Gauguin on a Run at Sotheby's

Sotheby’s sold some Gauguin prints in London today at prices that confirm the run that began in June of last year when a monotype doubled the estimate to make €312,750. That turns out be a conservative number compared to this record-setting work:

Ten prints by Paul Gauguin from the Collection of Stanley J. Seeger, sold for £1.54 million ($2.47 million), almost four times the pre-sale low estimate for the group. A new auction record for a print by Paul Gauguin was achieved when Crouching Tahitian Woman Seen From The Back sold for £577,250 ($924,466), over three times the estimate (£180,000-220,000). The traced monotype, or ‘printed drawing’, was fiercely contested by a number of determined bidders, finally selling to a private collector on the telephone after a five-minute battle.

If that’s not enough action, Sotheby’s announced this week that its New York May sale would contain this rarity:

Jeune tahitienne is an exquisite sculpture carved during Paul Gauguin’s first trip to Tahiti between 1890 and 1893 (est. $10/15 million*). As the only fully-worked bust portrait that Gauguin is known to have created, it is unique within his oeuvre, and numbers among the artist’s finest sculptures in private hands.