Phillips Shines as Emerging Artists Take Center Stage

The number three auction house stole the show at the last of this year’s sales, but frenzied bidding for newcomers and growing financializaton is looming large over the market.

David Hockney, Nichols Canyon, 1980. Courtesy Phillips

In the last week of major auctions in 2020, emerging trends of the last months consolidated themselves in an out-of-touch market that seems to increasingly move eastwards, in which, surprisingly, Phillips might turn out to be best positioned.

The flurry of sales that were aimed to give this unprecedented year a last boost of revenue mostly achieved lukewarm results. The big exception were Phillips’ auctions, especially Monday’s 20th Century & Contemporary Art Evening Sale, which posted the best-ever New York total for the auction house, $134.6 million. In a further twist of events, that result was buoyed not just by emerging artists, which is Phillips’ specialty, but by David Hockney’s Nichols Canyon, 1980, hitting over $41 million, the fifth-highest lot auctioned at Phillips over the last decade, and Clyfford Still’s PH-407, 1964, selling for almost $18.5 million. Other eight-figure lots, of which Phillips only sold one in 2020 before these sales, included Jean Michel Basquiat's Portrait of A-One A.K.A. King, 1982 ($11.5 million), and Joan Mitchell's Untitled , circa 1953 ($11.3 million), as well as Yoshitomo Nara's Hothouse Doll, 1995, which sold for $13.2 million in last week's Hong Kong sale.

Amy Sherald, The Bathers, 2015. Courtesy Phillips

That isn’t to say that there weren’t any emerging artist action. Amy Sherald’s The Bathers, 2015, was propelled to a dizzying $4.3 million record (estimate: $150,000 - $200,000), while Mickalene Thomas and Kehinde Wiley achieved more reasonable new highs for I've Been Good To Me, 2013 ($901,200), and Portrait of Mickalene Thomas, the Coyote, 2017 ($378,000), respectively. Dominating every headline of the 2020 sales this year, Matthew Wong set yet another record at Phillips’ Hong Kong sale, his River at Dusk, 2018, setting the new threshold at $4.8 million. New emerging artist records – there were some two dozen of them throughout the week, many at disproportionate levels ­– were the main focus of these sales, coupled with the realization that the center of bidding has shifted to Asia. Infer from that what you will.

Change in Total Sales, # of Lots Offered and Sold: sanyu

While Phillips CEO Edward Dolman pointed out the increased demand from Asia after the New York evening sale, the disparity was already evident at Christie’s 20th Century: Hong Kong to New York sale on December 02, when an exciting and successful Hong Kong session was followed by a less-than-thrilling New York session. The Hong Kong sales that preceded the relay sale could be termed successful with a $129.8 million inclusive-premiums-total (combining the Modern and Contemporary Art Evening Sale and the standalone auction Sanyu: Goldfish) versus a $136.3 million high-estimate exclusive premiums. Two outperforming Sanyu lots at the first sale plus the $21.8 million Goldfish, 1930s–1940s, further cemented a record year for the Chinese-French artist, whose eight top lots now all sold within the last two years, six of them in 2020.

Zhang Xiaogang, Bloodline Series The Big Family No. 2, 1995. Courtesy Christie's

Zhang Xiaogang was the most notable record-setter at the Christie’s sales, his Bloodline Series The Big Family No. 2, 1995, achieving $12.5 million (estimates: $4.9 million - $6.1 million), almost $400,000 more than his previous record from 2014. A series of records were set later at the Hong Kong part of the relay sale, the most significant of them being Dana Schutz’s Elevator, 2017, which smashed its $2.6 million high estimate as the hammer came down at $6.5 million. Further highs were established by Nicolas Party’s Still Life, 2014 ($1.4 million), Georges Mathieu’s Souvenir de la maison d’Autriche, 1978 ($2.2 million), and, would you believe it, Amoako Boafo, who finally broke the one-million-dollar threshold with Baba Diop, 2019, which sold for $1.2 million.

Amoako Boafo, Baba Diop, 2019. Courtesy Christie's

Still, the top lot of that sale was achieved in New York, where Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s Pierreuse, 1889, more than doubled its $4 million mid-estimate, selling for $9.1 million. The thin interest in New York continued the next day, as the total of the Post-War & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Featuring The Collection of Morton and Barbara Mandel edged just over the low estimate (exclusive premium) with premium included. Yet here, too, mid-tier emerging artist records dropped like dominoes, among them Salman Toor and Titus Kaphar already being household names, and others like Sarah Sze and Ursula von Rydingsvard beginning similar trajectories.   

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Pierreuse, 1889. Courtesy Christie's

Finally, there was Sotheby’s Impressionist, Modern & Contemporary Art | An Evening Sale last night, which seemed more a reaction to the other sales than being driven by the auction houses own interest. The scanty pre-sale estimate of $48.5 million - $71 million was rescued by Alexander Calder from flopping completely. Calder’s Mariposa, 1951, smashed its estimate of $6 million - $8 million, only stopping its climb at $18.2 million, thereby bringing the sale total to $62.9 million and establishing Calder for the second time in a row as the leading lot of a Sotheby “marquee” sale.

Pablo Picasso's Buste de femme assise, 1962, failed to spark fireworks but at least sold above mid-estimate for $11.2 million. The record-setting prize here went to Barkley Hendricks, who with Mr. Johnson (Sammy From Miami), 1972, not only set a new record of over $4 million, but also a record year with a $9.3 million total.

Barkley Hendricks, Mr. Johnson (Sammy From Miami), 1972. Courtesy Sotheby's

Reporting on sell-through rates seems like a farce at this point (not unlike pre-sale “estimates”), as this year’s dynamics have led to unprecedented manipulation of such figures, with auction houses withdrawing lots – sometimes last minute or mid-sale – that fail to spark enough interest, and/or securing large numbers of them with third-party guarantees, sometimes half of them or more. This financialization is in line with the overly eager bidding (especially from Asia) for emerging artists that set new records several times a year, making it seem like interest is increasingly led by financial interests. While a Covid-induced reset could be good for the art market, this trend represents a dangerous route to take, and the survival instincts of the auction houses could soon push it over the edge of greed, of which a return would become very difficult.

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