“Is the air con on? It’s pretty hot in here”, said the auctioneer Yü-Ge Wang during the high-profile sale of works from the collection of Anita and Poju Zabludowicz at Christie’s London, yesterday 25 June.
The auction itself simmered rather than reaching boiling point, with most works comfortably selling within estimate. The sale totalled £15.4m (with fees) with 89% sold by lot and 97% by value. 56 pieces from the 8,000-strong collection “embracing discovery, dialogue and risk” went under the hammer, many of them fresh to market, alongside an ongoing online sale featuring an additional 44 works (until 30 June).
Overall, three lots were withdrawn, including Heidi Bucher's Parquet, Room nr. 25, Second floor, Obermühle (Ahnenhaus) (1980–82, estimate £100,000-£150,000) and Martin Ede's Des Yeux Verts—Sans Visage (2003, est £15,000-£20,000). And seven failed to find buyers, including Alex Israel's Self-portrait (2013, est £100,000-£150,000), and Wade Guyton's Untitled (2015, est £150,000-£200,000).
In 2023, the Zabludowicz couple closed their non-profit project space located in a former north London Methodist church after 16 years. Their decision to close followed a well-publicised boycott movement against Anita and Poju Zabludowicz over their links to Israel.
“Having closed the project space… they are offering the works at Christie’s in a spirit of renewal. Now directed by their daughter Tiffany, the Zabludowicz Collection remains oriented towards the future,” says the auction house.
The top lot, Philip Guston’s Mirror Head (1977), slightly underperformed, fetching £3.9m (with buyer’s fees) against an estimate of £3.5m to £5.5m. “Almost three metres in width, Mirror Head is a large and powerful manifestation of the shift [towards figuration]. It depicts the artist’s wife, Musa McKim—the back of her head, to be precise. She appears to be facing her hazy reflection in a mirror,” says the Christie’s website. At the very bottom end, Aaron Curry’s spray painted piece Pixelator (Infinite Mask), 2008, sold for just £381 against a £10,000 low estimate.
Works that nudged their low estimate included John Baldessari’s painting Life Balance with Toilet/Far and Near (1990), which sold for £114,300 (with fees), against a £120,000 low estimate, and Jonathan Gardner’s The Cloud (2016), which made £38,100 (with fees) against an estimate of £40,000 to £60,000). But 12 works exceeded their high estimate including Thomas Houseago whose Astronaut No. 1 sculpture (2008) realised £92,250 (with fees; est £50,000-£70,000).
The auction was a market test in particular for Richard Prince, currently undergoing a renaissance with major shows in Vienna and Venice, and the ubiquitous street artist Kaws. The former had two works consigned including Untitled (Cowboy), 1994, which went for £1.5m (est £800,000-£1.2m). The couple consigned three works by Kaws, with Companion (Original Fake, 2011) garnering the highest price at £228,600 (est £350,000-£550,000).
The market for Damien Hirst is in flux but the Brit artist’s butterflies still have their wings. I Love You (1994-95) sold for £762,000 (estimate £600,000-£800,000). Bidding for the work, which had a third-party guarantee, leapt quickly to £570,000 and then stalled. I Love You is one of a suite of 12 butterfly paintings for which Hirst was awarded the prestigious Prix Eliette von Karajan in Austria in 1995.
Six other lots were third-party guaranteed. Records were set for Anj Smith, Jakub Julian Ziolkowski and Rose Wylie, whose 2015 work Sailing Boat sold for £292,100 (est £150,000-£350,000). Bidders from countries such as the United Arab Emirates and Japan participated online via Christie’s live.
The Zabludowicz couple started collecting in 1994, with more than 600 artists represented in their holdings. In 2010, the Zabludowicz Collection initiated an international residency programme for artists on the island of Sarvisalo in Loviisa, Finland.
In 2021 however, 25 artists “deauthored” their works of art in the Zabludowiczs’ collection because of the London couple’s links with Israel. The group of artists and cultural workers, known as Boycott/Divest Zabludowicz or BDZ, cited the Zabludowicz Collection’s links to the Israeli state as the motive for “disaffiliating” themselves (none of these artists’ works were in the auction). Artnet News reports that the pair are selling the works because of their "disillusionment" with the art world.
The couple did not comment on this but Tiffany Zabludowicz told The Art Newspaper: “We are very happy with the results of this auction, which has been an exciting moment of transition for the collection. It has been a great experience to collaborate with Christie’s on this sale of approximately 1% of the collection… the collection has always and will continue to focus on art of our time and on supporting the wider art ecosystem.”
Poju Zabludowicz’s late father was a Polish Holocaust survivor who built up the Israeli and Finnish defence company Soltam Systems, which he sold in 1991; he is now chair and chief executive of the family business, a private equity firm called Tamares Group.
A family spokesperson told the Financial Times: “Most of Tamares Group’s investments are in the USA, UK and Finland, with a small percentage in Israel. These investments are in real estate, private equity, hospitality and technology. Tamares has no investment in the West Bank or military-related interests.”
Following the Hamas attacks on Israel in 2023, the couple released a statement saying that “we are deeply saddened and troubled by the horrific war that is unfolding in Israel and Gaza”.