The Post-War and Contemporary Art Day Sale realised a total of £14,168,940, selling 98% by value and 89% by lot. Banksy’s iconic Love is in the Air realised the top price, selling for £978,000. Yayoi Kusama’s Pumpkin [TOWSSO] achieved £831,600 against a pre-sale estimate of £200,000 while Waves at Daybreak sold for £201,600 (estimated at £50,000-70,000).
This level of bidding reflected the depth of interest witnessed in the Shanghai to London Evening Sale series on 1 March and was followed by MR.’s May – Blue Hawaii, which soared above estimate to realise a world auction record for the artist (£504,000). Günther Förg’s Untitled sold for £604,800, Etel Adnan’s Untitled realised £201,000 and Stanley Whitney’s Untitled achieved £163,800.
Further records were set for Atanda Quadri Adebayo’s Let Love Lead (£20,160), Winston Branch’s When I need my Father’s Eyes (£126,000), Anne Collier’s Woman Crying (Comic) #16 (£100,800), Peter Uka’s Invisible Guardian (£56,700), and Adjei Tawiah’s Pink Suit (£50,400)*, with a record in the medium for a painting by Eileen Agar’s Harlequin (£63,000).
Outstanding results were achieved for Flora Yukhnovich’s Study of Putti (£302,400), Hilary Pecis’ Kitchen Counter (£252,000), Isshaq Ismail’s Unknown Faces No 3 (£138,600), Tomokazu Matsuyama’s Losing You More (£214,200), and Paula Rego’s School for Little Witches (£415,800).
Italian Masters attracted strong bidding with Arnaldo Pomodoro’s Sfera con perforazione (£567,000), Lucio Fontana’s Concetto spaziale, Attese (£592,200), and Alighiero Boetti’s Far quadrare tutto (To Square Everything Up) (£189,000).
