From Cranach to Basquiat: upcoming auctions at Christie's
Jean-Michel Basquiat - Portrait of the Artist as a Young Derelict - 1982Lucas Cranach the Elder - The Nymph of the Spring - 1640
A self-portrait by Jean-Michel Basquiat and a mythological painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder are among several works announced by Christie's for its spring and summer auctions.
Images: Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988), "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Derelict", 1982 ·· Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553), "The Nymph of Spring", c.1540
"Portrait of the Artist as a Young Derelict" is a spectacular and somewhat bizarre self-portrait by Jean-Michel Basquiat, which Christie's defines as "both self-portrait and altarpiece". Painted in 1982, the year in which Basquiat painted his best works (according to the artist himself), the work will go on auction in May in New York, along with "See Plate 3", one of Basquiat's rare sculptures, also created in 1982, which has a pre-sale estimate of $4-6 million.
Christie's has not made public the pre-sale estimate for "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Derelict", which some sources put at around $30 million. Although Basquiat has been one of the artists whose work has appreciated the most in the last decade, last year the market showed signs of a certain oversaturation of Basquiats: despite the undisputed success of "In This Case" (which fetched $93 million despite being far from being one of Basquiat's great masterpieces), in November his "Made in Japan II" failed to find a buyer at Sotheby's, while "The Guilt of Gold Teeth", a spectacular work from 1982, was auctioned at Christie's for $40 million, a relative disappointment considering its pre-sale estimate of between $40 and $80 million.
Christie's has also announced that two paintings from the Cecil & Hilda Lewis collection will be auctioned in July. The first of these, "The Nymph of Spring", is a classic mythological painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder, painted around 1540, which carries a pre-sale estimate of £6-8 million. Cranach is one of the very few Renaissance painters whose works appear on the market on a regular basis, which is why his prices have been somewhat inconsistent. In 2011, Drouot put another "Nymph" (directly related to the painting to be auctioned at Christie's) up for auction in Paris with an estimated price of between 3 and 4 million euros, but the work was not sold as the minimum price was not reached. Two of the finest Cranach paintings to come on the market in the last 20 years, "Bacchus at the Wine Vat" in 2011 and "The Faun Family" in 2014, also failed to sell.
Meanwhile, "Pewter jug and silver tazza on a table" (pre-sale estimate of £2.5 to £3.5 million) is a still life by Jan Jansz. den Uyl (1595-1639) that Christie's calls "his undisputed masterpiece".

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