SPRING AUCTION season in NEW YORK: Picasso & Leonardo DiCaprico

The NY Spring season of mega auctions is under way. What does it all mean? 

Sotherby's is just a few blocks away & Christies very near, so off we went. 

"How the art world has changed!" says my husband, an auction veteran for 50 years. Even in 15 years I have seen a shift. 

But it looks as if things are really in upheaval. As an excellent Ft piece by John Gapper  http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/1d20e4b6-d47c-11e3-bf4e-00144feabdc0.html.  points out there is dirty work at the crossroads. 

Last Tuesday saw a 1932 Picasso sell for $28 million & a Monet waterlily "Japanese Bridge" 1918 for 14m. 

But as the Ft tells us, this may not be the real figure. And 14m seems a snip when this week's Richter is estimated at 25-35 million with Jeff Koons' Popeye sculpture even more. Then there's  Christies's Bacon triptych 3 studies of John Edwards (1984)" estimated $80 million.

The Tuesday sale was slow & boring. Majority bidding on the phones, little actual excitement. Many key works did not sell, Too overpriced. Gone the gowns & smart attire; gone the anticipation of live bids & a room bristling with competition. 30% of the buyers were from Asia, all invisible. The real glamour nowadays lies in the vast doorstep catalogues with their immense glossy research. The installation for the 4 or 5 day viewing is another is spectacle, an art form in itself.  And maybe the fact that Leonardo DiCaprico was there!   www.sothebys.com

The auction houses - a duopoly- have recently turned themselves into art dealers.  Currently 2 separate selling exhibitions fill Sotheby's second floor. 43 Dubuffet paintings & sculptures, $65,000 to $3.5m  + 25 works by Vasarely: Op Star (today everyone's a star), 85,000-half a million. There is a price list but u have to ask. Again the installation is stunning, & almost overwhelms the art. 

Not missing a trick, there's new jewellry by Anish Kapoor & Botero's wife, Sophia Vari, for sale. As it was US Mother's Day I tried on a few Kapoor rings which he makes in editions of 10 to 100 with the London goldsmiths firm of .....  Gold & blue enamel my choice! 

So where does this leave the vast vast majority of artists? Sadly high & dry. Since the crash the day sales are often dire, tepid events with low prices. It's still very hard to survive as an artist, unless u are among the top 12 or 15 artists with a name like Warhol or Gauguin. 

Sothebys May 7

BALTHUS & INDIANA.  Which to tell you about first??

For 2 weeks in NYC there is an important exhibition opening event every day - sometimes 2 or 3,  plus the Christies & Sotherby auctions plus performances, art book fairs, art fairs, United Nations causing traffic standstill. Where to start?! So I will entice u with 2 images, both well known but one perhaps the most iconic, famous image of the 1960s - 

                                                            Indiana's Love from 1966
"Some people like to paint trees. I like to paint love. I find it more meaningful than painting trees." —Robert Indiana, 

                                                                         Balthus

ROBERT INDIANA IS AT THE WHITNEY MUSEUM & BALTHUS IS AT THE MET. http://metmuseum.org

INDIANA, born the same year as Warhol, is that most American of Pop artists. Inspired by highway signs, pinball machines, roadside neon and flashing slot machines, his big, bold. hard edged, colourful graphics are mesmerising. 

This is the largest ever show of his work. I wrote about Indiana's 2004 show, "Peace Paintings" for the Financial Times, financial times . Politics often inspire his work, in this instance the Iraq war produced a heartfelt cry WHY OH WHY in strident hues around a CND logo. The last oil there was HOWL, SHRIEK, SHOUT, SCREAM FOR PEACE. Nothing changes. He is still a master of of eye-catching mottos & slogans.

Sadly the show lacks any drawings or note books, which I am told by Simon Salama-Caro who is doing Indiana's catalogue raisonne, are beautiful. But the 100 works here - many large 8 ft paintings and lots of little known obelisk totem sculpture, fill an entire floor with vibrant 60s Pop style colour, design and stencilled lettering:  HUG EAT SIN DIE.  And of course LOVE with its slanted O, an image ubiquitous from millions of mugs, key rings, T shirts, even doormats.

Whitney Indiana installation 

Big surprise is the number of vertical wooden columns or herms and constructions of wood n' metal which start early - in 1959. Lacking cash for paint & canvas he began collecting old metal wheels and rubbish from the NY warehouses being demolish for Wall St's expansion. He said he made "The Lost into Found. Junk into Art. Neglected into Wanted. Unloved into Loved." He was soon putting short everyday words onto these via found stencils. At this time text like this was unprecedented, and says Barbara, "Audacious."

PS. For Scots - Indiana learnt to set metal printing type at Edinburgh College of Art in the 1950s. 

Director Adam Weinberg & eminent curator Barbara Haskell

                                   Simon Salama-Caro, director of the Indiana catalogue Raisonne

Back in Scotland it's  Open Doors day in Edinburgh - http://www.doorsopendays.org.uk. 127 places. Take advantage. I will report on Glasgow's events later.