Art World
A Rare Rosenquist and a Late Basquiat Lead this Week’s artnet Auctions
Auction highlights from artnet's current sales.
Artnet Auctions
Share This Article
It’s always a good time to add another artwork to your collection, and our team of specialists at artnet Auctions have selected a group of works from current sales to help you find the right piece. Whatever your tastes, we have you covered.
Contemporary Art: Live Now Through February 22, 2018
Red on Red on Red, 2009
Mixed media on paper
Estimate: 4,000–6,000 USD
Photo: artnet Auctions.
Depicting an indoor-outdoor scene, this work on paper exhibits Shara Hughes’s most recognizable subject matter and aesthetic, utilizing a variety of vibrant colors to develop the composition. Her unique artistic process is highly improvised and excludes formal planning, allowing her to develop works that are markedly distinct from one another.
Untitled (Another), 1992
Photo collage
Estimate: 35,000–45,000 USD
Photo: artnet Auctions.
Throughout her career, artist Barbara Kruger has appropriated the visual language of advertising to critique the culture of American consumerism. Her work examines stereotypes and behaviors of consumer culture with text layered over mass-media images to broadcast her ideas. Inspired by the Constructivist Alexander Rodechenko, Kruger’s signature futura bold oblique font is rendered in red-accented black-and-white. Her work is immediately biting and bold in imagery and message, and will appeal to photography and post-war and contemporary collectors alike.
Pop Art: Live Now Through February 21, 2018
Gems, 1978
Estimate: 12,000–18,000 USD
Photo: artnet Auctions.
Andy Warhol’s obsession with consumerism and glamour is well documented, but it wasn’t until he had achieved widespread success as an artist that he explored jewelry—the most glaring example of conspicuous consumption. This lot from 1978, depicting a diamond, is from a series of four gems and is an unpublished proof aside from a small edition of 20. The work presents a great opportunity to collect a unique color variant from this wonderful series.
Cabeza (from Portfolio II), 1982–1984
Screenprint in colors on Saunders Hot Press watercolor paper
Estimate: 70,000–90,000 USD
Photo: artnet Auctions.
One of the most recognizable examples of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s distinctive style, Cabeza features many signature trademarks of the artist’s work, including the skeletal forms of the figure and the incorporation of scrawled text into the image. The yellow patterned backdrop recalls Basquiat’s beginnings as a street artist in the early 1970s. This print was executed in the early ’80s and was reprinted in conjunction with the estate in 2005.
For Artists (from Artists’ Rights Today), 1975
Screenprint in colors with collage on Arches Cover paper
Estimate: 2,500–3,500 USD
Photo: artnet Auctions.
James Rosenquist’s fine art career was heavily influenced by his beginnings as a commercial painter, when he created billboards and shop windows for a living. That early experience shaped his later large-scale compositions, which often included consumer goods and pop-culture references. This work, from his “Artist’s Rights Today” portfolio, is one of his rare early prints that includes collage. It’s from the deluxe Roman numeral edition of only 50 prints, and it exemplifies his ingenuity and innovative artistic instinct: The piece features a real leather belt fastened around the image of a Tide box, giving it a wonderful three-dimensional quality.
Only one of the artist’s works has come to auction in the last four years, so make sure you take advantage of this opportunity—it could be a long time before you get another one.
