Phillips’ Photographs, April 2021
Last Thursday saw another Photographs auction, this time from Phillips, which is the auction house’s first photography sale of the year. The auction brought together 256 lots from photographers such as Robert Frank, Thomas Ruff, Helmut Newton and Hiroshi Sugimoto are realised a sales total of $5,412,078 – the most expensive sales total of the year so far.
The most expensive lot at the auction was Robert Frank’s classic Trolley – New Orleans which far outperformed its initial estimate of $150,000 to $250,000 by selling for $403,200 – the second most expensive hammer price of the year so far.
Coming second was a collection of photographs by William Eggleston, titled William Eggleston’s Graceland which was valued at $180,000-$280,000 and reached a hammer price of $226,800, followed by Richard Avedon’s famous Dovima with Elephants which brought in $189,000 after a estimate of $150,000 to $250,000.
This auction also saw a world record for Alec Soth, whose Charles, Vasa, Minnesota sold for $113,400. View the images by clicking on their titles or see all the results from this sale at Phillips’ website here.