Auction Results: The Modern Image, Photographs from an Important American Collection, April 5, 2013 @Sotheby's New York

The results from this single owner sale at Sotheby's last week are proof that if the overall Buy-In rate can be kept low, even if prices aren't particularly frothy, the Total Sale Proceeds will likely come in in an acceptable range. Roughly 35% of the lots that sold in this auction found buyers below their pre-sale estimates, but with a Buy-In rate of just under 17%, the aggregate proceeds fell right in the middle of the range.

The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):

Total Lots: 59
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $1943000
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $2950000
Total Lots Sold: 49
Total Lots Bought In: 10
Buy In %: 16.95%
Total Sale Proceeds: $2544376

Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):

Low Total Lots: 21
Low Sold: 16
Low Bought In: 5
Buy In %: 23.81%
Total Low Estimate: $181000
Total Low Sold: $156875

Mid Total Lots: 25
Mid Sold: 21
Mid Bought In: 4
Buy In %: 16.00%
Total Mid Estimate: $598000
Total Mid Sold: $487126

High Total Lots: 13
High Sold: 12
High Bought In: 1
Buy In %: 7.69%
Total High Estimate: $2180000
Total High Sold: $1909375

The top lot by High estimate was lot 18, Edward Weston, Two Shells, 1927, estimated at $600000-900000; it was also the top outcome of the sale at $533000.

Only 65.31% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above the estimate range. There were a total of 4 surprises in the sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):

Lot 16, Edward Steichen, Anna May Wong, 1930, estimated at $7000-10000, sold at $25000
Lot 17, Edward Steichen, Douglass Lighters (for J. Walter Thompson), 1926, estimated at $40000-60000, sold at $203000 (image at right, top, via Sotheby's)
Lot 28, Walker Evans, Defensa Carniceria, Havana, 1933, estimated at $6000-9000, sold at $20000 (image at right, bottom, via Sotheby's)
Lot 55, Irving Penn, Nude Torso, Soaping, New York, 1978/1992, estimated at $15000-25000, sold at $59375 (image at right, middle, via Sotheby's)

Complete lot by lot results can be found here.

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