According to The Guardian, the first items from David Bowie’s personal art collection were sold at auction in London on Nov 10th, 2016, fetching more than £24m.
A 1984 Jean-Michel Basquiat painting, titled Air Power, was the most expensive of the night, selling for nearly £7.1m including premium – double the pre-sale upper estimate of £3.5m. Another Basquiat work, Untitled, sold for nearly £2.4m, more than three times its £700,000 upper estimate.
The only work by Bowie himself to go on sale in this first batch was Beautiful, Hallo, Space-boy Painting, an allusion to the astronaut character Major Tom, a recurring presence in Bowie’s songs. The painting, which he produced with Damien Hirst, sold for £785,000.
The second most expensive work was Frank Auerbach’s Head of Gerda Boehm, which fetched almost £3.8m – about £3.3m more than was expected. Speaking to the New York Times in 1998 about his admiration for Auerbach, Bowie said: “I think there are some mornings that if we hit each other a certain way – myself and a portrait by Auerbach – the work can magnify the kind of depression I’m going through. It will give spiritual weight to my angst.”
The proceeds of the sale will go to Bowie’s estate, which together with Sotheby’s spent several months putting the auction together.
Bowie, who died from cancer aged 69 in January, was an avid art collector and used to go to auctions, before buying more discreetly. He also served on the editorial board of the magazine Modern Painters during the 1990s.
[Source: The Guardian]