Christie’s Auction House in NYC to Sell $1B Art Collection of Microsoft Co-Founder Paul Allen

 

 

Edited by: TJVNews.com

 

In an interesting development, it was announced on Thursday that Christie’s auction house in New York City has won the right to the sell the most expensive art collection that the industry has ever handled, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

 

At least 150 artworks of Paul Allen, the co-founder of Microsoft, who died in 2018 after a recurrence of non-Hodgkin lymphoma is estimated to be worth $1 billion and the trove of paintings and sculptures that he collected include masterpieces by Renoir and Roy Lichtenstein, according to a report in the New York Times.  The report indicated that Allen directed all proceeds to philanthropic causes. The auction will take place in November and will be the largest in history, according to the Times report.

 

The sale is estimated to surpass the $922 million collection of real-estate developer Harry Macklowe and his ex-wife Linda Macklowe, sold earlier this year, as well as the $835 million estate of banker David Rockefeller and his wife, Peggy, in 2018, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

 

Speaking to the New York Times, Guillaume Cerutti, the chief executive of Christie’s, said in a telephone interview,  “It’s a major event for the art market and for the art world.“The fact that it embraces five centuries of great art — from Botticelli to David Hockney, plus of course the very inspirational figure of Paul Allen, plus the fact that the sale is dedicated to philanthropy — we are really moved by this extraordinary project we are on. It’s something that’s very special.”

 

In a statement sent to the WSJ, Jody Allen, the collector’s sister and executor of his estate, described her brother as being both “analytical and emotional,” adding, “He believed that art expressed a unique view of reality—combining the artist’s inner state and inner eye—in a way that can inspire us all.”

 

She added that “Paul truly understood the power and significance of art and was always happy to share that experience with others.  I am very pleased to have this unparalleled collection in the hands of Christie’s world-class operation to lead its safe passage to new collectors around the world, “ as was reported by the Times.

 

The NYT reported that among the highlights of the works from the Allen estate that will be for sale is Jasper Johns’s acrylic and paper collage “Small False Start” from 1960, estimated to bring more than $50 million, and Paul Cézanne’s “La Montagne Sainte-Victoire” (1888-90), estimated at over $100 million. But there are also several old masters. Other details of exactly which works would be offered were not available.

 

Among the impressionist works known to be in Allen’s collection, according to past museum shows: Edgar Degas’ “Woman Seated in Front of a Piano” from 1882-85, Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s 1877 “The Reader” and several examples by Claude Monet, including famed views of the Rouen cathedral and water lily ponds, as was reported by the WSJ. Allen also purchased such pieces as Georgia O’Keeffe’s 1927 “White Rose with Larkspur No. 1,” and Roy Lichtenstein’s 1962 “The Kiss,” the report indicated.

 

The WSJ reported that in 2000, he paid Sotheby’s $14.3 million for Mark Rothko’s 1956 abstract, “Yellow Over Purple,” and in 2004, he paid the same house $39.2 million for Paul Gauguin’s 1899 “Maternity II.” Two years later, he paid Christie’s $40.3 million for Gustav Klimt’s 1903 “Birch Forest.”

 

The WSJ also reported that a pair of Seattle museum exhibits in 2006 and 2019-2020 drawing from his collection offer clues into potential pieces that could be headed for auction. Among the older works that Allen or his estate has loaned are Sandro Botticelli’s circa-1480-1489 “Madonna of the Magnificat,” Jan Brueghel the Younger’s 1625 “The Five Senses: Sight,” and Canaletto’s 1783 Venetian scene, “The Grand Canal, Venice, Looking South-East from Saint Eustace to New Rialto Buildings.”

 

After leaving Microsoft in 1983, Allen began paying more attention to art. He was inspired in part by his librarian father, who collected Chinese celadon pottery and hung a poster of Georges Rouault’s 1916-1936 “The Old King” in the family living room, according to Allen’s 2011 autobiography, “Idea Man,” as was reported by the WSJ.

 

Despite the fact that his autobiography didn’t delve into the back stories about his holdings of impressionist and modern art, by the early 1990s, Allen started to make waves at major auctions and eventually gained a reputation as an extremely private yet omnivorous collector, according to the WSJ report.  In other collecting fields, he appeared more willing to discuss his activities, from war planes and Jimi Hendrix’s electric guitars to historic manuscripts and Captain Kirk’s first “Star Trek” command chair, the report added.

 

The NYT reported that Allen also treated art as an important investment. At Christie’s in 2016, he was the anonymous buyer of Monet’s 1891 canvas of a haystack for $81.4 million, then an auction record, according to Bloomberg.

