Christie’s was hoping to snare upwards of $50m at its series of Asia sales this week in New York. The auction house did considerably better than that, pulling in almost $76m during its three days of events at which it offered thousands of art objects, including jade, museum quality furniture, rare ceramics and porcelain. Among the highs was the sale of a rare 18th century blue and white Ming-style moonflask, for which a buyer paid $2.7m, almost four times its high estimate.
Works by Indian painter Maqbool Fida Husain, who died earlier this year, provided a big boost to the week’s South Asian Modern & Contemporary Art sale. His “Sprinkling Horses” sold for $1.14m, and “Yatra,” a 1955 oil, realized $932,500. In all, the 13 Husain works offered at Christie’s this week brought in $4.2m. At a parallel sale this week at Sotheby’s, works by Hussein sold for a total of $557,000. Christie’s biggest engine among the week’s events was its two-part sale of Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, which accounted for $38.8m of its Asia week total.
Read more at Christie’s.
