern art.
posted by cosmic.osmo at 8:28 PM on November 25, 2013

Legal ownership will transfer to the thieves if their caper results in a successful work of fiction and/or breathless media coverage.

Also insane royalties will now go to the geriatric remnants of National Socialist Germany for gifting the world with 70+ years of sublime movie villains.
posted by dgaicun at 8:37 PM on November 25, 2013 [1 favorite]

Francis Bacon, next to Max Ernst (and the rest of the Surrealists excluding the last 90% of Dali's work) produced some of my favorite art. Well, Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Rothko...the list goes on: but I don't get why Bacon got the nod from Big Money. Weird.

And don't get me started on Koons and Hirst...(!?!)
posted by kozad at 8:38 PM on November 25, 2013 [1 favorite]

I guess I'm not really the target market since I thought this referred to Francis Bacon the 16th century "English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, orator and author" (according to Wikipedia).
posted by kiltedtaco at 8:41 PM on November 25, 2013 [3 favorites]

kiltedtaco, I made the same mistake during an Important Curatorial Meeting of the artists' collective I used to be part of in my early 20s.

Oh, the lols.

Let's just say I will NEVER forget who Francis Bacon is, ever again.
posted by Sara C. at 8:45 PM on November 25, 2013 [2 favorites]

ZOIDBERG
posted by Mario Speedwagon at 8:47 PM on November 25, 2013 [1 favorite]

Someone looked at this, and thought, "I Hope to Christ someone finds this worthwhile when the revolution comes, and takes pity."

Poor fool.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:53 PM on November 25, 2013

this has a lot going for it as an auction piece - triptych, fame about fame, colorful. but as a representation of a critical turning point in art, or insightful solution, or the proto-genesis of the great things to come (ummm... neo-expressionism...), ummm... no. no, no, no. yeah, so great story about prices, about all those monied forces that coalesce to make such a selection... but ummm come on... for one thing it's English, hahaha. sorry about, nothing (terribly) wrong about that... except there is in art, at least a lot of painting... anyway.... as has been echoed here... Bacon???
posted by wallstreet1929 at 9:06 PM on November 25, 2013

Elsewhere in the auction world today a lead statue of a bird sold for $4,085,000
posted by Anitanola at 9:13 PM on November 25, 2013

Oh man I just finally clicked the link and discovered that it's not even a Francis Bacon painting that I like.

(I prefer the ones with the sort of papal melting heads in chairs that look vaguely imprisoned.)
posted by Sara C. at 9:17 PM on November 25, 2013

Let's just say I will NEVER forget who Francis Bacon is, ever again.

I got this. He's really Shakespeare, right?
posted by RobotHero at 9:17 PM on November 25, 2013 [3 favorites]

When I was a child, my parents took me to the Hirschhorn Museum as part of a family trip to DC. They were showing a retrospective on Francis Bacon. What I saw scared the fuck out of me, to the point where I wouldn't give modern art a chance for another 15 years. Also, I was really confused about 16th-century European history.
posted by evil otto at 9:49 PM on November 25, 2013 [3 favorites]

His studio was an amazing work of art its self.
posted by quazichimp at 10:00 PM on November 25, 2013

Let's just say I will NEVER forget who Francis Bacon is, ever again.

Knowledge is power.
posted by empath at 10:37 PM on November 25, 2013

A compelling argument for the nationalisation of all art and the need for an actual capital tax at the same time.
posted by MartinWisse at 12:55 AM on November 26, 2013 [2 favorites]

Francis Bacon and Christie's 'theatre of pure money'
posted by Mister Bijou at 1:48 AM on November 26, 2013

Of course, pride precedes the fall, and at some point, you realize that to implement aggressive out-of-order execution, you need to fit more transistors into the same die size, but then a material science guy pops out of a birthday cake and says YEAH WE CAN DO THAT, and by now, you’re touring with Aerosmith and throwing Matisse paintings from hotel room windows, because when you order two Matisse paintings from room service and you get three, that equation is going to be balanced.
posted by indubitable at 4:44 AM on November 26, 2013

because, if you could bind anyone who buys a home to "you must be a member of the home owners association" it seems like you could also bind "if you sell this art you must pay the artist or their estate X% of the price." it seems like that would be a good way for artists to be able to profit from the popularity of their artwork long after they make it.

No need for that: If the price of an artist's work appreciates, then the artists just needs to produce a few more pieces and sell them. Same thing for the estate; they'll likely have lots of pieces of the suddenly famous artist.
I don't think there are any poor artists out there whose pieces sell for millions (or even thousands) of dollars.
posted by sour cream at 6:01 AM on November 26, 2013

NB - there's no certainty that the buyer was an individual. Back in the eighties when it was the Japanese who were flush, banks and corporations were driving up the high end of high art.
posted by IndigoJones at 6:31 AM on November 26, 2013

but I don't get why Bacon got the nod from Big Money. Weird.

Speculation is the buyer was the Sheikha Mayassa of Qatar, who has an existing collection of similar works (including other Bacon work, as well as significant Rothko and Damien Hurst pieces).

