Auctions

Christie’s and Sotheby’s 2026 half year results: trophy lots and luxury goods fuel rebound

Private sales and flexible financing arrangements are also helping the businesses shore up their bottom lines

Gus the T-Rex sells for a record $50.1m at Sotheby’s

One of the most complete fossilised skeletons of its kind beat the previous record, held by Ken Griffin’s Apex, by more than $5m

Art marketanalysis

Auction houses made significant recoveries in 2026, ArtTactic report finds

Data from Sotheby's, Christie's and Phillips shows confidence from major single-owner sales is trickling down to the rest of the art market

Phillips counts on luxury watches for sales in first half of 2026

Three timepieces are among the house's top five highest-priced lots this year

Diarynews

Pop star Jay Chou’s Matisse dream comes true with $20m purchase

The Taiwanese musician has fulfilled a long-held ambition to own a work by the French artist, buying a painting at Sotheby’s New York

Art marketanalysis

Lévy Gorvy Dayan pioneers stand-alone strategy with sale of a single work

New York gallery responds to client needs by offering a $10m-plus de Kooning painting in attention-grabbing move

Art marketanalysis

Why one season of successful auctions won't transform the art market

While impressive results in New York and London suggest buoyancy at the very top end, further news of closures and downsizing illustrates the soaring costs facing bricks-and-mortar galleries

Art marketanalysis

What sold at Christie's London auction of controversial Zabludowicz collection?

Consigned from the holdings of Anita and Poju Zabludowicz, the £15.4m sale fell within estimate

Art marketanalysis

Sotheby's auction of Joe Lewis collection breaks record for most expensive sold in UK

Led by a once-scandalous Modigliani painting, the £296.3m London evening sale provided a bright spot for a market struggling with concerns of Brexit and overseas competition

Mexican authorities urge Sotheby’s to stop sale of two pre-Columbian artefacts

The objects, a stone mask and an intricate ceramic figure, are scheduled to be auctioned Thursday morning in New York

Indian tea company's art collection soars at Christie's London

Led by a £3.8m painting by Ganesh Pyne, the auction of the Goodricke collection is the latest South Asian Modern art sale to smash records

Booksnews

‘It's a work of art’: rare, cloth-bound first edition of Wuthering Heights to be auctioned at Christie’s

The book, estimated at up to £600,000, is the first original edition to appear at auction in more than a century

Nazi-looted Georg Kolbe fountain breaks German artist's auction record

Dancer’s Fountain sold for €4m, after it was returned by the artist's museum to the heirs of Jewish collector Heinrich Stahl

Art marketpreview

A Kennedy-connected Stiehl box and a pair of Van Huysum still-lifes: our pick of the June auctions

Plus a Maynard Dixon painting owned by Diane Keaton and a William Morris working combining cave art and glass

Art marketanalysis

Blue-chip gets a boost, but edgier art remains in the doldrums

New York’s marquee auctions made record figures for established names, but precious few by young artists. Meanwhile, struggling gallery sector is impacting primary contemporary market

Robert Mnuchin's $85.7m Rothko leads Sotheby's $407.5m auction in New York

Last night's season opening sale of post-war and contemporary art, which started with 11 lots from the late art dealer, set new records for young artists Ding Shilun and Yu Nishimura

New £5.5m record for Islamic glass leads London sales

A Mamluk footed bowl deaccessioned from the Toledo Museum was the star of this spring's sales of Indian and Islamic art, which saw strong bidding on Indian paintings and Iznik ceramics

Art marketfeature

This month’s blockbuster auctions in New York could bring upwards of $2.5bn

The sales at Bonhams, Christie’s, Phillips and Sotheby’s, spanning two weeks, will test the trade’s recent buoyancy

Vaccine billionaire buys $17.9m Raja Ravi Varma, setting new record for Indian painting at auction

Cyrus Poonawalla is the latest collector to pay top prices for South Asian art, as the Indian art market continues a bull run

Trey the Triceratops sells for $5.5m via Pharrell Williams's auction site

The skeleton of a young adult dinosaur, excavated in Wyoming during the 1990s "Bone Rush", sold on the musician's online Joopiter platform

Christie’s to hold its first South Asian Modern art sale in London in seven years

The auction, scheduled for 11 June, will bring together 93 works including rare Bengali pieces

French government blocks sale of newly discovered drawing by German Renaissance master Hans Baldung

The portrait has been deemed “a work of major historical and artistic interest“ for France’s national heritage

UK council criticised over sale of collection including works by pioneering photographer Tony Ray-Jones

Kent County Council, led by the Reform party, cited financial pressures as a reason for the forthcoming sale, while stating that the works had not been offered to any of the county’s museums or galleries

Henry Moore and Dorothea Tanning set records at Christie's triple-header sale in London

The evening brought in £197m, a 52% increase on last year's equivalent auctions

Art marketanalysis

London art market springs back to life in Sotheby's Modern and contemporary evening sale

The packed auction totalled £131m and made a record for Leon Kossoff

Sotheby’s to sell around £2m of art to support the Royal Academy in London

The auction will provide crucial financial support for the institution, which last year was looking at axing 60 members of staff as part of a cost-cutting drive

American poet Stanley Moss's passion for Old Masters comes to the fore at Sotheby's

The acclaimed poet, who died in 2024, was “a unique figure" who combined collecting and selling art with writing and publishing literature