A 1952–53 sculpture by English artist Henry Moore sold for £26.3 million ($35.2 million) at Christie’s 20/21 evening sale in London. The sale is the most expensive lot of the London March sales across Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and Phillips this week. All prices include fees.
The Moore work, a bronze sculpture titled King and Queen (1952–53), set a new auction record for the late sculptor and more than doubled its low estimate of £10 million ($13.32 million) after eight minutes of bidding between six collectors.
King and Queen is the last cast left in private hands of the artist’s magnificent double portrait sculpture, which had, until now, remained in the collection of the family who acquired it from Moore in 1954. The work is in part inspired by an 18th or 19th century Egyptian sculpture of the pharaoh Horemheb and one of his wives in the British Museum, though at the time many incorrectly assumed the sculpture was made in anticipation of Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation.
Before this week, Moore’s previous auction record had been set in June 2016, when his bronze cast, Reclining Figure: Festival (1898–1986), sold for £24.72 million ($33.1 million) at Christie’s.
In total, the 20/21 sales at Christie’s this week generated £197.47 million ($263.82 million), which is up 52 percent compared to the same sales last year. In addition to Moore’s new world auction record, Surrealist artists Dorothea Tanning and Toyen also achieved new benchmarks.
At Sotheby’s, their spring modern and contemporary sales realized a total of £154 million ($207 million), more than double the total of the equivalent sales last year.
The sale’s highlights included Francis Bacon’s 1972 Self-Portrait which sold for £16 million ($21.5 million), doubling its low estimate; Leon Kossoff’s Children’s Swimming Pool, 11 o’clock Saturday Morning, August (1971), which sold for a new artist record of £5.2 million ($7 million), nearly seven times its high estimate; and Alberto Giacometti’s Femme debout, which doubled its high estimate of £2.8 million ($3.73 million) to reach £5.1 million ($6.8 million).
Phillip’s, meanwhile, saw a total of £12.8 million ($17.04 million) across 23 lots sold for its London evening sale. A new auction record was set for Danish artist Anna Ancher when Young Girl Reading a Letter (Ung pige, der læser et brev) (1902) sold for £154,800 ($206,140), far in excess of its £50,000 ($66,580) high estimate.
Phillip’s, meanwhile, saw a total of £12.8 million ($17.04 million) across 23 lots sold for its London evening sale. A new auction record was set for Danish artist Anna Ancher when Young Girl Reading a Letter (Ung pige, der læser et brev) (1902) sold for £154,800 ($206,140), far in excess of its £50,000 ($66,580) high estimate.
Following Moore’s King and Queen, the most expensive lots across the three sales overall are as follows:
- Francis Bacon’s Self-Portrait (1972) sold for £16 million ($21.5 million) at Sotheby’s.
- Wassily Kandinsky’s Le rong rouge (1939) sold for £12.5 million ($16.7 million) at Christie’s.
- Pablo Picasso’s Le peintre et son modèle (1964) sold for £8.52 million ($11.4 million) at Christie’s.
- René Magritte’s Les grâces naturelles (circa 1961) sold for £8.52 million ($11.4 million) at Christie’s.
