Who’s Selling Art at the May 2025 Auctions in New York?

It’s springtime in the art world, and that can only mean one thing. Not the Venice Biennale, although many dealers, collectors and artists will no doubt be attending the Venice Biennale this week. No, we’re talking about the May sale.

As usual, this year’s sales hit an inflection point in the market. After two years of declining sales, the global art market returned to modest growth of 4% last year, according to the latest Art Basel and UBS Art Market Report. The $59.6 billion in total sales was not due to collectors recommitting themselves to contemporary art, but to a surge in quality lots at the November sale, namely from Sotheby’s Leonard Lauder collection, headlined by a $236.4 million work by Klimt.

While no works from the spring sales season are expected to reach this dazzling mark, that doesn’t mean there won’t be trophy pieces. The major auction houses seem to be getting the message: Collectors want artists with deep, stable markets and art with established, top-tier provenance. Thankfully for them, pieces from some of the most famous collections have been freed from their shackles.

Christie’s will auction 16 lots from the SI Newhouse estate, topped by a sculpture by Constantin Brancuşi, Danaid (c. 1913), and paintings by Jackson Pollock, No. 7A, 1948each estimated to be worth $100 million. The museum also displays three lots from the collection of Agnes Gund, the former MoMA board chair, the most expensive of which is a 1964 work by Mark Rothko No. 15 (two green and red stripes)estimated at $80 million. Christie’s concluded its evening sale with a group of paintings by Gerhard Richter from the collection of Marian Goodman, who died in January. The top piece in the group is estimated at $50 million.

Not to be outdone, Sotheby’s offers its own Rothko Trophy, a 1957 painting brown and black redestimated to be worth $100 million. The work is one of 24 works in the collection of the late art dealer and financier Robert Mnuchin. There’s a second Rothko, No. 1 (1949), estimated to be worth $15 million to $20 million. Sotheby’s will also display approximately 50 works from the collection of David and Shoshanna Wingate, including Giacometti sculptures La Clairière (combination avec neuf figures)estimated at between $18 million and $25 million.

These are all big-name consignors announced and touted by the auction house. What about the unnamed consignors of other top lots in the auction? Excellently, art news More than a few can be revealed. (Note: As always, no auction house will confirm or deny any consignor.)

On top is Jean-Michel Basquiat’s monumental painting from 1983 Museum Security (Broadway Meltdown)scheduled for Sotheby’s Contemporary Art Evening Sale on May 14, with an estimated value of US$45 million. Several sources revealed art news In fact, the shipper was John Sayegh-Belchatowski. The painting last sold for $14.6 million to an unnamed buyer at Christie’s in London in 2013; Belle Faxter According to reports, the buyer is Sayegh-Belchatowski. Although the collector did not respond to a request for comment, he posted about the piece on Instagram shortly after the consignment was announced. His Instagram profile photo is also a photo of the work, taken when it was on display at the Fondation Beyeler in Switzerland.

Sotheby’s auction also features Elizabeth Peyton painting from 1996 Earls Court (Liam + Noel)estimated at $1.5 million to $2 million. The work appears to come from the collection of New York neurosurgeon and collector Frank Moore and his late wife, Nina, who appears in the 2025 edition of art news Top 200 list. The work was last sold in 1998, according to Sotheby’s. The catalog for the 2008 New Museum exhibition “Always Alive: Elizabeth Paton” lists the Moore family as the lenders of the work.

The final item in the Sotheby’s sale: Agnes Martin, 1981 Untitled #10Estimated at $7 million to $10 million, the company was sold to its current owners in 1998 by Sperone Westwater. According to Tiffany Bell’s catalog raisonné, first published in 2017, the work is owned by Richard I. Furman.

Andy Warhol’s 1963 work, one of the top lots in Christie’s 20th Century Evening Sale on May 18 Double Elvis [Ferus Type] Has quite a long history. The piece, which has passed through no less than a dozen hands during its more than 60 years of existence, including Leo Castelli and Ileana Sonnabend, was most famously displayed at the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas as part of an art-centric renovation of the Old Vegas landmark after it was acquired by Station Casinos for $313 million. Station’s CEO and President Frank J. Fertitta III and Chairman Lorenzo Fertitta brothers are well-known art collectors, with a particular focus on American Pop Art and Abstract Expressionism. Several sources confirmed art news The Fertitta family is Double Elvis.

Several works auctioned by Christie’s that day appeared to be by art news Top 200 Collector Elie Khouri. The first is a 2010 painting by Lynette Yiadom-Boakye Shoot the desperate, hug the needyestimated at $700,000 to $1 million. The work was originally purchased by film mogul Michael Lynne and his wife Ninah in 2010 from New York dealer Jack Shainman. However, he returned it to Shainman at some point, who later sold it to Khouri in 2018. The Dubai-based collector proudly posted it on Instagram in 2019, and at the time of the interview last year, the painting was hanging in his home. lintel Magazine. (Curry declined to comment.)

The Yiadom-Boakye work is listed as an “Outstanding Collection Property”; other works with the same title in the sale include a 2005 painting by Richard Prince my mother-in-lawEstimated at $120,000 to $180,000, last purchased at Christie’s London in 2017, and a mixed media work by Alex Da Corte in 2021, sexy alphabet dreamestimated at $70,000 to $100,000.

If you’re wondering who’s behind the mysterious collection featured in Christie’s Post-War and Contemporary Art Day sale, titled “Matters of Vision: Properties of Exceptional Collections,” art news We have learned from reliable sources that this person is none other than Ronald Lauder. All 18 pieces by Lauder were originally owned by The Estée Lauder Companies, according to auction house provenance records. The works, mostly works on paper and some screen prints, include an untitled work by Brice Marden between 1965 and 1967, estimated at $200,000 to $300,000; a 1972 graphite seascape by Vija Celmins, estimated at $1.5 million to $2 million; and a 1965 Larry Poons A crimson canvas covered in cyan spots created in 2006, it is estimated at $400,000 to $600,000.

Finally, Phillips may be trying to attract some attention from Sotheby’s Mnuchin sale by designating his untitled 1948 Pollock painting as “Property of the Robert Mnuchin Collection.” The piece was indeed in the late dealer’s collection from 1990 until November 2024, when it was sold at Phillips. As a result, it failed to sell. Then things got complicated when the third-party guarantor, David Mimran, the son of billionaire Jean-Claude Mimran, allegedly failed to repay the funds; Phillips is now suing Mimran. The painting is currently estimated at $7 million to $10 million.