GERMANY / USA: Impressionist and Modern art by Klimt, Kirchner headline largest auction in history while controversial sale of Kirchner painting at Christie's auctio provokes criticism in Germany

Record ID: 739238

  • Title: GERMANY / USA: Impressionist and Modern art by Klimt, Kirchner headline largest auction in history while controversial sale of Kirchner painting at Christie's auctio provokes criticism in Germany
  • Date: 11th November 2006
  • Summary: COLOUR PHOTOGRAPH OF "BERLINER STRASSENSZENE"
  • Embargoed: 26th November 2006 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment / Showbiz
  • Reuters ID: LVA541CMZ0T4BXN9C6N3B2HCP0HJ
  • Story Text: Christie's fall sale of Impressionist and modern art lived up to its billing as the biggest auction in history, led by a group of four Nazi-looted Klimts restored to their rightful heirs that raked in nearly 200 million U.S. dollars.
    The Klimts included a portrait that fetched the third-highest auction price ever, while new records were also set for Gauguin, Schiele and Ernst Ludwig Kirchner at the 491,472,000 U.S. dollar sale.
    In the end, however, the night belonged to Klimt, and to Maria Altmann, a Los Angeles nonagenarian and the niece of the Austrian couple Adele and Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer who lost the works to the Nazis.
    The four paintings, led by the portrait 'Adele Bloch-Bauer II,' fetched a total of 192.7 million USD including Christie's commission -- double the expectations for the works by the Austrian artist which had never been offered on the open market.
    'Adele Bloch-Bauer II' alone went for just under 88 million USD, becoming the third-highest priced piece of art at auction. Last summer Manhattan's Neue Galerie obtained 'Adele Bloch-Bauer I' for a reported 135 million, at the time the top known price in history for a work of art.
    The total was some 200 million USD higher than any previous single event, Christie's said. Only six of 84 lots on offer went unsold.
    It almost didn't matter that one of the star lots, Picasso's 50 million USD Blue Period portrait of Angel Fernandez do Soto, was yanked by Andrew Lloyd Webber after an 11th-hour claim and litigation over its rightful title.
    The British composer decided not to sell the work, the proceeds of which had been earmarked for charity, without a clear title, Christie's said earlier on Wednesday. But auction officials said they were confident they could resolve the matter in "short order" and would be able to sell it on behalf of Lloyd Webber's foundation as planned.
    Another Nazi-looted work restituted to the rightful heirs and sold on Wednesday (November 8, 2006) y was Ernst Ludwig Kirchner's 'Berlin Street Scene,' which soared to 38.1 million USD or more than twice the low estimate, making it the sale's fourth-highest priced work. Bought anonymously for the collection of the Neue Galerie, it also smashed the artist's previous record of 8.78 million.
    The two other Klimts -- 'Apple Tree I' and 'Houses in Unterach on the Attersee' -- fetched 33 million USD and 31.4 million respectively, while Schiele's 'Single Houses' sold for 22.4 million, just beating the artist's old mark. Records were also set for Bonnard and Balthus.
    Christie's President Marc Porter said the amazing prices attained by the Klimts gave testimony to the importance of the restitution issue, in that works such as those pursued so energetically on Wednesday were in pristine condition and totally new to the open market, having been hanging on museum walls since the 1940s.
    The auction's result, he told Reuters, was evidence that "putting reasonable estimates on works that are fresh to the market is just paying off in unimaginable ways."
    Meanwhile, the controversial auction in New York of a painting by German expressionist Ernst Ludwig Kirchner has provoked outrage in Germany on Thursday (November 9) following the 38.1 million dollar sale.
    'Berliner Strassenszene' (Berlin street scene), painted by Kirchner in 1913, was bought anonymously for the collection of the New York Neue Galerie at Wednesday's Christie's auction.
    In Germany, controversy over the painting's ownership erupted long before the auction after Berlin's Bruecke Museum was forced by Berlin authorities in July to hand over the Nazi-looted work to the alleged rightful heirs who then put the artwork up for auction.
    Ludwig von Pufendorf, chairman of Friends of Bruecke Museum where 'Berliner Strassenszene' was on display until last summer, told Reuters Television "of course we are hugely disappointed."
    "Bruecke Museum is losing its main work, a piece of its identity," Pufendorf said.
    He argued that the painting was "exported illegally."
    Pufendorf added "we looked into it from a legal point of view and we will confront Mr. Lauder" of Neue Galerie where the painting is expected to go on display.
    "He will not get happy with this painting," Pufendorf said about Lauder.
    Munich lawyer Daniel Amelung tried to prevent the painting from being auctioned by demanding its confiscation.
    On November 6, two days before the New York auction, Amelung filed charges against Berlin's mayor Klaus Wowereit and others "politically responsible."
    Amelung told Reuters Television he was acting on behalf of a Munich art collector whom he refused to identify.
    "At first of course we had some hope to get back the painting," Amelung said.
    "We tried to avoid similar cases in the future," Amelung said who claims some one hundred comparable cases currently exist.
    In his view, the handing over of the painting to the heirs was an "arbitrary donation."
    Amelung argues 'Berliner Strassenszene' was possibly unrightfully declared 'Nazi loot.'
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