Auctions
Otto Hans Ressler Opens New Auction House
Alexander Forbes
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Europe has a new player in the auction game. Three years after stepping down as co-founder and managing director of Vienna’s im Kinsky auction house, Otto Hans Ressler announced the opening of a new house, Ressler Kunst Auktionen GmbH on Thursday, der Standard reports.
Ressler spent 18 years building im Kinsky into one of Europe’s more prominent contenders in the secondary market. He stayed on as im Kinsky’s contemporary art expert until last March. Before launching that house, the 65-year-old worked at Vienna’s Dorotheum for 15 years. For a portion of that time he was the director of the house’s visual art department.
Ressler is joined by three partners in the new venture: real estate developer Valentin Basilides, financial adviser Markus Schmut, and photo expert Peter Coeln. Coeln owns the photo gallery Ostlicht and runs the Westlicht Photo Museum as well as its affiliated auction house Photographica.
Auctions at Ressler Kunst Auktionen won’t get underway until 2015. And, the schedule looks to be more relaxed than your average house—at least to start. The house plans two auctions per year of no more than 150 lots. They intend to focus principally on modern and contemporary Austrian art.
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