The Peter Simon collection fetches over £100 million at Christie’s

The first evening auction of the traditional modern and contemporary art event during London Art Week took place at Christie’s on 14 October, featuring the sale of the most important works from the collection of Peter Simon, the textile entrepreneur and founder of Monsoon. Only one of the 41 lots selected for the evening auction remained unsold, yielding a total of 107.5 million pounds within the pre-auction estimates of between 78,700,000 – 115,090,000 prior to the auction, setting a record for a collection sold in London. The forthcoming catalogue on 15 October and the online catalogue will help to further boost the total result for the collection.
The Monsoon collection was fully guaranteed, with a quarter guaranteed by the auction house and the remaining three-quarters by third-party guarantors; as many as 10 guarantors were added and announced at the start of the auction. This addition likely saved as many as eight lots from going unsold; in total, a quarter of the lots were purchased by the guarantors, including four of the top 10 sales. The collection had been assembled on the advice of a well-known eccentric London gallery owner and adviser, whose son now works at the auction house. Whilst the core of the collection is rooted in the post-war English painting tradition, the best results came from international and contemporary works.

« Streak 2», 1979 di Bridget Riley (1931), acrylic on linen, (116,2 x 251,8 cm)

A collection of this kind would not be complete without Francis Bacon, whose large two-metre panel ‘Figure in Movement’ from 1978 was sold, after just one bid above the reserve, for 17.2 million pounds (estimate: 14–18 million) to a lady in the auction room, seated next to the Monsoon collection’s adviser. A second work by Bacon, a dramatic, smaller-scale figure painted 33 years earlier, was, however, saved from the reserve and only reached the low estimate of 4 million pounds after the addition of commissions. One of the three large optical compositions by Bridget Riley, the 1979 work ‘Streak 2’, measuring two and a half metres in length, was hotly contested, eventually selling for a new record of 5.2 million pounds; Overall, the artist’s three works in the catalogue fetched £8.8 million, but the other two most likely went to their respective guarantors below the low estimates. Another record was set for a sunny landscape by David Bomberg, an artist who does not often feature in evening auctions; his 1929 aerial view of the city of Toledo was hotly contested, fetching up to 3.3 million pounds. But the best buy in the collection in terms of increase in value is probably a delightful large decorative painting, ‘Last House’, by Hurvin Anderson from 2013, purchased that same year and now resold for 5.7 million pounds, from a guaranteed estimate of 2–3 million. A second work by the artist, ‘Hope Gardens’ from 2005, however, went to the guarantor, reaching the low estimate of 1.2 million only after the addition of commissions. As in the case of Bridget Riley, the market seems willing to pay a significant premium only for the very best works.

«San Miguel, Toledo, Afternoon» 1929, di David Bomberg (1890-1957), oil on canvas, (71,1 x 70,5 cm)

«Composition A, with Double Line and Yellow», 1935, di Piet Mondrian (1872-1944), oil on canvas, (59,2 x 56,3 cm)

Four of the top six results were achieved by works from the international avant-garde movements of the early 20th century. Two lots benefited from the guarantee, selling at their respective lower estimates: a geometric composition by Mondrian from 1935, predominantly in shades of white, went to the guarantor for £9.7 million including fees (estimate: £8–12 million), whilst a large, characteristic canvas by Mirò from 1925, featuring two lovers in space – ‘Les Amants – Adam et Eve’ – was sold for £8.6 million including fees (estimate: 7–10 million). A protracted series of bids involving at least five contenders led to a new record for Liubov Popova, a Russian avant-garde artist who died in 1924 at the age of just 35, whose 1918 geometric Futurist-Suprematist composition from 1918, ‘Painterly Architectonic’, went to a buyer in the auction room for £7.6 million including fees, three times the high estimate of 1.8–2.5 million. The large 1924 painting ‘Le siphon’ by Fernand Léger also sparked a bidding war, involving several gallery owners, before being sold to an anonymous online bidder for £5.3 million, exceeding the high estimate; the same buyer also took home the magnificent preparatory drawing for the painting for £180,000, three times the low estimate. Meanwhile, a 1984 composition by de Kooning went to the guarantor for £5.3 million. The only Italian artist in the catalogue was Alighiero Boetti with a characteristic large ‘Mappa’ woven in Peshawar by Afghan refugees in 1988, which came close to the high estimate at £2.9 million including commissions. The extended duration of the collection auction pushed the subsequent evening catalogue of 20th–21st-century art into the late evening, with a total realisation of just over 111 million pounds for the 46 lots sold.