ART HK had a record 67,205 visitors, a 6% increase on last year’s Fair.
Major sales of Asian and Western Contemporary Art at ART HK 12 included:
- De Sarthe Gallery from Hong Kong sold No. 313, 1969 by Chinese artist Chu Teh-Chun for over US $3 million to a South East Asian collector. The gallery also sold Hans Hartung’s work T1966-H32, 1966 to a Singaporean collector for US $400,000.
- Tornabuoni Art sold five works by Alighiero Boetti from their solo presentation of his work, including Mappa, 1984 which sold for EUR 1 million.
- Elegy to the Spanish Republic No. 45, 1960 by Robert Motherwell was sold by Bernard Jacobson Gallery for US $1 million.
- White Cube sold George Baselitz’s Stalin und Woroschilov pissen von der Kremlmover for EUR 500,000 to an Asian collector.
- Hauser & Wirth London and Zurich sold Western Mash Monument, 2006/2011, a fine silver sculpture by Paul McCarthy, for US $450,000 to a Latin American collection.
- Sprüth Magers Berlin London sold Sterling Ruby’s work SP191, 2011 for US $155,000 to an Australian collector and George Condo’s Toy Head, 2012 for US $150,000 to an Asian collector.
- Blum & Poe from Los Angeles sold two works by Zhu Jinshi , No.5, 2006 and Thick Strokes, No.4, 2006 for US $70,000 each to an Asian collector.
- Lin & Lin Gallery from Taipei sold all 15 of its Liu Wei paintings.
Victoria Love Salnikoff, an art consultant in New York, visited the fair for the first time. “Looking over the roster of galleries participating,” she said, “I felt it was a strong representation and felt the quality of works would be quite high. I wasn’t disappointed.” […]
“I still don’t feel that the standard of the fair is close to the Art Basel or Art Basel Miami,” Ms. Love Salnikoff said. “If the date for this fair moves close to the Art Basel dates I will probably choose Art Basel over the Hong Kong fair.”
- Francesca Minini: sold two works by Giulo Frigo for $4,000 each.
- Ignacio Liprandi Contemporary Art: two collages by Jorge Pedro Núñez for $2,800 a piece.
- Green Cardamom: installations from Pakistani artist Ali Kazim priced £10,000-25,000 ($15,800-39,500). They sold one piece.
- Art Informal: sold their entire installation from Jose Santos III as a whole for $150,000.
- Volte Gallery sold three works, one work by Ranbir Kaleka for $350,000.
- Arario Gallery: smaller pieces with prices ranging from $10,000-50,000.
- GBK sold twenty works for between A$3,000-40,000 ($3,000-39,500). These included a sculpture by Claire Healy and Sean Cordiero for A$35,000 ($34,600); an oil painting by Hitesh Natalwala for A$6,000 ($5,900); and a work by Grant Stevens for A$10,000 ($9,900).
- Ingleby Gallery sold eight pieces with prices in the range of £1,200-50,000 ($1,900-79,100).
- Paul Kasmin Gallery: three works in the range of $35,000-850,000
- Chi-Wen Gallery had sold three to four pieces.
“The layout needs improving,” said Iwan Wirth of Hauser & Wirth, staring at a 20ft mirrored Tatsuo Miyajima installation flashing in front of his stand. “The corridors are narrow, the public projects like this one are confused. But that being said, I have also had a great fair, selling 12 pieces on the first day, mostly to Asian clients.”
- Ingleby Gallery immediately reserved Peter Liversidge’s “Everything is Connected” (2012) for £35,000;
- Rossi and Rossi sold half its stand of paintings by Nortse on the first day
- David Zwirner sold three works in the first half hour, including a Borremans for $900,000.
- Pace Beijing sold a major work by Li Songsong and had a bidding war going on over a Zhang Xiaogang
- Gagosian was attracting equal interest with a magnificent butterfly painting by Damien Hirst, as well as a small painting by its single Chinese artist, top seller Zeng Fanzhi.
POST-COLONIAL CONTEMPORARY ART (Artnet)
- David Juda: David Hockney’s $950,000 painting of a log, “Felled Totem, September 8th, 2009,”
- Stephane Custot: “Expansion” is a six-foot-long, multicolored abstract created by Chinese painter Chu Teh-Chun in 2006 sold Wednesday to a Chinese buyer for around $900,000.
- Cheim & Reid: sold a Louise Bourgeois drawing for $100,000 and a collage by Donald Baechler for $50,000.
- Hauser & Wirth: made a range of important sales over the night, including Zhang Enli’s canvas “The Curved Wires,” 2012, for $165,000 to a Beijing based collector and Bharti Ker’s mixed media “The Dragon, the Tiger and the Phoenix,” 2012, for $300,000 to a collector from Hong Kong.
- White Cube:Anselm Kiefer show at their Hong Kong space this week. Six canvases had already been sold at prices ranging from $600,000 to just under $1 million.
- de Sarthe Gallery: two oils by modern master Chu Teh Chun, including a superb work from 1969 for $3 million
- Sprüth Magers: Sterling Ruby canvas at $155,000 to an Australian collector and a George Condo — “Toy Head,” 2012, — at $150,000 to an Asian collector
- Galerie Krinzinger with aAngela De la Cruz oil for 43,000 euros and a Hans Op de Beeck sculpture “Butterflies,” 2012, for 30,000 euros.
ArtHK Opens with Strong Sales (Artinfo)