The New York spring sales of Post-War and contemporary art begin this evening at Sotheby’s. The Sotheby’s Contemporary Sale is unexceptional – featuring little that is worthy of note aside from the Baroque Egg with Bow, 1994 – 2008, by Jeff Koons. The more interesting lots, like the Koons piece, are from the late 1980s and 1990s – such as Untitled, 1988, a self-portrait painted by Martin Kippenberger.
The highlights of this season’s auctions will appear predominantly at Christie’s Evening Sale tomorrow night. The top lots at Christie’s auction are dominated of course by the Betty Freeman collection, and funnily enough, the most excellent works on offer aside from this collection continue the theme of California, figure painting, and Pop. Freeman, the contemporary art collector and patron of avant-garde music, was a friend of artist David Hockney. It was this friendship which led to the creation of Hockney's magnificent painting Beverly Hills Housewife, 1966-7. Part of his celebrated series California Dreaming, the large painting depicts Freeman in front of her modernist home. Aside from this masterwork will be another Hockney owned by Freeman, White Buildings and Clouds, 1965. This work painted during his second visit to the West Coast is part of a series he made of skyscrapers thrusting into the California skies. Also from the Freeman collection are several Lichtenstein’s, including Frolic, 1977 – Lichtenstein’s light-hearted reflection on the history of art and the artists who inspired him such as Picasso and the Surrealists.
Apart from the Freeman collection, the California theme continues in the more remarkable works on sale, such as Richard Diebenkorn’s delightful Ocean Park No.117, 1979, a work from this artist’s series of explorations of abstraction and figuration bathed in the West Coast’s Mediterranean light. Eric Fischl’s diptych Dog Days, 1983, also takes the California coast as a backdrop for his ambiguous human interactions.
Phillips de Pury finishes the week up, with the most remarkable lot probably Robert Gober’s Untitled, 1993-1994, a massive Farina cereal box.
