Paul Gauguin : 110 years of auctions

[06/10/2002]

 

As the centenary of Paul Gauguin’s death approaches museums are rushing to hold prestigious retrospectives on one of the most influential painters of his time. The NY Metropolitan’s “Gauguin in New York Collections: The Lure of the Exotic” closes on 28 October 2002, but an exposition opens the following April at the Musée du Luxembourg and runs to June. For the auction houses, this is an opportunity to put up some extra Gauguin pieces. In the first season of 2002, no less than 58 works by Paul GAUGUIN were put up for auction, nearly as many as in the whole of 2001. It is rare indeed to see such a profusion of Gauguins on the market.

But Gauguin’s work has long adorned the walls of the world’s auction houses. Paul GAUGUIN himself auctioned off some thirty canvases to finance his first voyage to Tahiti. The 1891 auction brought him FFR 10,000, equivalent to just over EUR 30,000 today — just about enough for a good engraving. The sale of his studio in 1895, just before his second trip to Tahiti, was a fiasco. The exotic works were largely ignored. The highest price paid was 500 francs, for Aha Oe Feü. A canvas called Te Fare could only be sold at the knock-down price of 180 francs —compare this with Claude MONET’s view of Rouen Cathedral, which sold for FFR 13,000 the same year.

 

Now, a century later, Te Fare, painted in 1992, is the most expensive work of Gauguin ever sold at auction. In 1991, the collectors packing Ader-Tajan drove the price up to FFR 52 million. Over the very long term (1895-2001) Gauguin’s drawings have generated annual returns of 5.4% (adjusted for inflation) and are now worth approximately 264 times their 1895 value. But this gradual exceptional gain in value actually disguises a series of shorter price cycles, and the modern Gauguin collector can expect short sharp fluctuations in prices. In 1997-2001, Gauguin’s benchmark index gained nearly 76 points.
Since then the trend has been down. With large numbers of works coming onto the market at ambitious reserve prices, set in the wake of the recent gains, collectors rarely battle for Gauguins on the auction floor. It is unusual for a work to be bid above its high estimate. Only two of eight canvases on offer managed it during the first half of 2002. Two others had to be bought in. The top hammer price of the first season 2002 was the GBP 600,000 paid for Le Champ Lollichon et l’église de Pont-Aven, GBP 100,000 above its low estimate.

Sotheby’s is offering Gauguin lovers two engravings from 1893-1894 on 10 October. The less expensive of the two, Nave Nave Fenua, estimated at EUR 1,500-2,000, was printed posthumously by Pola Gauguin. And on 15 October, the Dorotheum in Vienna is putting up La Petite Parisienne, a bronze cast in 1975 (estimate: EUR 2,800 – 3,800). Next year is the official centenary — watch out for a further rush of Paul GAUGUIN work to the market.

From Mireur Dictionary of fine art sales 1700-1900 This Artprice publication provides the complete auction records documenting the formative period of the European art market: 1700-1900. In 1903 Hippolyte Mireur originally published his dictionary of art auctions held in Europe and in the United States (1700-1900). The seven-volume complete edition of the work came out just once, in 1911, and there are very few copies left in circulation today. The dictionary has nonetheless been an essential reference work for art professionals. It is the world’s only source of information on this foundational period for the European art market.
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