#art-auctions

#art-auctions

Pollock's 10-foot-long drip painting “Number 7A, 1948” shattered records for work by the late artist, selling for $181.2 million. The superlative sale nearly tripled the artist's previous auction record of $61.2 million for the sale of “Number 17, 1951” in 2021.

Lawren Stewart Harris (1885-1970) garnered significant acclaim for his landscapes, of which Lake Superior Sketch, VI (ca. 1925-1928) is a premier example. The Canadian artist and Group of Seven co-founder developed a unique style that was compositionally pared down yet psychologically complex-here, the deep, shadowy hues and painterly brushstrokes convey the threat of a storm without compromising the serenity of the Canadian landscape. Dated from a period of prodigious experimentation, largely inspired by the shifting natural world, Lake Superior was one of the artist's most potent and longstanding sources of inspiration.

After developing arthritis, he sought out a milder climate in the South of France, and he was deeply inspired by the natural landscapes of the region. Taking on a looser approach to composition and leaning into the experiential aspect of light and color, works like Paysage du Midi exemplify this late-career transformation.

Coming off a triumphant anniversary sale season, which saw Heffel Fine Art Auction House achieve an industry rarity of 100 percent sold result, the Heffel Spring Auction is now on the horizon. Comprised of two sessions slated for May 21, 2026, Post-War & Contemporary Art will take place at 5 p.m. EDT followed by Old Master, Impressionist, & Modern Art at 7 p.m. EDT, the live sale will be held both in Toronto as well as in Heffel's Digital Saleroom.

The record price in the category, $13.8m- paid last year at Christies' in New York for a painting by the Mumbai-based Modernist M.F. Husain-is more than three times what it was 20 years ago.

If you want to sell Basquiats and Birkins to the very rich, it might help to have a location on Billionaires' Row. It might also help if that location had a certain cultural cachet. Bonhams, the international auction house, managed to find such a spread in a 42,000-square-foot space that is knitted from the lower floors of an odd collection of prewar buildings and razed lots, with pops of old brick walls and limestone interrupting expanses of sheer, contemporary glass.

"We are still in the early days of the so-called great wealth transfer," says the lawyer Pierre Valentin, the joint head of art law at Fieldfisher. "The wave started in the US with the sale of collections such as those of Sydell Miller, Mica Ertegun and more recently, Leonard Lauder. The wave is coming to Europe, for example with the auction of the collection of Pauline Karpidas [last] September. I expect that there will be many more of those 'white glove' sales in the next 10 to 15 years because younger collectors collect differently from their parents and grandparents."

Every year sees increasing interest in Vincent van Gogh, and this is a truly global phenomenon. The Dutch artist is now a megastar in East Asia-in China, Korea and Japan. Here, we review the Van Gogh year in 2025. The big surprise of the year was news that the Van Gogh Museum may have to close its doors unless the Dutch state provides more money to help look after its buildings.

"We treasure those pieces," she told the Washington Post. "They are integral to the character of the museum. They belong to the public. They are now probably going into private hands. It's just a shame."

The Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art, a private museum created on the outskirts of Tokyo in 1990, is cashing in on its collection of canonical Western Modernism. The museum, which was owned by the chemicals giant DIC Corporation and ceased operations at the end of March, has consigned its treasures to Christie's. They are collectively expected to bring in at least $60m across several sales this autumn in New York.

In a 2003 letter to Jeffrey Epstein, Donald Trump allegedly included a drawing of a naked woman, with pubic hair shaped from his signature, raising eyebrows.