Displaying items by tag: consignor

A commercial statement filed in New York this summer has raised questions about the circumstances surrounding the sale of a painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat at Christie’s, New York, on 13 May.

The work, The Field Next to the Other Road (1981), was consigned to the auction house by the dealer Tony Shafrazi and included in the Post-War and Contemporary evening sale where it sold for $37.1m, the sixth-highest price of the night.

An 18^th century portrait of the German Duchess Anna Amalia of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach commissioned by the German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe has been returned to its rightful heirs after 70 years. The oil painting by Angelika Kauffmann went missing from the duchess’ descendants’ palace in Poland during World War II. The work did not resurface until 2011 when a Polish consignor brought the work to Sotheby’s.

The painting was returned to the city of Weimar during a ceremony at the Weimar palace. Michael Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, the heir of the painting, has decided to loan the work to the city permanently. Upon its completion, the work, which is said to be worth hundred of thousands of euros, hung in the Roman House in Weimar, which was also commissioned by Goethe. The painting was later moved to the palace in Weimar and then to a family residence in Silesia, which is now part of Poland.

A Sotheby’s employee in London was the first to spot the painting on a German database for lost art. After reporting its reappearance to Weimar city officials, Sotheby’s held on to the painting until an agreement was reached. An exhibition of the work at the Roman House is being planned for next year.

In 2006 The Cardsharps was sold to the late collector and scholar Sir Denis Mahon for just over $65,000 at an auction at Sotheby’s in London. At the time of the sale, Sotheby’s identified the work as being by a “follower” of the Italian master, Caravaggio (1571-1610). However, after his purchase, Mahon identified the work as a Caravaggio original and obtained an export license for the work that put its value at $15.5 million according to a claim filed at London’s High Court of Justice.

Due to their failure to identify The Cardsharps as an authentic Caravaggio painting, Sotheby’s is being sued by Lancelot William Thwaytes, who consigned the work to the 2006 auction. Thwaytes is now seeking unspecified damages, interest, and costs relating to the price difference between the painting’s 2006 selling price and what he believes it was actually worth on the open market that year had it been properly attributed to Caravaggio. Thwaytes claims that Sotheby’s was negligent in its research prior to the work’s sale, leading to its extraordinarily low selling price.

However, Sotheby’s stands behind its belief that the painting is a copy and not a work by Caravaggio’s hand, citing Caravaggio expert Professor Richard Spear and several other leading scholars. Sotheby’s added that their view was supported by the market’s reception to the painting when it was put up for auction.

Mahon, who passed away in 2011, donated 58 works from his collection worth around $155 million to various U.K. galleries.