American Paintings, Drawings & Sculpture Bring $27.1 Million at Sotheby's New York - 19 May 2011
Today’s auction of American Paintings, Drawings & Sculpture at Sotheby’s New York achieved $27,124,125 in total, above a pre-sale low estimate of $25.3 million. Six of the paintings on offer brought prices over $1 million, and new artist records were set for Ernest Leonard Blumenschein, William J. McCloskey and William Aiken Walker.
The sale featured works from two remarkable private collections–Property from the Collection of Edward P. Evans and Property from a Distinguished East Coast Collection–and was led by George Bellows’s Dock Builders from the Evans Collection, which sold for $3,890,500 (est. $2/3 million). The first of a series of works by the artist that focus on Maine’s rugged seamen, the canvas exhibits the same compositional dynamism that Bellows made famous in his iconic boxing scenes. Sotheby’s now holds the top four prices for the artist at auction.
