$73M US Rothko work breaks auction record
Published May 17th, 2007
Aggressive art buyers lifted Sotheby’s sale of postwar and contemporary art to new heights on Tuesday, with a Mark Rothko painting smashing the record price for a postwar artwork sold at auction.
Banker and philanthropist David Rockefeller, who attended Tuesday evening’s sale in New York, had put the artwork on the block after purchasing it in 1960 for $10,000 US, on the advice of the then head of the Museum of Modern Art.
The Rothko was the second painting of the evening to break the record for the most expensive contemporary artwork to sell at auction. Earlier in the sale, a 1962 Francis Bacon painting titled Study for Innocent X was snatched up by an anonymous bidder for $52.6 million US.
The U.S. spring auction season wraps up on Wednesday with Christie’s sale of contemporary and postwar art, with lots including one of Andy Warhol’s famed Marilyn Monroe silkscreen paintings.
