The power position has reversed. The seller, now, has the upper hand at auction. Works that have been off the market for decades, are resurfacing, and people want them. The LAMA Auction, this past weekend, revealed that buyers are out there, hungry, and willing to spend. Direct examples of this were the prices realized, for some works that I had selected to procure.
First was a sweet little Lynne Foulkes, about the size of a Polaroid picture. It's estimate, under a thousand, I thought there'd be a chance I'd go home with it. Nope, went for $4000 (add another 25% to cover the "Hammer" fee). The next deal I thought I would take was a Karl Benjamin, a nice little, 2-color composition by the iconic, hard edged, abstractionist; estimated under 3k, ttok 5k, on the hammer. The Donald Judd print went for $3000, a nice Ed Ruscha, Ballerina, went for an astounding $7500, a fairly common Francis Bacon print, went for $8500 (estimate 5k). Of the 3 Mossimo Vitali prints, the 2 beach scenes went for about $2000, but the go-cart track image took in twice that at the hammer. The hand colored Jim Dine's passed, and a print of his from the tool series garnished a thin, $750. I think the real crowd shocker was the realization of a $100,000 bid on Reg Butler's "The Unknown Political Prisoner" maquette; which had a pre-auction estimate of 20-30,000. Pictured at left
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