Banksy’s prices may have dropped with a bang but not all street art is dead, according to Georgina Adam:
There is still some life left in the urban art category, judging by the solid results made in Paris last week at Artcurial, France’s third-biggest auction house. Its “graffiti and street art” sale raised €383,000 (£340,400) for 80 lots sold, with the top price going to a work by Speedy Graphito, “Mandala” (2009), which sold for €35,200 (est €20,000-€25,000). The artist had consigned the work himself, as well as a two-metre-tall sculpture, “King Size” (2009), the cover lot, which sold for an over-estimate €21,600. “Generally we don’t sell works directly from the artists, but there are exceptions in the urban art category,” says sale specialist Arnaud Oliveux. The house also scored with older works, setting a new price high for US graffiti artist Futura 2000, whose 1984 “Baby Formula” made €34,000.
The Art Market: Meaty Graffiti Pieces (Financial Times)
