Artwork that after belonged to late Warner Bros. music government Mo Ostin is anticipated to usher in greater than $120m throughout Sotheby’s marquee auctions this Could, one in every of a number of notable single-owner collections which were consigned this season.
Ostin led Warner Bros. Information for greater than 30 years and was a number one determine within the music trade for greater than half a century. He labored with artists together with Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and Sammy Davis Jr within the Fifties and, in subsequent a long time, artists together with Madonna, Prince, Inexperienced Day and the Purple Sizzling Chili Peppers. He died final 12 months at age 95.
Ostin additionally collected artwork for round 50 years. In Could, Sotheby’s will provide some 30 works from his assortment that the public sale home estimates will promote for greater than $120m collectively. Works headed to the public sale block embrace items by René Magritte, Cy Twombly, Willem de Kooning, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Joan Mitchell, Cecily Brown, Takashi Murakami and Pablo Picasso.
Cy Twombly’s Untitled (1962) Courtesy Sotheby’s
The devoted night sale of works from Ostin’s assortment might be led by two Magritte work: L’Empire des lumières (1951) and Le Domaine d’Arnheim (1949). L’Empire des lumières has not been seen in public since Ostin acquired it in 1979, although comparable works from his collection of 17 work with the identical title are within the collections of establishments just like the Peggy Guggenheim Assortment in Venice, the Museum of Fashionable Artwork in New York, the Menil Assortment in Houston and the Royal Museums of Effective Arts in Brussels. Final 12 months, a big 1961 portray from Magritte’s L’empire des lumières collection offered at Sotheby’s London for £51.5m (£59.4m with charges), setting a brand new public sale report for the Belgian Surrealist.
Ostin was given Le Domaine d’Arnheim by his shut pal and music trade titan David Geffen—one of many world’s pre-eminent artwork collectors and humanities philanthropists—from his personal assortment as a thank-you reward for serving to him set up Asylum Information. Ostin insisted on paying Geffen a good market value in trade, based on Sotheby’s, which expects it to convey round $20m at public sale.
Different spotlight’s from Ostin’s assortment embrace Twombly’s Untitled (1962), which the artist painted in Rome throughout his “Baroque interval” that was influenced by Italy’s historical structure, artwork, poetry and pantheon of gods. Moon View (1984) by Basqiuat has not been seen in public for greater than 20 years, based on Sotheby’s.
Paysage (1965) by Pablo Picasso Courtesy Sotheby’s
Two Figures (1946-47) by De Kooning will make its first public sale look in additional than 30 years as a part of the sale, based on Sotheby’s. The portray was as soon as a part of the gathering of Joseph H. Hazen, the previous vp and director of Warner Bros. Ostin acquired Cecily Brown’s Free Video games for Could (2015) only a 12 months after it was painted. Picasso’s Paysage (1965), previously within the assortment of Picasso’s late daughter Maya, is a uncommon panorama of Mougins, France, the place Picasso spent the final 12 years of his life.
Ostin’s assortment is the newest in a rising variety of vital collections that can hit the public sale block in Could in New York. Current high-profile consignments from collectors or their estates embrace Chicago commodities dealer Alan Press and his spouse Dorothy, late Institute of Modern Artwork, Boston trustee Gerald Fineberg, and extra works from the record-breaking collections of publishing billionaire S.I. Newhouse and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen.
