The 10 Most Expensive Art Sales of 2011

The art world is changing. While Chinese auctions surged from ninth place in 2000 to first in overall art sales in 2010, 2011 marked another watershed: The priciest individual art purchases of the year at auction were works from China. Otherwise, global investors continued a stream of record-breaking purchases last year favoring 20th century America, especially Pop Art, and 20th century English and European works, notably Viennese. For the first time Warhol outsold Picasso, but the gross sales of those two giants fell into third and fourth place behind China’s Zhang Daqian, who does not appear in Worth’s annual list below, and Qi Baishi, who tops it.

1. $65.5 million

Eagle Standing on Pine Tree; Four-Character Couplet in Seal Script | Qi Baishi

Just short of 9’ tall, this imposing work with bold calligraphy by peasant-born Qi Baishi was once a birthday present to Chinese nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek. Today it’s considered a national treasure in China and a jewel in the crown of a new world order, at least as far as fine art sales are concerned. The artist was a self-taught painter, carver and calligrapher whose 93 years spanned the end of feudal China and the beginning of its modern age. It was sold from the collection of art investor Liu Yiqian at China Guardian Auctions in Beijing to the Hunan TV & Broadcast Intermediary Co. on May 22nd.

2. $62.1 million

Zhichuan Resettlement | Wang Meng

The surging Chinese market is made even more unpredictable by the fact that auction houses often don’t use estimates. For a landscape with calligraphy featuring travelers on horseback by Wang Meng, one of four renowned masters of the Yuan Dynasty in the 14th century, bidding began at $1,500 at the Beijing Poly International Auction house on June 4th. The final price was $62,117,492 higher.

3. $61.7 million

1949-A-No. 1 | Clyfford Still

The rare opportunity to buy not one, but four works by American Abstract Expressionist pioneer Clyfford Still caused wallets to open wide at Sotheby’s Contemporary Art Evening Sale in New York in November. Sotheby’s director Lisa Dennison secured 1949-A-No. 1, the darkest of three related paintings, for a new high for a Still at auction. Dennison is believed to have purchased it on behalf of Qatari royals.

4. $43.2 million

I Can See the Whole Room...and There’s Nobody In It! | Roy Lichtenstein

This eye-through-a-peephole comic-inspired painting, its title writ large in cartoon-speak, was among other booty won by dealer Guy Bennett at Christie’s Post-War Contemporary Evening Sale in New York. Topping Christie’s record-breaking sale of Oh... Alright… for $42.6 million in 2010, this new highest sale price for a Roy Lichtenstein has at last dethroned the prince of Pop, Andy Warhol, at least for a single year. Lichtenstein, whose comic-inspired period remains his most enduring contribution, once said he began such explorations to please his children.

5. $42.9 million

Venice, a View of the Rialto Bridge, Looking North, From the Fondamenta del Carbon | Francesco Guardi

This monumental but rarely seen depiction of the Grand Canal, owned for over a century by the descendants of Sir Edward Guinness—yes, that Guinness—became the only Old Master in 2011’s top 10 when it sold slightly above its high estimate at Sotheby’s London in July. The sale broke records not only for the artist and for a depiction of Venice, but for any “view painting” ever. It is one of four related works Guardi completed in the late 1760s; they are widely regarded as the artist’s masterpieces.

6. $40.7 million

La Lecture | Pablo Picasso

This gentle, lyrical rendering of Pablo Picasso’s mistress Marie-Thérèse Walter asleep sold in a spirited contest at Sotheby’s London for nearly twice its low estimate to an anonymous buyer assisted by a Sotheby’s specialist for Russian clients. The spare, light-toned painting from Picasso’s “lovestruck” period out-earned his less flattering depiction of rival muse Dora Maar, which sold for $29.1 million later in the year at Christie’s London to Greek financier Dimitri Mavrommatis. The Modern master’s reign as the best-selling artist for several years running was ended in 2011 by China’s Zhang Daqian. Picasso’s combined auction record for 2011: $360,308,105. Zhang Daqian’s: $721,799,891.

7. $40.4 million

Litzlberg am Attersee | Gustav Klimt

This vibrant image of a lakeside town nestled at the base of Gustav Klimt’s jewel-carpet of a mountain also carries the fascination of a darker provenance. It was first owned by patrons of the artist whose heir, Amalie Redlich, inherited the painting—in its original Josef Hoffmann frame—in 1927. Redlich and her daughter, Mathilde, were deported from Vienna in Hitler’s “final solution” in 1941 and never heard from again. The seized painting hung in Salzburg’s Museum of Modern Art for decades until its government-ordered return to a grandson was negotiated, a deal which stipulated that a portion of the proceeds from the sale of the Klimt would facilitate the building of a wing in Salzburg honoring the Redlichs. Purchased at Sotheby’s New York by Zurich art dealer David Lachenmann on behalf of a private collector, this work is also an excellent example of Klimt’s influence upon his most famous student, the artist next on our list.

8. $40.1 million

Houses With Laundry (Suburb II) | Egon Schiele

With Gustav Klimt’s mosaiclike bright colors laid in against Egon Schiele’s own moodier grays, this rare cityscape sold at Sotheby’s London near the low estimate, but still a new record for Vienna’s once infamous firebrand. One of only three notable Schiele cityscapes to appear at auction in the last decade, this sale also settled a longstanding Nazi-theft dispute, begun in 1998. The seller, the Leopold Museum of Vienna, will pay $19 million to heirs of Lea Bondi Jaray (who fled Vienna in 1939), as part of a deal allowing it to maintain ownership of her stolen Schiele, Portrait of Wally.

9. $38.4 million

Self-Portrait | Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol’s first important self-portrait, consisting of four separate likenesses, was commissioned for $1,600 in 1963 by Detroit collector Florence Barron. The Barron family sold the piece—originally commissioned by Barron as a portrait of her before she changed her mind and suggested Warhol paint himself—for a record $38,442,500 at Christie’s New York’s Post-War and Contemporary Art Evening Sale last May. The work was battled over in a record 16-minute bidding war, netting the largest purse yet paid for a self-portrait of Warhol, from a European buyer. The artist’s total gross in 2011: over $375 million, placing him third behind the Chinese phenoms Zhang Daqian and Qi Baishi, who tops this list.

10. $37.1 million

Three Studies for Portrait of Lucian Freud | Francis Bacon

Sotheby’s London office was confident about this one. Not seen in public since 1965 and held by the same secretive owner during that time, these typically gruesome studies of Francis Bacon’s friend/competitor Lucian Freud were expected to spark the excitement of rediscovery. But no one anticipated the frenzy of interest it provoked: After a 10-bidder free-for-all spanning four continents, an anonymous buyer in the room brought the hammer down well over twice the high estimate. Bacon’s gross sales for 2011 place him as the 11th best-selling artist in the world last year, behind no fewer than seven Chinese artists.

By Edward Wise- Worth