Macklowe art collection becomes most expensive ever sold at auction
The famed Macklowe collection, subject of a bitter divorce battle between a New York property developer and his ex-wife, became the most expensive art collection ever sold at auction Monday.
Sotheby’s sold its second offering of works from the collection for $246.1 million, bringing the total value of the group of paintings to $922.2 million, a spokesman told AFP.
That exceeds the $835.1 million that the Rockefeller collection sold for in 2018, then the highest total ever made by a single private collection at auction.
Among the highlights of Monday evening’s sale were Mark Rothko’s Untitled, which fetched $48 million and Gerhard Richter’s Seestück, which went for $30.2 million.
A woman poses in front of Gerhard Richter's ‘Seestuck (Seascape)’ during the New York press preview on May 6.
Andy Warhol’s Self Portrait sold for $18.7 million while Willem de Kooning’s Untitled went for $17.8 million.
Sotheby’s won the rights to sell the Macklowe works back in September. It sold 35 of the pieces in November for $676.1 million before selling the remaining 30 on Monday.
Sotheby’s had described the paintings as the “most significant collection of modern and contemporary art to ever appear...