March 9, 2017
LONDON (AFP) - Gerhard Richter's arctic scene "Eisberg", broke the record for a landscape at Sotheby's contemporary evening sale on Wednesday, selling for 17.7 million pounds ($21.6 million, 20.4 million euros).
The frozen landscape -- which had been estimated at 8-12 million pounds -- had been kept in a private European collection for the past 30 years.
But the evening auction also saw many other records shattered.
Christopher Wool's Untitled painting sold for 7.1 million pounds ($8.6 million, 8.2 million euros), double its highest estimate, while a Pat Seir painting went for over three times its highest estimate, at 681,000 pounds ($828,000, 786,000 euros).
German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans also set a new personal record in his first appearance in a Sotheby's sale. His chromogenic print went under the hammer for 460,000 pounds ($560,000, 531,000 euros).
David Hockney's 1990 painting of his Malibu home was auctioned off for 1.7 million pounds ($2 million, 1.9 million euros). It was last sold in 2010 for 508,000 pounds.
Overall, the auction achieved 118 million pounds ($143.6 million, 136.2 million euros) in sales, a 69 percent increase on the previous year's auction.
Christie's, which held its own postwar and contemporary sales the previous day in London, managed a 96.3 million-pound haul ($117.7 million, 117.1 million euros).
SOTHEBY'S (isin = US8358981079)