Art Market
In early November 2005 Rothko's 1953 oil on canvas painting, Homage to Matisse, broke the record selling price of any post-war painting at a public auction, at US$ 22.5 million.
In May 2007 Rothko's 1950 painting White Center (Yellow, Pink and Lavender on Rose), broke this record again, selling at US$ 72.8 million at Sotheby's New York. The painting was sold by philanthropist David Rockefeller, who attended the auction.
In May 2011 Christie's auctions sold a previously unknown Rothko painting, accounting for the work as #836. The work was added to the existing Rothko catalog of 835 works after expert authentication. The newly discovered painting, Untitled, #17, created in 1961, came to light when a private collector put it up for sale, claiming he bought it directly from the artist. A seven-foot-tall oil on canvas in red and pink on an ochre background, the painting opened with a house bid at US$ 13 million and sold for US$ 30 million, plus sellers and buyers fees (US$ 33 million, all inclusive).
In May 2012 Rothko's 1961 painting Orange, Red, Yellow (#693 in Anfam's catalogue raisonné) was sold by Christie's, New York, for US$ 86.9 million, setting a new nominal-value record for a post-war painting at a public auction. The painting had formerly been in the collection of abstract expressionism built up by David and Gerry Pincus.
Read more about this topic: Mark Rothko
Famous quotes containing the words art and/or market:
“In art the end does not sanctify the means: but sacred means employed here can sanctify the end.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“When General Motors has to go to the bathroom ten times a day, the whole country’s ready to let go. You heard of that market crash in ‘29? I predicted that.... I was nursing a director of General Motors. Kidney ailment, they said; nerves, I said. Then I asked myself, “What’s General Motors got to be nervous about?” “Overproduction,” I says. “Collapse.””
—John Michael Hayes (b. 1919)