Leading Phillips’s Modern & Contemporary Art Evening Sale in Hong Kong, Jean-Michel Basquiat’s, Native Carrying Some Guns, Bibles, Amorites on Safari (1982), fetched HK$99 million ($12.66 million)—all sales figures include fees. This sale marks the highest-value lot sold at auction in Hong Kong in the first half of 2024.
The event at Phillips Hong Kong on May 31st achieved a sales total of HK$210.22 million ($26.89 million). With 23 out of 24 lots sold, the auction had a 96% sell-through rate by lot and a 97% sell-through rate by value.
This significant lot followed another standout sale, of Basquiat’s Untitled (ELMAR) (1982), which sold for $46.78 million at Phillips New York earlier this spring. “Building on the success of Basquiat’s Untitled (ELMAR), this evening Native Carrying Some Guns, Bibles, Amorites on Safari from the same collection sold for a significant HK$99 million ($12.66 million), becoming the highest value work of the season across all houses and categories in Hong Kong,” said Meiling Lee, Phillips’s head of Modern & Contemporary Art, Asia.
Banksy’s The Leopard and Lamb (2016), which sold for HK$36.8 million ($4.7 million), was the second most expensive lot of the evening, exceeding its pre-sale high estimate of HK$28 million ($3.59 million). Other notable sales included Teppei Takeda’s Painting of Painting 026 (2019), the artist’s international auction debut, which sold for HK$1.84 million ($235,528)—more than six times its pre-sale high estimate. Sun Yitian’s A Tender Panther (2017) also sold for HK$1.65 million ($211,163), the second-highest price achieved by the artist at auction.
