A significant painting from Argentinian-Italian artist Lucio Fontana’s La fine di Dio series has been added to Sotheby’s upcoming Contemporary Evening Art sale on May 15 with an estimate between US$20 million and US$30 million, potentially setting a new auction record.
“Put quite simply, (this Fontana) is the very best,” says David Galperin, Sotheby’s head of contemporary art for the Americas, citing the rarity of the color in the artist’s work and the combined density of the mark making in the piece.
Concetto spaziale, La fine di Dio, 1964, is one of only four yellow paintings from the series, and is considered one of Fontana’s greatest, along with marking a transition point for the artist’s next decade of work. This particular painting comes from the collection of Dallas art collectors Cindy and Howard Rachofsky.
The couple have long been collectors of significant art, beginning with a focus on American works and expanding to post-war European pieces. They are also active in philanthropy, raising funds for a variety of groups including amfAR and the Dallas Museum of Art (the latter of which they’ve donated more than US$50 million in art to). The duo also operate The Warehouse in Dallas where more than 1,000 pieces of their collection rotate through exhibitions.
The densely pierced canvas is one of 38 in the overall La Fine di Dio series with the other three yellow versions held in private collections. The edition heading to auction was acquired by the Rachofskys in 2003 for US$2.3 million and was considered a focal point of a Fontana retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2019.
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According to Galperin, there is evident strength in the Fontana market, with the last yellow version selling at auction in 2015 at Christie’s for nearly US$29.2 million, with fees, a then-world record for the artist. In November, Sotheby’s sold another example from the series in white for nearly US$20.6 million, with fees.
The piece will go on preview in Sotheby’s galleries in Milan from April 5-11 and then again in New York from May 2-15.
Other works in the May sale include a collaborative painting by Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat with an estimate of about US$18 million, and a Francis Bacon painting of his tumultuous partner George Dyer potentially fetching between US$30 million andUS$50 million.
