The Armory Show went up against a snowstorm and a schedule clash with the contemporary auctions in London and the European Fine Art Fair (TEFAF) in Maastricht—but still managed to pull in substantial crowds. Notable visitors to the fair, which closed on March 12, included actors Timothée Chalamet, Neil Patrick Harris, and Julianne Moore as well as the comedian Chris Rock.
But, in the end, an art fair is for selling—not for celeb-spotting. Sales reports, of course, are slippery—some purchases may have been finalized long before the fair, while others might only be hypothetical, still awaiting the all-important paperwork (and cash). Prices, however, are far more reliably telling, giving a valuable snapshot of where individual artists stand in the art-market matrix today (even if some dealers offer slightly inflated figures). Meanwhile, some dealers prefer to report ranges or the “asking price,” to obscure the actual price and, for instance, cover up any favorable treatment that another buyer of a comparable work may not have received. So take all of this with a grain of salt.
Laure Prouvost’s The Hidden Paintings Grandma Improved – We Are Coming Out (2017). Courtesy of Lisson Gallery.
PAINTING
$1 million: James Rosenquist painting at Thaddaeus Ropac
$650,000: Robert Longo drawing at Thaddaeus Ropac to a Stuttgart museum
$600,000: Carmen Herrera’s painting Cadmium orange with blue (1989) at Lisson Gallery
$550,000: New work by Alex Katz at Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac
$350,000: A Mary Corse monochrome white painting at Kayne Griffin Corcoran
$225,000: A Fred Tomaselli painting at James Cohan
$173,000: Katharina Grosse’s o.T. (2017) at König Galerie
$168,000: Painting by Huang Rui at 10 Chancery Lane to a San Francisco-based institution
$140,000: A Kehinde Wiley painting at Sean Kelly
$100,000: A Lee Mullican painting at James Cohan
$89,000: Callum Innes’s Exposed Painting Delft Blue (2018) at Sean Kelly
$60,000–250,000: Three paintings by artist Piero Dorazio at Mazzoleni Gallery
$60,000–90,000 each: Two paintings by Emma Amos at Ryan Lee
$60,000: Stanley Whitney’s Stay Song 16 (2018) at Lisson Gallery
Installation view of David Castillo’s booth, a solo presentation of Sanford Biggers. Courtesy of David Castillo Gallery.
$50,000: Sanford Biggers’s Annunciation quilt painting sold to a major Washington, DC-based collection at David Castillo Gallery
$50,000: Sam Moyer’s Edgewater Window (2018) at Sean Kelly
$48,000: A Gregor Hildebrandt painting at Wentrup, Berlin
$40,000–60,000: A Shin Sung-Hy painting at Gallery Hyundai, Seoul
$39,000: A painting by Nevin Aladag at Wentrup
$35,000–80,000: One of André Butzer’s colorful, cartoonish paintings at Nino Mier Gallery
$36,900: Laure Prouvost’s painting The Hidden Paintings Grandma Improved – We Are Coming Out (2017) at Lisson
$25,000–60,000: Two paintings by Gianfranco Zappettini at Mazzoleni Gallery
$23,000: A painting by John Seal at König Galerie
$17,000 each: Paintings by Gareth Cadwallader at Josh Lilley Gallery
$10,000–25,000 each: Paintings by Derek Fordjour at Josh Lilley Gallery
$10,000–15,000: Cinga Samson’s works at Cape Town’s Blank Projects gallery
Vik Muniz’s Metachrome (Abaporu, after Tarsila do Amaral) (2018). Courtesy of Galeria Nara Roesler.
PRINTS AND PHOTOGRAPHS
$85,000: Hank Willis Thomas’s screenprint Race Riot (With Interference) at Jack Shainman
$50,000: A large version of Vik Muniz’s Metachrome (Abaporu, after Tarsila do Amaral) (2018) at Galeria Nara Roesler
In excess of $45,000: Two-thirds of Julian Opie’s edition of 45 relief prints at Alan Cristea Gallery
$35,000–65,000: Pace reportedly sold out of Tara Donavan’s Composition Card pieces during the fair’s VIP preview
In excess of $25,000: More than half of a portfolio of mixed-media prints by Yinka Shonibare MBE at Alan Cristea Gallery
$25,000: Alec Soth’s photograph Nick, Los Angeles (2017) at Sean Kelly
$19,000: A screenprint by Imi Knoebel at Galerie Ludorff
$10,000: Mary Lai’s work on paper at Repetto Gallery
SCULPTURE
$470,000: Tony Cragg’s dynamic sculpture wt (extended) sold at Lisson
$250,000: Two artworks by Su Xiaobai sold at Pearl Lam Galleries
$200,000: A mushroom sculpture from The Haas Brothers’ “Afreaks” series at R & Company
$140,000: Erwin Wurm’s Bag Walking (2017) at Konig Galerie
$125,000: One of Daniel Buren’s mirrored wall projections from his “Prism and Mirror” series at Galeria Nara Roesler
$40,000: Sanford Biggers’s Free Radical mixed media sculpture sold to New York collectors Carole Server and Oliver Frankel from David Castillo Gallery
$40,000: A sculpture by Peter Linde Busk at Josh Lilley
$20,000: A José Davila sculpture at König Galerie
$4,000 each: Laura Vinci’s gold-plated brass leaves, Folhas Avulsas #1 (2018), at Galeria Nara Roesler