Virtual tour: 20th Century at Christie’s in New York
Get up close with the pioneers of art as we know it today – offered across a series of exceptional sales
On 13 November, 20th Century Week at Christie’s in New York kicks off with the 68-lot Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale. Focusing on the shift from early Impressionism to the materials and textures that define Modern art, auction standouts include Claude Monet’s luminous Matinée sur la Seine, Joan Miró’s Peinture, Vincent van Gogh’s Labourer dans un champ and Fernand Léger’s groundbreaking 1913 Contraste de formes.
Georges Braque’s 1913 Cubist still-life from the Stanford Z. Rothschild, Jr. Collection leads the 14 November Impressionist and Modern Art Works on Paper sale, alongside a richly coloured gouache and watercolour by Joan Miró, a 1916 pencil drawing by Giorgio de Chirico, and a rare 1925 ink drawing by Edvard Munch.
Also on 14 November, the 243-lot Impressionist and Modern Art Day Sale opens with a group of seven exceptional animal bronzes by Rembrandt Bugatti. With strong selections of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist works by Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Pierre Bonnard and Henri Martin, and Modern masterpieces by Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger and Chaïm Soutine, among others, the Day Sale offers an exciting opportunity to acquire works from the artists and movements that defined Modernism.
Leonardo’s Salvator Mundi, the greatest rediscovery of the 21st century and one of fewer than 20 surviving paintings accepted as from the artist’s hand, leads the Post-War and Contemporary Art Evening Sale on 15 November. The early 16th century masterpiece will be offered alongside Andy Warhol’s Sixty Last Suppers, based on Leonardo’s original. Executed just a year before Warhol’s death, it is the largest painting by the American Pop artist ever to come to auction.
Further Evening Sale highlights include Mark Rothko’s Saffron; Louise Bourgeois’ Spider II; Cy Twombly’s Untitled — the largest painting from his Bacchus series; and works by Frank Stella, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Franz Kline and others.
Offered across two sessions on 16 November, the Post-War and Contemporary Art Morning and Afternoon Sessions feature works by Gerhard Richter, Jean Dubuffet, Georg Baselitz, Alexander Calder and Robert Rauschenberg, and many more.
All 20th Century Week sales will be on view at Christie’s in New York from 7 November. To find out more, visit christies.com/20thcentury