Sotheby’s had something to cheer about in today’s Asia Week auction:
Today at Sotheby’s New York a 600 year-old Collection Of Ming Dynasty Buddhist Sutras sold for a remarkable $14,026,000, many multiples of the $100/150,000 estimate. The lot took 31 minutes to sell and was sought by as many as 15 bidders in the room and on telephones before a four-way contest with bidders from both Asia and the US which resulted in Mr Liu Yiqian, who was bidding by phone with Rongde Zhang, Head of Sotheby’s Classical Chinese Paintings Department in New York, securing the work.
The result is the top price at any sale during the March Asia Week series of auctions in New York and represents the highest price paid for a Chinese Painting outside of Asia. The Sutras came from An Important Japanese Collection and new information that surfaced after Sotheby’s catalogue went to print identified the only other known works from the series as being in a noted Chinese Collection.