• “The market is dull,” Robert Landau, a Canadian dealer, noted after the sale. “People are desperate for merchandise. Buyers are waiting for the sales in June, which will have better material.”

Ever aware of the activities of Russian bidders, Bloomberg’s Katya Kazakina tracked the action:

• A 6-foot-long canvas by Belgian Surrealist Paul Delvaux […] fetched $9 million after an energetic bidding war [between] Alina Davey from Sotheby’s Russian department in London and Victoria Gelfand, Belarus- born director at Gagosian gallery, who works with the art dealer’s Russian clients. Gelfand won the battle. […] Davey’s Russian clients snapped up two works by Dali and one by Giacometti, totaling $11 million. A telephone bidder, working through Mikhail Kamensky, managing director of Sotheby’s in Russia, won a small 1901 flower painting by Picasso for $3.7 million.

Reuters put its finger on one obvious feature of the sale, ambitious estimates:

• David Norman, co-chair of Impressionist and modern art, said the sale indicated “we need to try to keep the estimates as appealing and as based on recent precedence as we can.”

Picasso’s Mistress, Gauguin’s Tahitian Lead Sotheby’s $170 Million Auction (Bloomberg)

Sales steady at NY’s spring art auction (Reuters)

44 Works Sell for $170 Million at Sotheby’s Auction (New York Times)