 

That same year, he sold a painting of an American fighter jet screaming across the sky by Gerhard Richter for $25.6 million, more than double the $11.2 million he paid a decade before, and in 2014, he sold a Mark Rothko painting for $56.2 million, for which he’d paid $34.2 million in 2007, according to the Times report.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by: TJVNews.com

 

In an interesting development, it was announced on Thursday that Christie’s auction house in New York City has won the right to the sell the most expensive art collection that the industry has ever handled, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

 

At least 150 artworks of Paul Allen, the co-founder of Microsoft, who died in 2018 after a recurrence of non-Hodgkin lymphoma is estimated to be worth $1 billion and the trove of paintings and sculptures that he collected include masterpieces by Renoir and Roy Lichtenstein, according to a report in the New York Times.  The report indicated that Allen directed all proceeds to philanthropic causes. The auction will take place in November and will be the largest in history, according to the Times report.

 

The sale is estimated to surpass the $922 million collection of real-estate developer Harry Macklowe and his ex-wife Linda Macklowe, sold earlier this year, as well as the $835 million estate of banker David Rockefeller and his wife, Peggy, in 2018, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

 

Speaking to the New York Times, Guillaume Cerutti, the chief executive of Christie’s, said in a telephone interview,  “It’s a major event for the art market and for the art world.“The fact that it embraces five centuries of great art — from Botticelli to David Hockney, plus of course the very inspirational figure of Paul Allen, plus the fact that the sale is dedicated to philanthropy — we are really moved by this extraordinary project we are on. It’s something that’s very special.”

 

In a statement sent to the WSJ, Jody Allen, the collector’s sister and executor of his estate, described her brother as being both “analytical and emotional,” adding, “He believed that art expressed a unique view of reality—combining the artist’s inner state and inner eye—in a way that can inspire us all.”

 

She added that “Paul truly understood the power and significance of art and was always happy to share that experience with others.  I am very pleased to have this unparalleled collection in the hands of Christie’s world-class operation to lead its safe passage to new collectors around the world, “ as was reported by the Times.

 

The NYT reported that among the highlights of the works from the Allen estate that will be for sale is Jasper Johns’s acrylic and paper collage “Small False Start” from 1960, estimated to bring more than $50 million, and Paul Cézanne’s “La Montagne Sainte-Victoire” (1888-90), estimated at over $100 million. But there are also several old masters. Other details of exactly which works would be offered were not available.

 

Among the impressionist works known to be in Allen’s collection, according to past museum shows: Edgar Degas’ “Woman Seated in Front of a Piano” from 1882-85, Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s 1877 “The Reader” and several examples by Claude Monet, including famed views of the Rouen cathedral and water lily ponds, as was reported by the WSJ. Allen also purchased such pieces as Georgia O’Keeffe’s 1927 “White Rose with Larkspur No. 1,” and Roy Lichtenstein’s 1962 “The Kiss,” the report indicated.

 

The WSJ reported that in 2000, he paid Sotheby’s $14.3 million for Mark Rothko’s 1956 abstract, “Yellow Over Purple,” and in 2004, he paid the same house $39.2 million for Paul Gauguin’s 1899 “Maternity II.” Two years later, he paid Christie’s $40.3 million for Gustav Klimt’s 1903 “Birch Forest.”

 

The WSJ also reported that a pair of Seattle museum exhibits in 2006 and 2019-2020 drawing from his collection offer clues into potential pieces that could be headed for auction. Among the older works that Allen or his estate has loaned are Sandro Botticelli’s circa-1480-1489 “Madonna of the Magnificat,” Jan Brueghel the Younger’s 1625 “The Five Senses: Sight,” and Canaletto’s 1783 Venetian scene, “The Grand Canal, Venice, Looking South-East from Saint Eustace to New Rialto Buildings.”

 

After leaving Microsoft in 1983, Allen began paying more attention to art. He was inspired in part by his librarian father, who collected Chinese celadon pottery and hung a poster of Georges Rouault’s 1916-1936 “The Old King” in the family living room, according to Allen’s 2011 autobiography, “Idea Man,” as was reported by the WSJ.

 

Despite the fact that his autobiography didn’t delve into the back stories about his holdings of impressionist and modern art, by the early 1990s, Allen started to make waves at major auctions and eventually gained a reputation as an extremely private yet omnivorous collector, according to the WSJ report.  In other collecting fields, he appeared more willing to discuss his activities, from war planes and Jimi Hendrix’s electric guitars to historic manuscripts and Captain Kirk’s first “Star Trek” command chair, the report added.

 

The NYT reported that Allen also treated art as an important investment. At Christie’s in 2016, he was the anonymous buyer of Monet’s 1891 canvas of a haystack for $81.4 million, then an auction record, according to Bloomberg.

 

That same year, he sold a painting of an American fighter jet screaming across the sky by Gerhard Richter for $25.6 million, more than double the $11.2 million he paid a decade before, and in 2014, he sold a Mark Rothko painting for $56.2 million, for which he’d paid $34.2 million in 2007, according to the Times report.