Sotheby’s led London Old Masters Paintings sales last week, achieving a result of £22.6 million, or about $34.25 million. That total, including buyer’s premium, compared with only £6.4 million, also with fees, at Christie’s sale of Old Masters that same week.Christie’s sold only 57.7 percent by lot and 41 percent by value, among the lowest figures in the last 10 years.The Christie’s star lot, a watercolor representing a Hare by Hans Hoffmann, a famous Dürer revivalist of the 16th century, was estimated to fetch £4- 6 million but failed to sell.Another highlight of the sale, a beautiful view of Venice by Guardi valued at £1.5-2 million was - surprisingly - unsold too. The sale result was also penalized by the late withdrawal of an important picture by Hans Memling.Among the few good results: a Pietro Testa mythological scene sold for £746,000 and a spectacular work by Charles-Antoine Coypel sold for £506,500, both bought by the dealer Dickinson.According to the fine art broker and private consultant Nicolas Joly, the Christie’s sale was not very attractive and the estimates of the highlights probably too ambitious. The saleroom remained quiet and the few bids rarely exceeded the reserve prices.Sotheby’s night that followed was fortunately less difficult. The auctioneer succeeded in selling its star lot, a landscape by Constable called “The Lock” for £9.1 million, but there was only one telephone bid for it. The painting benefited from a conservative estimate of £8 million £12 million.A similar first version of that composition was sold for £22 million at Christie’s in 2012. Results for the impressive Italian views by the famous Vedutist Caspar van Vitelli were also disappointing. Only one of the two - the view of Naples - found a buyer at the reasonable price of £845,000.A record was set at auction for an early depiction of a Madonna and Child by Jan Gossaert at £4.63 million. The catalogue indicated that the lot was guaranteed with an irrevocable bid.Lot 5, a “Betrayal of Christ” by the Master of the Dreux Budé Triptych, painted in about 1440, aroused keen interest amongst the public. This picture, which is considered to be the first night scene of the Northern European painting, was bought by the Louvre for £965,000. Another interesting price was achieved by a strange gray landscape representing a “Cavern in the Gulf of Salerno” by Joseph Wright of Derby. Although the canvas seemed to be worn, it fetched £665,000 over an estimate of £100,000 to £150,000.Sotheby's sale was 65.9 percent sold by lot and 83.6 percent by value.It seems that buyers are now looking for “out of the ordinary” images and that trends are moving on in the segment of Old Masters’ Paintings. Plenty of food for thought for auction houses in this field.
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