Sothebys : Sotheby's Highest-Ever Total for an Auction of Contemporary Art in Europe

Press Release

For Immediate Release

Rosamund Chester | Rosamund.Chester@sothebys.com| Toby Skeggs |Toby.Skeggs@sothebys.com

Warhol's Painting of a One Dollar Bill sells for £20.9m/ $32.8m / €29.4m

- Highest price for any work sold in London this week -

Two newly discovered works by Francis Bacon make £30 million

Four Eggs on a Plate, a present from Lucian Freud

to the Late Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, makes almost £1 million

-Ten times low estimate, and £250,000 per egg-

"We reached new heights at Sotheby's tonight with the highest total we've ever achieved for Contemporary Art in London. Bidders from across the globe were drawn to Warhol works that ripped up the rule book for 20th-century art; rediscovered Francis Bacon gems; and some of the greatest works by British artists of the last 70 years. Tonight's achievements affirm the pivotal position of London within the international art market."

Artistic Currency: Warhol's One Dollar Bill (Silver Certificate)

/ €29.4m tonight - the highest price achieved across all auction houses this week (est. £13-
18m). This marks the fourth consecutive sale season in London that Sotheby's has achieved the
top lot across all auction houses.
 One of the defining works of the artist's career, this work not only set the foundations for the entire 'dollar bill' series, it is also the only painting from this body of work to have been painted entirely by hand.
 This was one of eight works sold this evening that took the dollar as their subject, which made a combined total of £34.3m / $53.9m / €48.4m. The remaining 11 works from the
collection will be sold in the Contemporary Art Day auction tomorrow.

Further standout works

Two major self-portraits by Francis Bacon, re-discovered in a European private collection earlier this year, sold for a combined total of £30m. Acquired soon after they were painted in
1975 and 1980 respectively, they had never been on public exhibition before this year:
 Francis Bacon's, Self-Portrait (1975) realised £15.3m / $24m / €21.5m (est. £10-15m).
 Francis Bacon's, Three Studies for Self-Portrait (1980) fetched £14.7m / $23.1m /
€20.7m (est. £10-15m).

£367,000.

British Art

British art accounted for over 30% of this evening's sale total (£42m)
 Seven bidders drove Four Eggs on a Plate (2002), a treasured gift from Lucian Freud to the late Dowager Duchess of Devonshire to £989,000 / $1.6m / €1.4m, nearly 10 times the pre-sale low estimate (£100,000-150,000), equating to almost £250,000 per egg!
 The auction record for Paula Rego was broken twice this evening when the sale of
Looking Out (1997), for £965,000 / $1.5m / €1.4m, was swiftly followed by The Cadet and his sister which soared to £1.1m / $1.8m / €1.6m (est. £600,000-800,000).
 Frank Auerbach's early portrait of his cousin Gerda, Head of Gerda Boehm (1961), soared to £2.2m / $3.5m / €3.1m (est. £250,000-350,000) - a new auction record for
any work on paper by the artist, and the second-highest price achieved for the artist at
auction.
 David Hockney's view of his beloved Yorkshire Wolds, Arranged Felled Trees (2008)
recently exhibited at The Royal Academy and The Guggenheim Bilbao, totalled £3.4m /
$5.3m / €4.8m, above its high estimate (£1.5m - 2m).
New Auction Records
 For any work by Paula Rego: her record was broken twice this evening when the sale of
Looking Out (1997) for £965,000 / $1.5m / €1.4m was swiftly followed by The Cadet and his sister which soared to £1.1m / $1.8m / €1.6m (est. £600,000-800,000).
 For any work on paper by Frank Auerbach: Head of Gerda Boehm (1961) soared to
£2.2m / $3.5m / €3.1m (est. £250,000-350,000).

Notes

 Pre-sale estimate: £142.2 - 202.6m ($223.3-318.2m/ €200.6m-285.8m)
 Sotheby's previous highest total for any auction of Contemporary Art in London:
£123.5m (February 2015).
 Freshness of the material: 78% of works offered in tonight's sale had never before been offered at auction.
 84.5% sold by lot - Sotheby's 11th consecutive Evening Sale of Sotheby's Contemporary
Art worldwide with a sell-through rate over 80%.

Sotheby's Contemporary Art Day Sale continues tomorrow

 293 lots, estimated to raise £13.1- 18.5m (US$21-30m)
 Led by Peter Doig's Bird House (small) (1995), est. £600,000-800,000; a group of never- before-seen letters written by a teenage Lucian Freud to the poet Stephen Spender; and
28 works being sold to benefit Ikon gallery on its 50th anniversary.
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Sotheby's has been uniting collectors with world-class works of art since 1744. Sotheby's became the first international auction house when it expanded from London to New York (1955), the first to conduct sales in Hong Kong (1973), India (1992) and France (2001), and the first international fine art auction house in China (2012). Today, Sotheby's presents auctions in 10 different salesrooms, including New

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