The Qatari royals have also spent a lot of money to bring the World Cup to Qatar and to open branches of major American universities -- for example, the Cornell Medical School, and branches of Georgetown, Northwestern, Texas A&M, and Carnegie-Mellon -- in Qatar. All part of an effort to make Doha a major cultural center -- and they obviously have lots of money to spend.
posted by aught at 7:12 AM on November 26, 2013

You're on. I will give you these two words I just made up. Snurgle. Blax. Both are worth 25 mil each.

Sold! for 50 million in words! I believe those are the most expensive words ever invented. Enjoy your new comment!
posted by Ad hominem at 9:20 AM on November 26, 2013

Excerpts from commentary by Michael O'Hare:

"What happened here? First, it was a transfer in which practically no real economic resources were consumed....

Giving up control of $140m in return for something either means you are an idiot beyond rational analysis, or you expect the something to get you a stream of benefits that tots up to more. ...you might be ... counting on someone else to pay close to $200m to cover your commissions, storage costs, insurance, and foregone interest on the investment until you sell it on.

You might be making a gesture like Pogner in Die Meistersinger, who put his daughter up as a prize in a singing contest to prove how admirable he and his insecure bourgeois pals are by embracing art. ...for the quiet, discreet admiration of his rarefied small circle of friends. ...the stream of benefits is an elevation of the buyer’s positional standing ...it has nothing to do with the painting itself, only reputation and the fact of the purchase.

Speculative investments ...rest on the expectation that an asset will eventually create real economic value ...this value might reasonably have to do with people engaging with it as a painting, and this can happen in ... the old-fashioned way, standing in front of it, looking, and letting it do stuff to the inside of your head .... Bacon’s work will have to generate (at 5%) something like $3600 worth of this value/working hour forever ...I’m not aware of anyone able to sell access at rates anything like that...

It can also be consumed in reproduction, but ... I can’t make up a $140m story for it.

What should we think about this nonsense from a societal perspective? ..it’s a little worrying ...But maybe it’s good for art: painters in garrets will observe this windfall for Bacon’s heirs and redouble their efforts to make great works that will someday be worth millions, works that will enrich our lives!

Right. Like the kids shooting hoops instead of doing homework in order to have a zillion-dollar NBA contract and buy their mothers nice new houses....

What could you do with $140m if you really cared about art (and artists)? ...invest it to earn a cool $7m per year to provide twenty live-work spaces for artists ... hire a hundred art teachers for public schools, forever...

But if you did one of those things, you couldn’t have your rich friends to an exquisite dinner, with that painting on the wall certifying how much you love art. Do I hear $150m, in the back on the right? Are you all in, and all done…?"
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 12:52 PM on November 26, 2013

Excerpts from commentary by Michael O'Hare:

This commentary persists in thinking about a $100m+ art purchase from the perspective of someone with a normative (from a middle-class N. American / European) amount of money.

It's just not going to make sense from that perspective no matter how many knots he ties himself into to "tell stories" to explain it. The rich are different from you and me.
posted by aught at 2:20 PM on November 26, 2013

Dude I am not rich, and if I had $200 million I would totally buy a painting I really loved, just for silly personal reasons of wanting to own one of my favorite things in the entire world, ever.

That said, there are only 34 paintings by Vermeer, and the one that sold in 2004 went for only like $30 million. I could have almost seven Vermeers (about a fifth of his extant oeuvre) for $200 million.

Comparing apples to apples, I would TOTALLY spend $200 million on my favorite Cy Twombly painting, or on one of Louise Bourgeois' spider sculptures, or one of Richard Serra's Torqued Ellipses.

And again, I'm not rich or anything. It would just be extremely fucking bad ass to own something like that. Just out of sheer love. If I were a billionaire, I would definitely do it. I think billionaires that don't do this must just not really like art.
posted by Sara C. at 3:17 PM on November 26, 2013 [1 favorite]

Pours himself a glass of very cheap bourbon.
posted by srboisvert at 4:11 PM on November 26, 2013 [2 favorites]

it seems like you could also bind "if you sell this art you must pay the artist or their estate X% of the price

This is a long established principle in the art world, called droit de suite. It was enacted into law in the US for the first time as the California Resale Royalty Act which was recently ruled unconstitutional. However, it is my understanding that droit de suite clauses may be enforceable if included in a sales contract.
posted by charlie don't surf at 11:16 AM on November 28, 2013 [2 favorites]

The Super-Rich Are Ruining The Art World

The art world has become a fantasy object for the professional classes—and that’s a troubling turn of events, because art must be experienced concretely, immediately. Since the democratization of culture began in the nineteenth century, a rising middle class has seen in the arts a dazzling enrichment and complication of its own ideas and ideals—of its belief in fairness, seriousness, standards, transcendence. And now, with the middle class in disarray, art is no longer embraced as anything close to an ideal. Art is just another hope to be abandoned, along with the hope that your children might do better than you’ve done. In place of art as an ideal we have art as an idol. (Or art as an educational tool, by way of the numbingly utilitarian logic that if you learn to play Bach you will improve your math skills.) No wonder everybody is following not the art but the sky-high prices at the auction houses—and the parties at Art Basel Miami Beach, where the same dealers and collectors are gathering this week to play more or less the same games.

posted by the man of twists and turns at 5:59 PM on December 10, 2013