REMATAN EL ARTE VERDADERO O EL OTRO? NEW YORK

Susana y los ancianos, Battoni

There were record prices for artists like Fra Bartolommeo, Sandro Botticelli, Pompeo Batoni and Hans Memling at the old master painting auctions held on Wednesday and Thursday at Christie’s and Sotheby’s in New York. But there were also scores of works by artists like Goya, Bassano and Guercino that went unsold without so much as a bid. In trying to decipher the patchy results, dealers grumbled that estimates were too high. Auction house experts, trying to put a positive face on their sales, spoke of the influx of Russian buyers who bought many of the top works. “There was a definite taste for the 18th century, and those paintings brought good prices,” said George Wachter, the worldwide co-chairman of old master paintings at Sotheby’s, after the morning session of his sale on Thursday.Nicholas Hall, Mr. Wachter’s counterpart at Christie’s, said works that were either “really recognizable or really rare” tended to fare best. “There was bidding from three different continents for the Botticelli,” North America, Asia and Europe (in this case, Russia), he said of a devotional panel that Christie’s had named the “Rockefeller Madonna,” because it was once owned by John D. Rockefeller Jr. It sold for $10.4 million, a record for that artist at auction, on Wednesday. (It had been estimated to bring $5 million to $7 million.) Mr. Hall also noticed an absence of dealer bidding this year, perhaps because works tended to have what he called “retail estimates,” which made it hard for bargain-hunting dealers wanting to replenish their stock. At Sotheby’s, Batoni’s “Susanna and the Elders,” a history picture from 1751 expected to bring $6 million to $9 million, sold to a telephone bidder for $11.4 million, also a record price for that artist at auction. Memling’s “Christ Blessing,” a panel painted on gold ground depicting Jesus, bust length, his right hand raised in blessing, brought $4.1 million. It had been in the same family for 150 years. The price was far above its $1 million to $1.5 million estimate and was another record for the artist at auction. (Final prices include the buyer’s commission to Sotheby’s: 25 percent of the first $50,000; 20 percent of the next $50,000 to $1 million and 12 percent of the rest. Estimates do not reflect commissions.)
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