Sotheby’s London Achieves Highest Contemporary Art Sale in Its History

By Rachael Hesling

With the conclusion of its contemporary art season in London on July 2, 2015, Sotheby’s achieved its highest-ever total for a London contemporary art sale series.

Record Sales

● The luxury art broker garnered a total of $232.2 million for a 30 percent increase on its equivalent sales in 2014.

● The 2015 contemporary summer series brought the total annual value of contemporary works sold by Sotheby’s London to $500 million.

Works Sold

● Its top-grossing piece was renowned pop artist Andy Warhol’s One Dollar Bill. The first in his famed series of “dollar” paintings, the work dates back to 1962 and sold for $32.8 million.

● Other notable works sold at the auction included two self-portraits by English figurative painter Francis Bacon, whose expressive depictions of distressed human figures spurred him to prominence during the postwar era. Other featured artists included Gerhard Richter, Lucian Freud, and Paula Rego.

International Buyers

● Sotheby’s London attributed its record-breaking event to a surge of new international buyers.

● Its penultimate summer auction, on July 1, welcomed the highest number of bidders ever involved in a Sotheby’s London evening sale of contemporary art and included buyers from 35 countries.

● A total of 20 percent of these buyers had never before bid in the contemporary category.