Pakistan-born figurative painter Salman Toor’s exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art, scheduled to run until April, has brought the emerging artist to the market’s attention. Now, alongside works by in-demand names Matthew Wong, Titus Kaphar and Jordan Casteel, Christie’s will bring Toor’s Rooftop Party with Ghosts I (2015) to bidders in its live contemporary art day sale on December 3 in New York. The work is expected to achieve a price of $100,000-$150,000.

The day sale will also include a group of seven works donated by artists Mark di Suvero, Rashid Johnson, Martin Puryear, Richard Serra, Joel Shapiro, Johnny Swing and Ursula von Rydingsvard to benefit the Storm King Art Center. Its set to follow a relay-style auction that will take place across Christie’s Hong Kong and Rockefeller center locations on December 2, headlined by examples from Pablo Picasso, Gerard Richter and Joan Mitchell.

Measuring at 46.5 inches by 66 inches, Rooftop Party with Ghosts I is one part of a triptych first debuted at New York’s Aicon Gallery during the artist’s 2015 showcase “Resident Alien,” where it was purchased by the seller. In a statement, Christie’s described Toor’s style as host to “liminal and surreal scenes and intimate views of imagined everyday scenes between queer and BIPOC men unapologetically inhabiting their space through a highly stylized and painterly use of color and form.”

The December sale will mark the second time a work by the artist has been offered auction. Phillips sold the first Toor canvas on the secondary market, Aashiana (Hearth and Home) from 2012, during its New York October evening sale, where it made £138,600 ($185,375). The painting beat its estimate of £30,000 ($40,124) by a factor of 4 times.

In an interview with Art Market Monitor prior to the sale’s announcement, Christie’s specialist and head of the contemporary art day sales in New York Rachael White Young noted that a growing collector base, institutional backing and scarcity of works on the primary market have led to increasing demand around Toor’s work. In June, the New York–based painter joined the roster of Luhring Augustine gallery. His works reside in the collections of MCA Chicago and Tate London in addition to three examples recently acquired by the Whitney Museum of Art.

Launched in October, Greenhouse Auctions, a new online-only auction platform designed around bolstering access to emerging artists, will hold its inaugural sale on December 2. The hybrid model aims to combine the selectiveness of primary market sales with the accessibility of auction by selling works directly from artists and small to mid-sized dealers.

Developed in just six-months over the course of the pandemic, Greenhouse’s founder, Shlomi Rabi, former Christie’s vice president and head of the photographs department in New York, conceived of the platform as a way to address disparities in the auction market. The digital platform, Rabi says was meant as a “hybrid model that leveraged the advantages of the [auction industry], but, on the selling side, exclusively caters to the primary market.” The concept, which Rabi says is centered around “community and transparency,” has entered the scene at a time when disruptive models and hybrid sale formats are proliferating in the post-pandemic market.

Comprising just 17 lots by international artists, the digital platform’s inaugural sale, “Sourdough,” will offer new-to-market works made during the pandemic. Works by newcomers and mid-career artists including Shai Azoulay, Molly A. Greene, T. Eliott Mansa, William Osorio and Tony Vazquez-Figueroa will be on offer at prices between $8,000-$12,000. Among the participating dealers in the auction are LnS Gallery in Miami and New York’s Meislin Projects.

Continue Reading

Deaccessioning, as the Baltimore Museum of Art just discovered when it was forced to withdraw works from sale at Sotheby’s in late October, has its perils. The Brooklyn Museum was able to sell works in the same sale that BMA had to abandon. Sometimes the difference between a scandal and success is planning and advice. At least, that’s what a new team of experienced lawyers and public relations people are betting as they launch a new service for museums.

In February of this year, Jon Olsoff, John Cahill and Paul Cossu announced the formation of a new law firm (OCC) catering to the art world. The lawyers at OCC have decades of experience working with institutions as they picked their way through the complex issues associated with these kinds of sales, both at auction and privately.

Now they’ve enlisted the help of Sotheby’s former communications head, Lauren Gioia, who will lend her 20+ years expertise as a consultant to OCC. During her time at Sotheby’s, Gioia led the communications strategies for the largest and many of the most complicated deaccessions in history.  Gioia and OCC are pooling their wealth of knowledge, experience and specific expertise—they’ve worked on a range of deaccessioning events at City of Denver/Clyfford Still Museum (2011), SF MoMA (2019), Georgia O’Keeffe Museum (2014, 2018), Dia Art Foundation (2013), MFA Boston (2003, 2011), New York Public Library (2005), Albright-Knox Art Gallery (2007), Berkshire Museum (2017/2018)—to provide integrated communications and legal counsel to museums and cultural institutions embarking on deaccessions and sales.

“Most museums have very capable communications and legal counsel,” Gioia said, “but deaccessions and sales require specific expertise and experience that we can provide.  Our role would be to partner with the existing teams to ensure institutions achieve a successful outcome based on their goals.”